Manuel Sumano and his boys of summer are at play in the fields of their lords.

831 -- Tales from the Area CodeFrom Carmel Valley Road to the Carmel River, an access road carves the western border of the agricultural field. Pools from last night''s rain checkerboard the dirt path, mirroring a fog-flecked sky and apparitions of the hills beyond. An army of rubber boots suction the muck with rhythmic slurps. The chorus quiets when half of us drop off to the left toward a dark, opaque strip of kale.

Armed with waders and yellow slickers, workers find solid footing in the mud and sweep cyclical slices through dripping red stems with their machetes, flipping the plants upward with expert grace and tying them with specimens pulled from the bouquet of twisty-ties attached to their hips.

The mood is peaceful. Commuters fly by in the distance, but the laborers feel like they are the only people on earth. Occasionally, a comment will pass from one man to another and someone will laugh quietly. The rapid colloquial Spanish fans out into the vaster landscape of muted sound.

Manuel Sumano moves among his colleagues with a tireless energy, untouched by the lulling momentum of early morning. His brow is slightly more furrowed, his eyes more pensive, his movements a little sharper than the others. He is a craftsman whose product depends on his orchestration of time and materials and, most importantly, a happy and energetic crew.

Sumano thrives in this role, depending on a working dynamic that functions in a steady forward motion. This is what every organization depends on, a leader that produces with the same reliability and consistency of a machine while balancing the idiosyncratic flaws of human beings and the whims of Mother Nature.

Manuel Sumano is a dignified man. He''s known by eveyone as Lito, short for Manolito. He works as a foreman from 6:30am to 4pm day in and day out with 17 men and women under his charge. In the summer months, this number will double to 35 with an influx of seasonal workers. He is responsible for the needs, comforts and performance of these people. He is also responsible for a high yield of quality produce. He has one eye on the fieldworkers, the other on the fields, and his heart in the whole lot of it.

Yet despite the frantic pace and preoccupied air, Sumano maintains a goofy, good-natured disposition. Standing with his legs apart, his arms across his chest and his eyes staring intently at the ground, he will throw his shoulders back and smile widely to display his snag tooth. His distinctive features--round face, protruding ears, knit brows, incisive eyes--shift and shape themselves to express a myriad of moods as mercurial as the California skies in May.

Sumano has worked as a fieldworker in Mexico and California most of his adult life. He grew up in an agricultural town (San Pablo Huixtepec, 20 minutes from Oaxaca City). He comes from farmer''s blood. Farming is a part of his being: the air, the dirt, the sun, the seasonal rhythm of planting and picking.

When Sumano came to California eight years ago, he was hired as a fieldworker at a local organic start-up company. From 1995-1997, he worked construction and then, in 1998, he returned to the same agricultural company and was hired as a foreman. He has seen the company expand by leaps and bounds. The fields managed by Manuel are an amalgam of vegetables and flowers grown under a scattering of fertilizer and natural pest-control techniques. This is no cut-and-dry cash crop.

And Sumano likes it that way. He is a bit of an agricultural nerd. He likes working for an organic farm because there are more factors to juggle and hurdles to jump. He likes the challenge.

As Much Art as Science

Roberto Garcia, who manages all of the company''s Carmel Valley fields, slows his automobile to a halt when he sees Sumano and me conversing in the road. Stopping the car, Garcia motions me over and confides in a hushed tone, "Manuel is responsible for the high quality product. He is very good at what he does." Farming is just as much an art as a science and like any art, it has its masters, people like Sumano.

Standing on the dirt road adjacent to the fields, Sumano and I resume our conversation after Garcia pulls away. "Primarily, I keep people happy," he says. "A large part of what I do is seeing to the needs of the men and women that work here--that they are safe and that they are comfortable."

At 37, Sumano is a surrogate father to many of the younger workers. I have seen him stroll into the company''s farmstand and, with a festive flourish akin to throwing down for the first round, buy workers coffee, juice, T-shirts.

He rallies a sort of team spirit, a pride-of-belonging sentiment. But while Sumano is paternal, he is not paternalistic. "We function like a family," he says of himself and the fieldworkers. "We eat together, we share ideas and voice complaints. Sometimes they know more than I do, and I learn something from them."

Part of being the head of a family is that you represent that family. He has a longstanding rapport with his bosses and feels free to voice the needs and concerns of his hired hands. According to his comrades, Sumano provides the bridge of understanding between the tillers of the crops and the bosses in the buildings. He communicate the realities and visions between the field and office, between Mexicans and Americans. Sumano unwittingly boasts "diplomat" on his resume.

I ask Mark Marino, who heads the chain of command in the company''s Carmel Valley fields, to sum up Sumano''s leadership style. "Ejemplo," he answers. "Manuel leads by example." Sumano carries his pride, his love for his work and his respect for his colleagues on his sleeve. It is an ebullient contagion that few can resist.

When asked about his future, Suma-no shrugs. He vacillates between building a life in Mexico and remaining in the United States. He has worked here for about eight years and has developed inextricable ties to California. He lives in Seaside with two of his brothers, plays soccer on the weekends, and has a built in an extended family at work. He loves what he does and he does it well.

On the other hand, there is that tug for autonomy and realizing his full financial and professional potential. His dream is to have his own farm, growing produce and raising cattle. But there is no immediacy involved in this decision. He leaves much to the hand of fate and fortune and at this point in time, he is needed exactly where he is.