Filix

Filix hates goats.  Donkey carts, not much better.
He lays on the horn. Goats and carts scatter.
Three small boys dash across the road.
The brakes howl.  The overloaded grain truck shudders.
I close my eyes and groan.
Much too close.
"No worry", he says, flashing me a smile.

Filix is set on getting this wheat to Addis by midnight.
That morning he had picked me up alongside the road.  
This, the only connecting road in southeast Ethiopia.

With no seat belt my anchor is the backpack wedged between my legs.
We sail through the potholes.

Animals, people, and carts litter the road.
What doesn't move aside we weave around.
A goat vanishes under the bumper.
It pops out to the right, unscathed.

The road is mud and rocks.
We crest a hill.  I flinch.
A truck, also overloaded, approaches head-on.
Filix veers left.  The oncoming truck slips right.
We pass another truck, this one mired in the ditch with a toppled load of pipe.
No stopping to help.  Too steep.

Filix switches on the tape player.
He doesn't chew quat to stay awake.
Most truck drivers do.
Makes me feel tense, he says.
He owns this truck so much is at stake.

Cows fill the road ahead.
Filix blasts the horn non-stop and pushes through.