Tales of Crete©

“I’m Fixing a Hole Where the Rain Comes In1”

7
By Jack Schimmelman

One insanely early, blazing, July morn, Jorge stopped by my cave,

shook me, woke me and insisted that I come with him. Of course, I did.
He was one excited Argentine. The furnace had just begun to heat the
dying evening breeze; the light yawning its way towards mountain and
sea. We passed the bad café, the good café (which was just yards
apart), the icy shower, people lying on the sand, the rocks, in all
positions known to exist and some unknown – all dozing entwined with
each other weaving dreams. Songs of the previous night flew lazily out
of my heart as Jorge and I walked across the first beach. Then we
climbed the first rocky outcrop to get to the second beach, but he
didn’t stop there.

“Jorge, are you sure you want to go further?

“Joaquin, follow me, I have something incredible to show you.”

Ok. We scaled the second mountain of rocks and boulders and came
to a plateau overlooking the seldom seen third beach. I was
exhausted. I was slightly exhilarated looking out towards the horizon
where Africa still slept as the golden, fiery circle now fully ruled the
morning Crete sky.

Jorge was beside himself with joy. We had arrived. “Look! Joaquin,
look!”

“Look where?!”

“Down! Down!”

And so I did. I looked down and saw nothing. Or so I thought. All of a

sudden, Jorge fell to his knees, put his head in a small hole that was
between two giant, stone outcroppings and gave out a massive sound
that he envisioned as music.

1
Thank you, Beatles.
Jumping up from all fours, he said, “put your head down there!”

“No. I don’t want to.” The curly headed, chubby boy from the Bronx
had had enough of Jorge’s orders.

“No, seriously, put your head in that hole!”

Ok. And when I did . . .

“Sing!” A command performance I was asked to give and so I did. I

sang into the hole in the rocks to “stop my mind from wandering” as
Paul McCartney had written.

“Do you hear?” By now, Jorge could hardly remain in his skin.

“Hear what?”

“The echo!!! Don’t you hear the echo?!”

So, I sang again. One tone, two tones, until they multiplied, ricochet
from rock to rock to mountain to sky to sea to my bones. Oh my God!
An echo you could die from, as my Yiddish mother might have said in
the Bronx.

“Now do you hear? I’ve been here all night singing into this hole!”

Yes, Jorge, I hear. “You mean to say you got me up at the break of
dawn, endangered my fragile toes on sharp crevices of these
mountainous rocks just to hear this echo?”

“Of course.”

Then, Jorge pulled me up and again dropped to his knees as if in an

Olympic event and started to sing into the hole at the top of his lungs.
If your head wasn’t in the stone fissure, the echo was lost. So, we took
turns singing into the hole, listening to the glorious reverberations. We
did this for perhaps an hour. We were enchanted. How Greek of us.
Although at that time I was ignorant of the Echo myth.

According to Greek mythology, Echo was a beautiful mountain Nymph

who loved to always have the last word. Due to her talkativeness, she
was given the task to distract Zeus wife Hera so that Zeus could freely
enjoy his love affairs with the other Nymphs.

Until one day, Hera discovered Echo’s deceit and she decided to
punish the Nymph; the punishment was to take away all of Echo’s
words and let her be only able to repeat the last words of the others.
(Encarta)

2
Jorge was devoted to sound. He was devoted to nymphs.

We hiked back to our café – the “good” café – and had our usual
breakfast with our friends who had all wandered in from their
respective caves. Carlos, standing on the terrace in his caftan,
majestically greeted us by asking where had we been.

“Why Carlos, don’t you know? We’ve just been sticking our heads in a
hole to hear Crete’s echo,” I said, comforted by my wise tone.

Carlos was duly impressed as he drank his coffee. Margot, Werner,

Anke less so. They had already discovered the echo but had kept the
secret to themselves.