The Rum and Whiskey Part 3

Missed Sunrise over the Rum, Circa 2012 Photo by Mistofer Christopher

The Rum and Whiskey Part 3

Mistofer Christopher

A low-pitched, guttural bellow of a terrified man interrupted my communion.  I sat up immediately, looked around trying to localize the sound and danger, while my blood washed away out of my body into where I don’t know and quaking yellow jello replaced it.

The last bit of reason doubled back to jump into the two-time rhythm of my skipping heart while my two lungs spun string to breathe in. “Wait…a…minute!” interjected the inside voice.  “You’re in the desert, it’s cold.  Wait a minute.  I’m in the desert, it’s cold.  There are scorpions and spiders and poisonous snakes.  Snakes sense heat better than the way you are starting to make sense.   You, I, must look like Times Square on Christmas in the middle of this Wadi rum pum pum pum.   All the snakes are calling their snakes and they are all gliding, sliding, and tiding to 42nd Street.”  I got up, shook my mattress, returned to my tent and zipped up the entrance.

 7:00am, 6 hours later, I had already missed sunrise.  I stumbled outside my tent in a morning stupor, blinking my eyes. The sun had not yet crossed the horizon line but night was now light.  I shook my head, truly disappointed, and just scratched it off my mental bucket list with a Family Feud triple red x.  Sunrise over Wadi Rum. ❌❌❌.  I wanted to see the layers of black peal back from night to obsidian to crow’s head to TV off to Dinka to asphalt to coal to charcoal to licorice to midnight blue to navy to royal to the outer rim of nazar boncuk to azure to sapphire to baby blue to sky with swathes and flashes of tangerine, lychee, macaw…and the grand finale…brown. 

I went to the main tent and saw my Bedouin host fixing breakfast.  I pictured the menu and I sandwiched wry and polite, speaking slowly but not loudly, in English so that my order was clear: “May I have some Bedouin rum this morning?”  He shook his head, his eyes were a quiz and puzzle.

“Coffee bro, Coffee!”  raising my voice with the necessary inflection that one throws out when the subject does not understand the joke, surmising that repeating the joke with a loud voice, and mild frustration, makes the joke more understandable.

 “Oh.” He politely offered a halfhearted laugh…