Lost Village

Deep in the heart of Spain, down a dusty country road, tucked in the narrow space between two small mountains, there is a town. It had a name, once. If I ever knew it, I’ve forgotten what it was. I prefer it that way.

It must have been beautiful, many years ago. I first saw it in late autumn when the golden Mediterranean sun had been drained of some of its color. A frost hung in the air, a thin film hanging over the valley. In the cold stillness of the morning, the stone buildings stood crumbling, but proud. They were like the white-haired ancianos in every plaza in Spain. Their bodies failing, their memories haunted by the Franco years, yet the light of pride shining in their eyes.

This was one of those ancestral villages, the pueblos whose family roots extended deep into the Middle Ages. It must have been an anchor for generations. The buildings were of the old style: two tall wooden doors facing the streets, full-height and towering over the cobbled roads, a little man-sized door cut into one of them. From there ran a wide hallway flanked by little stuccoed rooms, like a galley. Each house with a small wood stove, a damp kitchen, a winding staircase leading to the balconied rooms of a second floor. At the end of the corridor, another tall set of doors, and then the courtyard, open to the brilliant skies; stables nestling deep into the back wall of the courtyard so that horses and carts could be led straight through to their shelter.

The church still stood—or rather, attempted to stand—in the center of the village. Its ornate figures now told two stories: one of the apostles and the other of this place, their crumbling histories combined. I stood in the atrium of the small cathedral. The lace-like wall remained with its etched stone, though the stained glass that filled its openings was long gone. The arches of the hallways remained like bridges to another time. The church was open to the sky now, as though the ceiling of the cathedral had become Heaven itself. Perhaps this, alone, was an improvement. This sacred building must have witnessed the most important moments of a thousand lives, the decades marked by the procession of baptisms and weddings and funerals within its walls. Its bells must have heralded each hour of the passing centuries, the metronome of village life.

On a certain week day, the main plaza must have been crowded with market booths. Fruit and vegetable vendors, garlic peddlers, and transient salesmen with their merchandise hanging from strings and flapping in the warm breeze. The fountain in the center of the plaza must have bubbled and sparkled in the sunlight–once the meeting place of the village women, gathered around its perimeter in the age-old tradition of gossip as they washed the family clothing. The panaderia must have permeated the town with its yeasty fragrance, drawing representatives from each family to come and buy the daily stick of bread. Children must have called to one another across the plaza, the hum of conversation reaching far into the star-lit nights over late suppers of rice and fish. But it was all silent now.

I walked the winding streets, lost in the shadows of the past. The buildings were crumbling, their rubble spilling into the streets. Here and there, a piece of furniture remained as though frozen in time, locked in some long-gone era. A discarded chair. A wooden bed frame in an empty room. A broken table in a hallway. They were the only witnesses, now, to all that was lost.

Perhaps this place had felt like a haven, tucked as it was into the bosom of a quiet mountain. Far from the major cities, off the main roads. Perhaps, for a long time, this place remained unscathed by the forces that had swept through the rest of Spain. But even here, the hand of the dictator Franco could reach. At last, the pueblo had succumbed to the hierarchy of progress: the casualty of a new dam.

I closed my eyes, imagining that moment. The villagers gathering what belongings they could carry out of the valley. The tears as neighbor embraced neighbor and children bid one another farewell. Perhaps the priest stood at the doors to the church, keeping watch over his flock until the last moment. Or perhaps it was under the watchful eyes of the guardia civil, in their stark uniforms and glossy boots, that the villagers finally made their departure. One by one, the families vacated their homes. The streets grew ever quieter. The air grew still. The last villager, with a misty glance over the town, closed the door on this valley refuge.

Then the waters poured in. It must have been a phenomenal sight. I wondered if the villagers gathered to watch, high on the hills safe from the flood. Relentless, the waters rose: covering the benches, filling the doorways, obscuring the balconies. Soon nothing was visible in the valley–save perhaps the very top of the church tower, with its bell locked in place by the force of the water. And thus the town lay for many decades, silent under its watery funeral shroud.

But progress has a habit of reversing itself, so that what is made must be unmade in the name of advancement. In time it happened, long after Franco’s shadow had ceased to fall over Spain, that a new initiative was undertaken to re-route the rivers and dams. The waters receded and the town was revealed once again, crumbling and scarred by progress, yet whole and unwavering. And so it has remained.

The town has no name, though perhaps it could have shared mine. Or yours. Or anyone’s. After all, we are all marked by the waters of change—sometimes desolate, and sometimes crumbling. Yet we stand as the town, as the ancianos, bearing the scars of our age on our unyielding frames. We, too, will rise from the waters. We, too, will endure. We, too, will remain.