My infancy was protected by nature. I am convinced that trees can understand you; you can talk with them as equals. We only speak in different languages, and if one of us is deaf to the others grievances, the deaf one is probably us. We sacrifice our woods for the love of parquet floors and luxurious furniture, destroy our secular grove, cutting the branch out from underneath our feet. Racing for an immediate progress, we destroy eternal progress. I remember what grandpa, a proud peasant with an enormous love of the land, learned in vineyards and orchards, demanded of myself and my brothers, "Each of you boys plant a tree. And we will see who has luck and of what kind." We each waited with impatience for next spring to see if our tree would bud. When the time came and our trees didn't bloom, grandpa said to us, "you didn't take care of it like you should have, you made it angry somehow. You need to clear everything up with him. He will reward you with a beautiful bloom, but only after you treat him as you would like to be treated.
With time I became used to, and so did my brothers, putting our heart and soul in everything we were doing. I give the majority of credit for this to my grandfather.
I remember a spring long past. It was between the two Easter celebrations*. We had yoked our young cow, and our neighbors, and tilled furrow after furrow. All of a sudden I saw my brother coming from the village. Gonea was yelling with his whole heart, "hey mom, come home, the war is over! An uncle has come with a light heart, and he said that its over, no more fighting."
The calves stopped in the furrows. It seemed as if they had also understood that something happened. They uttered a cry and took off over the field. Mama and our neighbor were dumbfounded. They didn't even run after the cows. They simply embraced each other and laughed and cried at the same time. After a while they sat down, reached in their bags and started toasting jugs of tomato juice like glasses of wine. They were saying blessings, "thank God the war is over, maybe ours will come back home soon." That day our grandfather crafted a cross and stood it on the edge of our field. "Remember this day," he said. "Don't tread here, it is a blessed place."