It has been four days since I ran out of peanut butter. Never mind that I have eggs, cheese, and canned salmon. It is peanut butter that I want now. The cargo plane is, at last report, due at ten minutes to six. At twelve minutes to six, I jump into the school truck (not the four-wheeler on account of the rain), and head on over. As I come around the bend I see that no other vehicles have arrived. I wonder if there has been another delay. But no, I hear the plane go over in its final approach and soon I see it taxiing in.

That sound is a cue for the entire community, and four-wheelers and trucks start spilling out of the woodwork, clustering around the parked plane like chickens at a feed trough. Things start flying off the plane. Boxes of groceries, cases of water, school supplies, which people start handing to me. Soon my Fred Meyer box is in my hands, and I place it in the truck, hoping that they didn’t forget anything.

Now three step ladders are coming off the plane, along with some boxes bearing a name that nobody recognizes. People hand things off fire-brigade style, everybody looking into the plane in anticipation of getting their own stuff, until the pilot announces that that’s it. He starts up, threads the plane through the vehicles on the ground, and takes to the sky. Vehicles start trickling away. As I pull out, a man is looking at four large boxes on the ground. I think maybe he doesn’t have room in his vehicle for them, and I stop and offer to carry them. He shrugs, smiles, and says something about “the electricians,” who have not made an appearance.

It is the custom to leave unclaimed boxes where they were unloaded, and for somebody to tell the recipient that they are there. As I am unloading my boxes back at the teacher apartments, a man on a four-wheeler stops and asks me to inform the electricians, who are staying in another teacher house, about the appearance of their boxes. I agree to do so, and continue with my stuff. A few minutes later, the same man stops by again to let me know that the message has already been delivered. We smile and nod at each other, and each head back to examining our own newly delivered treasures.

Time for that peanut butter sandwich I’ve been thinking about for the last four days.