Chapter 10

I did keep my eye on Tina over the next few months. What continued to surprise me was the fact that she seemed to have her eyes on me about as much as mine were on her. This meant the two of us were often left staring at each other. More and more frequently, I would find myself engaging her in conversation. These were never long conversations, but I did get in the habit of stopping whatever I was doing when I noticed her passing by, then making some comment to her that she would usually respond to. I noticed that she had starting toning down the way she dressed. I believed she'd done this in response to comments I'd earlier made about the way she presented herself to people. These little fragments of conversation usually went something like this:

"Heard from Brad or Ashton lately?"

"No, but it doesn't surprise me that much. I doubt they drive to or from Las Vegas very often. Someday though."

Another time, and she was the first to speak.

"Do you think my ass is too big?"

"Too big for what?"

"I'm not sure. This morning I was looking at myself in the big bathroom mirror, and it looked bigger to me for some reason."

"It still looks the same as it always did to me. Maybe you were standing closer to the mirror than you usually do?"

"You'd tell me if it ever got too big though, right?"

"I wouldn't actually tell you myself, but I'd get either Brad or Ashton to send you an email to that effect."

We were keeping things light, but still flirting a little bit too. She kept herself in my sight and in my thoughts all this time, and this is all she seemed to want. I think her plan was to grow on me, by always being close at hand. It seemed to be working, if that was her plan. I don't know about growing on me, but she soon occupied a larger portion of my thoughts than she ever had previously.

During this time I'm talking about, I wasn't spending all my time bantering around with Tina. There was a lot we had to get done on the farm, including applying the soil amendments that we had planned on spreading. Every crop harvested removed important nutrients from the soil, and it was very important to add those nutrients back in, to keep those bountiful harvests coming. The soil analysis we'd had performed for us had identified several important trace elements which were too low for what would be termed ideal conditions. When we spread these leached out nutrients and minerals back into the soil we started right at the base of each tree and worked outward from there. There was always a higher concentration of the soil amendments applied closer in, than what was spread further from the trees, along the outside perimeter of the extended branches.

On a very good day, one worker, by himself could spread the soil conditioning chemicals to a hundred and fifty separate trees. Counting the recently planted forty acres in the quarter section, we had more than sixteen hundred trees planted. Only a bit less than half that number needed these soil enhancements. It took two of us nearly a week before we were satisfied that we'd done everything we'd set out to do in terms of replenishing the soil. Over the next few weeks, the soil itself, aided by the nourishment of constant daily irrigation, would accomplish the rest of what we'd gotten started.

Lupe and I had been working out several logistical problems connected with bringing adequate irrigation water to the quarter section of newly purchased land. We pumped our water directly from one of the veins of the Mojave Aquifer, which itself is one of the largest, if not the largest, natural aquifer in the western United States. Our water allocation was through the Mojave water agency, and the grant itself was a self perpetuating free holding attached to the initial ten acres upon which our lake was built. That water is the lifeblood of our farm, and it behooved us to find and purchase other self perpetuating water rights grants if we wished to maintain adequate resources to irrigate the three hundred twenty acres we would have under cultivation within the next three years.

Our current allocation was sufficient to easily handle the non irrigation related water needs of the farm, plus an additional two hundred fifty acres of tree irrigation, if it was dispersed at our current rate of use. We needed enough additional water to irrigate the remaining seventy acres we planned on planting trees for.

Rob had looked into the problem and had turned his attention towards long term mining claims issued by the United States government. Often, these claims carried the same type of water rights that we enjoyed. Rob was hoping to locate one or more old, abandoned, mining claims, and buy them up for the water rights they had attached to them. Our only other alternative would be to sink artesian wells on the quarter section, and then hope for the best. Drilling wells was an expensive proposition, and there were no guarantees that you would end up getting what you were drilling for, or, if you did, that the water coming from it wouldn't dry up just when you needed it the most.

Rob was the one who discovered that the wording on the original water rights grant contained two words that offered us a potentially amazing permanent solution to our impending water shortfall. These two words were "each such", and they described the water entitlement given to our man made lake. The wording clearly stated that "each such" lake shall be entitled to draw XXXX acre feet of water per annum from the Mojave Aquifer, or from each and any of its underground veins and tributaries. In other words, the number of man made lakes controlled the total acre footage of the grant. We had one lake on our ten acre parcel, and it covered approximately five acres. If we could build another, anywhere on that property, we'd be able to double our allowable annual draw.

Rob did some research and discovered these lakes had to be located on the parcel, but only at the point where the well head and the pump were both located. We ended up having to take out forty three of our thirteenth leaf trees to make room for the excavation of our second lake. We made this lake quite a bit shallower than our first lake was, and then installed a system of pumps that could transfer water back and forth between the two lakes quite easily. We managed to transplant the mature trees we'd uprooted, to the Eastern most edge of the quarter section, without losing a single tree in the process. Next, we ran two twelve inch water mains from the western edge of the new lake, straight across to the middle of the new land. From there, we split the mains off to produce four separate four inch pipes to go halfway into each of the four quadrants of the new land.

Five years ago, the pipes, and the hardware for splitting the water flow like we were doing it would have cost us more than six hundred thousand dollars. We managed to buy up enough lightly used pipe, and new, but liquidated, valves and flow splitting hardware, all for a little more than seventy thousand dollars.

The plan was to not leave much in the way of standing water in the just completed shallow lake. The only time we'd have water flowing in it was when we were pumping water up out of the ground, and into the lake, or when we were irrigating the new quarter section. All the rest of the time, our water would be stored in the original, much deeper, lake.

Counting the excavation and clay bottom packing we had done, we managed to complete the entire project for just under one hundred thousand dollars. Of the total area of just more than two and one half acres the new lake displaced, just over an acre and a half of it was on the original ten acre parcel. All the rest was situated in our original eighty acre orchard.

The good news is that we'd more or less permanently solved our irrigation water needs. The bad news is that unexpected outlay of nearly a hundred thousand dollars had reduced our once abundant cash reserve cushion to the point where we probably would need another great harvest during the next "on/on" harvest, which was still a year and some months away.

I hated the idea that we were pinning all our future hopes on something we had little actual control over. We were gambling, but we were doing so with more than our own futures. We were committing the continued economic viability of our farm to the vagaries of mother nature and pure lucky chance. One harvest killing tree or nut blight, and our future's and the future of all those depending on us, were going to be seriously threatened.

As usual, Rob had totally encouraged me to take advantage of the opportunity to permanently increase our water entitlement. He argued that once that particular loophole was known, to the various government agencies, it would quickly be closed off. Since we already had our second lake, and had met all the strictures of the original grant, we'd be 'grandfathered' in, and allowed to keep whatever we'd gone ahead and invested money in when all we needed to was go ahead and meet all the old requirements.

Rob also told me we now had enough water under our control to largely determine the future development in this portion of the water district. They certainly wouldn't be granting any new water rights in our geographical area, not for the foreseeable future. This gave us leverage when dealing with anyone interested in putting in any new development anywhere close by. They'd be forced to come to us for their water.

Once everything was purchased and built out, I had a private meeting with both Lupe and Raul, laying out where we now stood as far as the farm's reserves were concerned. I told them candidly, that with this new lake creating adventure, and all the laying in of new irrigation pipe for the new land, we had made ourselves vulnerable, in the event the next anticipated "Big" harvest went awry.

Both men understood the numbers I showed to them, but I doubted they believed that what I reported in the way of cash reserves could ever be depleted. To each of them, ten thousand dollars was a veritable fortune. The very idea of us being capable of exhausting twenty times ten thousand just didn't compute in their minds. Whatever they believed, I felt very vulnerable, with having that small of an amount in reserve.

I took small comfort in remembering that I'd had quite a bit less in reserves when I'd come and taken over the farm, right after my mom had passed away. Of course, back then, my unfixed overhead was only a tenth of what it now was. Besides Rob and me, there were twenty seven other residents living on the farm. They all had to be housed and fed, and that just added to the pressure and worry I was already starting to feel.

We were at the dinner table, having a meeting. It was around nine o'clock at night, and we were starting to get on each other's nerves, going over the same ground again and again. I'd been arguing with Rob about the need to cut back on any farm spending that wasn't absolutely necessary. His response was to tell me that I worried too much, that nothing bad was going to happen just because our cash reserves had been cut by a third. Lupe and Raul were just sitting there, for the most part, letting the two of us argue back and forth.

"Kyle, I understand that you're uncomfortable about all the money we had to spend to secure those additional water rights, but what's done is done. You aren't taking into account all the problems we solved for ourselves by acting when we did. There are risks in any business. You can't just sit around and do nothing when a problem arises. We had a big problem, and we went out, spent the money it took, and ended up fixing it."

"I do understand that, Rob, but you need to see my side of it too. Now that we know our cash reserves are low, it just makes good sense to conserve wherever we can."

"Enough, Jefe! Please."

Both Rob and I were startled when Lupe spoke up so unexpectedly. The two of them had been sitting there so quietly, we'd more or less forgotten they were even present.

"You think I'm wrong, Lupe?"

"Right, wrong, no matter. Stupid be afraid bad things no do anything about. Trees not having problems now. Better we keep like that. Money spend for powder, keep bugs off trees, good spend."

That was when I remembered what had started the argument between Rob and me in the first place. I had told Lupe we should hold off on buying chemicals to spray the trees with, until after we started seeing any signs of a particular beetle that had been found infesting pistachio orchards further North. The beetle would be a minor nuisance, but any infestation of them could be quickly fixed by spraying the trees after the first signs of the beetles were already present.

"You should have spoken up an hour ago, especially if you already knew you were so strongly in favor of us spraying."

"Jefe worry too much. Rob right. Lupe go home, sleep." He got up when he said that, as did Raul, and the two men left.

"You need to go out and get laid, Kyle. You're beginning to get on everyone's nerves with your constant worrying and hand wringing. Loosen up! Not everything is a life or death decision. All this worrying has everyone else on edge too. Relax a little. Nothing we can do. If the worst happens, it won't matter too much if we have an extra hundred thousand or not. No matter what happens, having those extra water rights will prove to be a very good thing for the rest of our lives."

I stood up myself and told Rob I was going to bed. I'd had enough of his telling me I was worried for no reason. That extra hundred thousand we'd spent on getting the water would have carried us all they way to the next "on/on" harvest cycle if this one that would be coming next year were to somehow fail. Now, if the next good harvest was a bust, we wouldn't have the needed reserves to see us through for the two years it would take.

The next morning I came out of the house at about six ten, and there was Tina waiting for me.

"I see you're up early again. What's the occasion?" I said to her.

"Last night I woke up when my uncle was explaining to my aunt about why your meeting took so long to get over with. He's worried about you, and so is my Uncle Raul."

"I'm fine. Instead of worrying about me, they should worry about what might happen if the harvest after this one turns out not being good." Tina laughed. "That wasn't supposed to be funny, Tina."

"I'm sorry, I was just thinking about something Lupe said to Maria about you."

I'd been walking around, checking on the water level in the bigger, deeper, lake, and walked over to where the pumps and transfer pipes crisscrossed between the two lakes. Everything looked in order to my untrained eyes. I wasn't sure what I was actually looking for, but I thought I'd recognize anything that was too different from what it was supposed to be. After I'd failed to see anything out of the ordinary, I turned and headed out towards the sorting shed and the machine shop when Tina grabbed hold of my hand and prevented me from further forward movement.

"What are you doing?" I pulled my hand back away from her.

"You aren't going to find anything wrong over there. You never do. It isn't healthy for you to be worried about every single thing. Uncle Lupe thinks you need a woman, so you don't spend all your time worrying about bad things happening."