I. Talk Like an American
Names on the city limit signs during our drive tell stories of the past five hundred years of European settlement in the area known today as Texas. The town names of Seguin, Gonzalez and Navasota hint of long-forgotten tales of heroism during the Spanish and Mexican eras. Shiner, Shulenberg and Old Ulm remind us of the German immigrants who bravely--or foolishly, depending on your perspective--came to settle the land in the 1800’s. The Cattlemen’s Café, the Lone Star Five and Dime and the Hempstead Stockyards recount of the last one hundred years, full of the English-language heritage of the state.
Some here say, “Speak American, this is America.” Sadly, those folks seem to forget that the Native Americans did not speak English. It often makes me laugh inside to think, too, that we derive the name "America" from the Italian first name “Amerigo”, as in Vespucci. The true first true European language of the land was not the native tongue of Great Britain, but rather, that of Spain. Later through the years, many areas were populated by Czechs, Germans, and Poles. In some of those communities, until recently English was a distant second in usage, if at all.
As a side note, I had a friend in high school whose mother was born and raised in Texas, yet spoke English with a German accent. Until World Wars I and II, some of the school districts in smaller towns and communities in Texas did not even use English as the primary language for education. With the war effort to unite them, the state and local authorities imposed an English-only effort during the big war. Afterwards, in the great homogenization of the past fifty years, somehow this story has been lost.
When my mother was an elementary school teacher here, she and her colleagues were instructed to insist that parents only speak English to their wee ones at home. To bilingual held a stigma, which is why so many of my Latino friends around my age speak less espanol than I. Unlike in South Florida, where to be Latino is virtually synonymous with being bilingual (Span/Eng), here in South Texas, you can make no assumptions about language usage by ethnicity. Some people you would expect to speak Spanish do not, yet with the large immigration of the past twenty years, others that you think will speak English do not, either.
II. About the Close Relative
I’m sitting at a picnic table underneath a gnarled pecan tree in near Navasota, Texas. This morning at 6 am, my parents and I began our journey to visit a close relative who has been incarcerated for almost seven years now. We are here for a Christmas visit. My parents will spend two hours inside the medium-security building, seated at another picnic table outside with our loved one.
We have been given special dispensation today, since I have come farther than 300 miles, so that after two hours my mother and I will exchange places. My guess is that after two hours, my father will have tired, so my visit will likely last no more than 30 minutes.
The abbreviated length of my portion of the day is fine with me. I am closer now with the relative than I had been before he was in prison. It’s odd how that could be so, but true. He and I had little in common then, but both need each other more now: he needs letters from the outside to prevent him from going crazy, while I need to prove that I'm maybe not such a bad guy, despite the fact that I eschew fishing and hunting.
III. Of France and Texas
The drive to this small town was quite pleasant. Sometimes I forget how rich the area of South Texas can be in terms of agriculture and animal husbandry. There was a light fog this morning as we left San Antonio. As the first glimpses of dawn struck the road, I was impressed by the natural and rugged beauty lying before me. A hard freeze has yet to hit the area, so the grass is still largely green, although much of the other vegetation has turned brown or gray. It can be a harsh country, its brush and shrub-like trees offering little the way of majestic views. Yet, there is still something at every turn of the highway to delight the eyes.
Some may laugh, but when I was in Languedoc, a province in the south of France next to Provence, last summer while volunteering at La Sabranenque, I often thought that there was an air of the place that reminded me of home in the Hill Country and southern coastal plains of Texas. There is no way that I can claim that the two areas are just alike, although I am often reminded of the similarities between the two. Texas and France are about the same size in land area. And, believe it or not, there are wineries in the Lone Star State, although some in France, Italy and California might laugh heartily at the nascent industry.
One of the reasons for my fascination with Franco-Mediterranean culture has to do with the fact that my grandfather’s family was French. Another, much sillier reason, pertains to diplomatic relations between the royal court and the new country of Texas. After the Mexican government permitted new immigrants to settle the area of East Texas, soon the ugly issue of slavery raised its head. Many textbooks may say that the struggle was for liberty, but one of my favorite college professors told us the truth: the new peoples often came from the Old South and wanted slaves to work the fields. The Mexicans banished slavery.
And so, the Texas War of Independence from Mexico was fought. It is heresy for some, but I cannot believe that the righteous won, not when a free land turned against human rights.
After the Lone Star victory, France rushed in to open diplomatic ties. Given the European power’s previous ownership of Mexico, perhaps it hoped to gain back in Texas some of what it had lost when the Mexicans beheaded the Emperor Maximilian France had imposed upon the nation south of the Rio Grande.
For whatever the reason, after Texas joined the United States, Paris maintained the French legation in East Austin. As a high school and college student with a car, often I would visit the museum there in order to pass time. Most Americans may have forgotten Lafayette’s aid to the original colonies, but everyone has forgotten France’s support of the independent country of Texas, save one sentimental fool who happened to spend two months in the birthplace of Liberte, egalite et fraternite last summer. (While standing by the Seine, I offered honor and homage to the French legation in Texas by throwing a rock into the river. Yes, it’s corny, but then, I never claimed to be otherwise.) IV. On How to Crack a Pecan
As the wind whips around me, a few remaining pecan pods fall from the tree which offers me, well, if not shade, at least company. One of them nearly boinks me on the head. Picking it up, I remember the secret to shelling pecans in the wild. It is not an easy process and requires great skill and mental fortitude. Although I somewhat hesitate to share sacred local customs with strangers who may be reading this blog entry, perhaps one day some unfortunate reader will be stranded in the countryside and will remember this brief lesson, thus saving her/himself from death by starvation.
You begin by finding two pecans, then place them in the palm of one hand. Pressing firmly, you squeeze the two nuts together until one of them cracks. Repeat until the meaty inside is visible. Then, eat.
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