My conversations with 1808

It has now been two years since my friendship with 1808 started. It all began on an early afternoon when I was overcome with drowsiness and had to take a short ‘siesta’, leaning my head on the garden’s table. Not even a few minutes had passed when a piercing cry made me open my eyes –first one eye, then the other– with difficulty. In front of me there was a little black, big-headed animal with antennas that was trapped between the table and my hat’s brim.

“Help! Help! Please, Giant, help me! Please, Giant! Save me!”

I raised my head. With great surprise, I blinked my eyes as if I could not believe what was happening. The animal kept screaming and shouting. There was no doubt, it was not a dream: I was wide awake. The ant could speak! The ant was talking to me!

I lifted the hat carefully, so as not to hurt the ant. Without a hint of fear, it said:

“Thank you, Giant”. And it continued its way along the table.

“Ant, stop!” I said. “You wake me up, you talk to me and now you try to go away as if nothing had happened.  Can you actually speak?”

“Of course I can, Giant. Do you think we, ants, are silly? We speak from the moment we are born and we can speak more than one language, not like you. We speak all human languages and also ‘Antish’, our mother antenna, pardon, our mother tongue.”

“I can’t believe that. I had never heard about that.”

“Well, giant,” answered the ant. “Just because you can’t hear something it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. We can speak, but we are not allowed to communicate with you; it’s a safety measure. You are so simple and egocentric that you can’t stand it!”

“Holy shit!”

“Hey, hey… We can use any register you like but I would prefer using fewer vulgarities.”

“I’m sorry, Ant.”

“Please, don’t call me just Ant. You can call me 1808, that’s how my friends call me. I already know your name is Javi. They’re always calling you Javi: Javi here… Javi there…, and I’m always carrying heavy things, working like a beaver, trying to avoid being stepped on by your huge shoes. I must leave now. I am late and if my boss finds out I’ve been speaking with you, she will send me to the central warehouses.”

“Hey, wait a moment!” I shouted. “Please, tell me, will we ever see each other again?”

“Yes,” my new friend answered laconically.

“And will we ever speak again?”

“Well… All right.  If I walk around here and I see you, I will call you.”

And that is how my relationship with 1808 started. Yes, that is how my conversations with 1808 started.

To be continued.

Traductora: Virginia Ruiz Moreno