Somos en escrito The Latino Literary Online Magazine
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| Pedro Barrera, the author's father, typing up a prescription in the family drugstore, late 1950s |
By Mario Barrera
Texas'Lower Rio Grande Valley
My family's modest frame house was a couple of blocks on the “wrong side” of the tracks, in a mixed working class and middle class neighborhood. On one side of our house was a migrant worker household, on the other a plumber's family. A line of fruit and vegetable packing sheds clustered by the railroad tracks.
The social atmosphere at Mission High School
However, friendship was one thing, dating quite another. That is where the rubber met the road, all four tires. At one point one of my brothers went on a movie date with a Danish exchange student, where they were observed by some of the school's Anglo cheerleaders.
The next day the girl was pulled aside by one of the cheerleaders and told that “we” don't date the Mexican boys here. I'm not sure if a European teenager would have been completely clear on that particular concept of “we.” My mother had attended that same high school during the 1920s. Here is how she described the situation in her day:
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| Mission Theater, where the author viewed the world outside his hometown for 9 cents a ticket, ca 1963. Both the theater and barbershop next door are gone. |
There were some very good looking Mexican boys in the high school who started dating Anglo girls and there was quite an uproar about it. The superintendent of schools told the Anglo girls in front of some Mexican girls that the best of the Mexican boys were worse than the worst of the Anglo boys. The Mexican girls went home crying.
So if that was one of the downsides of South Texas ethnicity, there was also an upside. That was brought home to me vividly one warm Valley evening. I and three of my bowling buddies were out rabbit hunting that night, basically just an excuse to hang out and shoot guns. Certainly none of us was eager to eat those tough Texas jackrabbits. That we all survived these types of excursions over the years without getting shot is something of a minor miracle. That particular evening's misadventures included two of us being thrown from the car's fenders when the driver mistook some tumbleweeds for boulders in the road. It hadn't helped that the two fender riders had covered the car's headlights with their legs in a vain effort to get the driver to slow down.
There weren't a lot of muddy spots in the roads in our dry part of the state, but we managed to find one to get stuck in. Despite our best efforts, we were unable to free the car. It was well past midnight, and cell phones were off in the distant future. So now what? It was unlikely that any other cars would be coming down that forsaken dirt road at that time of night. For lack of a better plan, the car's owner stayed with it and the rest of us set out to look for help. In the distance, a couple of coyotes seemed to mock our plight. Fortunately for them, they were out of gun range.
After perhaps a half hour of walking on a dirt road even smaller than the one we got stuck on, we came across one of the small ranchitos that dotted the area. The house was dark. Since I was the only one who spoke Spanish, I became the spokesman by default.
“Buenas noches,” I called out, or something to that effect. No answer at first. I called out again. Still no answer, and no light came on in the house. But we all heard, crystal clear, the ominous clack-clack of a shotgun shell being chambered. Uh-oh.
To our relief, the next thing we heard was “Quien es?” that is to say, “Who is it?”
“My name is Mario Barrera,” I answered, and went on to explain that we were from Mission and our car was stuck in the mud. Still no lights. I hoped he wasn't looking for more shotgun shells.
“Well, who is your family?” the male voice inquired in Spanish.
I explained that my father was Pedro Barrera and he owned the Barrera drugstore in town, the only one in the Spanish-speaking side of town.
After a short pause: “Do you know Cayetano Barrera?”
“He's my uncle.”
“Oh. Well, he delivered me.”
So that was it. We were in like flan, thanks to my father's older brother who had at one time had a medical practice in Mission and regularly drove out to rural areas of the county in his Model T Ford to bring medical care to isolated families. My tío Cayetano had been the first Mexican American to graduate from a Texas medical school, in 1920. He practiced in Mission until dying of tuberculosis in 1947, years before my little nocturnal hunting misadventure.
At any rate, with ethnic solidarity established, the Mejicano rancher graciously revved up his old pickup truck and pulled our car out of the mud. A clear victory for roots and bilingualism.
We capped off the evening by throwing two defunct jackrabbits up on the corrugated tin roof of The Eagle's Nest, the local high school burger hangout. Why? No particular reason. To the best of my recollection, it was not my idea. At least, I'd like to think it wasn't.
The next day, our family doctor examined me and assured me that the bruised arm I had suffered as a result of being thrown from the car's front fender was “bent, but not broken.”
I suppose I should have suggested to my father that we drive out and thank the Good Samaritan farmer, but even if it had occurred to me, it's unlikely we could have found the place.
Mario Barrera, born and raised in Mission, Texas, attained a doctorate in political science from the University of California, Berkeley; he taught there and at four other UC schools until retiring in 2000. His best known book, Race and Class in the Southwest (Notre Dame, l979), won a national award from the American Political Science Association. His comedy novel, Kitty and Shep, (Dog Ear Press, 2015) is featured in Somos en escrito. This vignette gives us a taste of the book-length memoir he is working on about his hometown. He lives in Ventura, California.