PEACE ON THE ROAD
It Is Spring In Texas
March 24, 2012
The first thing that I should do in writing this is to bring you up to date on the condition of my health because the last I wrote I was still in pretty poor condition. The last thing I wrote was that I was unable to get from a kneeling position to a standing position without help. I am thankful that I can now get up without help. I would not mind having something, maybe a bucket, to place a hand upon to assist my legs. I did not drive any vehicle from September to February, but now I have been driving seven weeks and feel confident that I am safe back on the road. People who are not close to me think that I have recovered totally. I am not claiming more than 85-90% recovery so far. I still have a ways to go but at least I feel that I can do about everything I need to do. I was able to resume being the editor of the park newspaper back in November. That was a job that I could do sitting down at the computer and my brain was recovered enough to handle the job. Around Christmas time I started to teach in the Computer Club on a limited basis. A few times I had to cut off a session or pass the session to someone else because I would lose my voice and could not talk. By this time I can be almost as mouthy as I ever could. The other day I drove an hour and half to South Padre, took a “Pirate” cruise, and drove an hour and half back home and still felt like I was fresh. That made me feel good mentally of course. I know that I have some more recovery to still do. I am certainly glad that I have recovered as well as I have. To be honest I do not believe that I will ever fully understand how fortunate I have been this year.
In a lot of respects I live a lifestyle that is not common to the average person. Just the fact that I live in a motorhome fulltime and do not have a home anywhere that has a foundation touching the ground puts me in a small percentage of the population. Couple that with wintering in an area that has people from both the countries that border the USA and I drop to an even a smaller percentage of the population. Here in Rio Grande Valley just 3 miles from the border of Mexico border there are a lot of Mexican residents and workers. In fact it is reported that 80% of the population is Hispanic. When the Winter Texans return to the valley that figure must drop somewhat because there are nearly a quarter million that come to the valley when it is the coldest in the north. It has also been stated that 80% of the population is bilingual, and I think that must drop in the middle of winter with the Winter Texans back.
There are also a lot of Canadians that come down from north of the border, with quite a few being from the Provence of Quebec where they speak French. So here we sit with people speaking Spanish and French. Everywhere we go to eat or shop a lot of people are speaking a language that I do not.
I have always been partial to little girls. I suppose that is due at least in part to the fact that my only child is female. I am sure I would have been happy with a son but I have never felt any loss in not having a one. With the large Hispanic population down here there are many small children anywhere we go and they are so pretty. I tend to like the little girls more than the boys after a certain age, but either of them have such beautiful brown eyes and black hair. Also the parents tend to dress up the girls in cuter outfits with bows and frills than the boys. I have heard from several people that the kids are disciplined at home more that the children of the whites. That may well be right because they seem to be better behaved than the average child. It also seems to me that there are family values in the Mexican families that may have been lost in many homes. While I cannot prove it and I don't like generalities, in general I think that the care of the elderly by the Hispanic people is better than average.
I have seen a lot of different attitudes toward both the Quebec, Canadians and the Mexicans down here. A lot of people have an attitude that I would have to say is incorrect. Most of my life I have heard that the people in New York City were rude and unfriendly and never helpful. When I was there I found the opposite. People were polite, friendly and very helpful. I have come to the conclusion that a lot of times a person sees in people a combination of what they expect and what they act like themselves. I have heard people say the French from Quebec are unfriendly and do not associate with Americans. I have found exactly the opposite to be true. They are very warm and eager to be friends. If I were in Quebec or Mexico City and could only speak a small amount of the local language I would guess that I would tend to spend my time with American speaking people and might well be considered stand offish. In a lot of ways it is unfortunate that my willingness to learn another language is not great. If I wanted to, I could submerge myself in Spanish or spend a lot of time with French speaking people. But I only want to learn a few words of either language, just enough to be polite I guess.
My daughter teaches in a section of a college that is set up for the people that live in the deaf culture. So of course she has learned American Sign Language. From what I have been told by others she is quite good at it. This is another culture whose language I could learn. While I would have less contact with that language than I do with French or Spanish I could learn it. I know quite a few of the deaf at least by facial recognition. If it were not for their willingness and ability to share with me in my own language I would have less friends, and I do consider some of them to be friends. With just a little effort I might consider them the same way some people I have met consider the people of New York City, or Quebec or Mexico. But I have learned that to my thinking that way is simply wrong.
I have heard many bad things about “Mexicans” in general. But I am willing to bet that any group that could be conceived has had the same things said about them by some other group. When I say group I mean someone like the Irish, the Jews, the Germans, the teenagers, the Texans, the hill people, the valley people, the Christians, the lumberjacks, and the list could go on for pages. In every group there are some that will be undesirable and live up to the bad reputation. But I for one believe that for the most part people just want to live a good life by their standards and raise their children in a healthy situation. Because a person does not agree with my beliefs does not make them wrong, it just makes them different.
Things are different down here in the Valley where there is a culture difference from what I grew up with. There are several “Colonias” in the area of Mission/McAllen. It is reported that there are well over 2,200 of them near the Texas/Mexico border with a population of nearly a half million people. The Colonias are usually laid out on land that is not suitable for for farming or ranching. The people that live in the Colonias are some of the poorest people in the country. According to many they are also some of the hardest working people if they have an opportunity. Bentsen Grove resort does what it can to help one of the local Colonias. When people replace furniture or household dishes or bedding or just about anything that is found in a home and have no need of the old items they are often given to some of the residents here who in turn take it to the Sisters at the Colonia who then give the items to the needy. I understand one or two truck loads are taken there every week. The residents build homes as they can afford material which includes things like a door or a used window or wall which is torn down one place and brought home to build another room. Often the only water available is from a garden hose connected to a neighbor or an extension cord from a neighbor who has electricity. Well over 1,500 coats are collected by BGR (Bentsen Grove Resort) and given to a group that is represented by the weather reporter of a local TV station. BGR auxiliary sponsors ten families every Christmas so that the children can have some new clothes and toys and a quilt that they have made. As people are leaving the valley for the summer they are asked to donate any food that they would normally throw away to the Colonias. It is a bit strange to think that these people would welcome a half box of cereal or half a jar of ketchup. But that is the situation they live in. I truly cannot imagine the desperate situation that these people live in. Compared to them most people I know are rich.
There are a lot of Ropa Usada (used clothes) stores down here unlike any thing that I have ever seen anywhere else. Some are clean, organized, and equal to any upscale used clothes store I might see in Kansas or Colorado or New York. But there are many that are quite different. Forklifts will bring in bundles that weigh a ton or more and are bound with steel bands. The bands are cut and the clothes are dumped on a warehouse floor where people searching for clothes sort through large mounds of new or used articles. Some BGR residents have found New Tuxedos with a price tag on them. Others have found some of the weirdest clothes you could imagine which they bought to wear for Halloween or some of the stage performances here at the park that almost require a weird attire. We went to one the other day and bought nine coats for $5.25, or thirty cents a pound for the coat drive. If we had wanted to spend more time there were a lot more available. The women that were looking for clothes were into the piles like chickens after a fat bug every time the forklift brought a new batch of clothes to the area.
PEOPLE LOOKING FOR CLOTHES AT A ROPA USADA WAREHOUSE
I have not been doing a lot of activities more than have been necessary. A year ago while we were at a park meeting Erma won a free ticket to the South Padre “Pirate” cruise. We immediately bought a ticket for me, but due to circumstances we could not go for about a year. The cruise was a lot of fun. There were several “crew members” that put on quite a show for all the passengers and it was especially a show for the kids, which there were several. There were sword fights between the crew and they passed out water pistols to everybody and there was a lot of water squirted at everybody. If a person did not get squirted by other passengers the crew squirted them. They also had a treasure hunt for the kids. Pieces of eight were scattered around the deck and the children picked up the “booty” and put them in a bucket. Whoever picked up the most “pieces of eight” would get a prize. When the pieces were counted the crew decided that everyone had done such a good job of collecting the booty that all should get a prize. The crew was great! Most of their talk was right out of a buccaneer movie, and they tried to get everybody to talk the same way. Just about everybody was painted up with a mustache and some of the ladies had a small bird or fish or something else painted on them. After all don't all pirates have a tattoo? Out of the same port they have dolphin watch cruises. We saw several pods of dolphin. We were told that two hundred or more dolphin spend the whole year in the area we were cruising. We got some pictures but maybe on some later outing I can get good pictures.
THE BLACK DRAGON PIRATE SHIP TIED TO THE DOCK AT PORT ISABEL
It is definitely getting to be late spring here in South Texas. The trees are all leafed out again, flowers are blooming everywhere and the temperatures are up in the 80's and 90's. But one of the big signs is all the Winter Texans are leaving in hordes. The park is getting to actually look vacant. Many of the activities are shutting down and the chair people are heading north. In just a few weeks there will be none left except those that live here all year. There are about a hundred full time residents.
We have not decided when we will slowly move out of Texas but I have been telling neighbors that we will be here till some time between the end of April and some time in May. We will need to go back to Forest City, Iowa to the Winnebago factory with the hope that they can fix the leak problems that were supposed to be fixed last fall. I am not anxious to return to where I got bit by the mosquito. It is hard for a lot of people to understand that we do not make a lot of plans as to where we will go. We want to travel as the wind of our minds dictate. There have been several times that we left for vacation with no destination selected. That will be our plan this summer also. I will let you know later where we are.
Till later this is Doug of
Peace On The Road
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