Already already thinking.

backroad, dirt track

This could be the earliest ever hammock hanging.

Round here; I think the Mexicans will have already hung theirs.

Talking of Mexicans and hammocks, isn’t there a personal connection?

I went to Mexico a long time ago.

And did you buy a hammock?

I intended to.

But didn’t?

No.

Why not?

It’s a long story.

I’m not in a hurry, I’m going to stay in this hammock for at least three hours, though if I snooze don’t take it personally, I had an early start this morning.

You’ll need a good weave.

Please explain.

Well, I can’t remember all the details now but the perfect hammock is all about the weave, I read it in the People’s Guide to Mexico.

An excellent read I believe. (editorial note t)

Indispensable.

But probably out of publication as it was a hippy thing, no?

That may well have been the case but it new its stuff when it came to hammocks and THE place where the best are made.

And where is that?

Like I said I can’t remember all the details.

Can you remember any?

It’s in Mexico. In the south, I was up in the north.

Ah.

But I was heading there, and I had done my reading up and I was in the north but I was a veritable fountain of knowledge (and a bit of youth) on all things hammock-y. Especially the weave, the double weave in fact.

Tell on.

Well, I found myself alone in this village market and I started wandering amongst the chickens and the tortillas and I per-chanced on a hammock merchant.

What did you do?

Well, as I had already made up my mind to buy my-one-trip-to-Mexico-in-a-lifetime hammock in THE place down south where the best are made, I saw this as a good opportunity to get some tactile and visual practice to supplement my literary understanding.

And?

I found this hammock hidden, amongst the tat, that was the mother of all hammocks. It answered every one of the twenty or so criteria for the perfect hammock that I had learnt by heart.

But can’t remember now.

I have a hammock.

Is it the one?

No.

Why not?

Already, already thinking.

What’s that?

Well, in my mind I had decided that I was going to buy this hammock in the village where they were made from the half-crazy witches who made them from a secret formula.

And you were in a chicken and tortilla market in Northern Mexico, what did you do?

I asked the price.

In Spanish?

Claro.

Y?

The vendor named a price, I made a mental note so I would have a future financial point of reference whilst haggling with the half-crazy southern witches, thanked him and walked away.

No problem, so why the long face.

He called after me, dropped the price by half and I turned and said no thanks, I’m not interested.

Yeah, good; you wanted to buy this down South.

Then he knocked another hundred pesos off.

Nice.

I smiled, shook my head and said, no, thanks a lot.

And?

Another hundred came off.

Good haggling.

I wasn’t haggling.

He was.

I know, and the hammock was The mother of all the mothers and the price he was now offering it out was a gift. It was hammock-vans.

Nirvana?

Si.

Y?

I left, travelled south, went west, went east, continued further south. I was in Mexico for three months before crossing into Guatemala and I never saw another hammock that came even a couple of trees close to the wonder of that one.

Bummer.

I even went back for a second-once-in-a-lifetime-visit-to-Mexico trip, and nada.

Already, already thinking.