Chapter 92: Try
"Are you alright, Heneral?" one of my escorts hurriedly rushed to my side.
It was embarrassing. I had only been hard at work for less than an hour, and already I was out of breath. I had collapsed into the mud, sitting heavily with my back hunched and my eyes squinting up against the sweltering sun. The sky was a perfect blue, and the heat bore down like a punishment. This was one of those times I wished the weather wasn’t so good. A light overcast would have been perfect—just enough cloud cover to dull the sun’s wrath.
"I am alright," I brushed off the soldier’s helping arms as I stood up with some difficulty by myself. My knees were shaking.
I thought of rejoining the line of workers digging the ditch, but I wasn’t feeling too well. I felt a bit dizzy and had no more strength in my arms and legs. In the end, I accepted the soldier’s offer to assist me back to the road.
It was all clearly a mistake. My uniform was all mud now and I had not even brought more than two sets of clothing. I was confident I could do a little help without getting too much dirt.
Now, not only was I filthy, I was also disrupting the work. Several of the soldiers had paused to glance in my direction, curious or perhaps concerned. Capitan Sadiwa, standing legs-deep in muck, noticed as well. He began wading toward me.
"I am alright, Capitan! Carry on!" I hollered to him and gave him a thumbs-up. He clearly did not understand what a thumbs-up meant, but at least he heard what I said. He paused, and then after giving me another look-over, he smiled and turned to where he was overseeing his men, trying to unclog an irrigation canal.
I could only shake my head at the bother I was causing. It was like that one time in my previous life when I tried to help a young woman with her groceries in the parking lot, at 70 years old, oblivious that she was then stronger than me. She was polite about it, but she probably did not like me dropping and consequently tearing one of her grocery bags.
Don delos Santos was chuckling as he helped lift me up out of the fields to the elevated road.