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the border

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joey boy meets the west

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an excerpt from a tall border story

published by the author around 1973

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(one of the chapters)

Flies

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     Ramon, thee notorious town drunk, sat upon the sidewalk with his back propped up against a wire fence, and an empty Tequila bottle in his hand.  Flies, of course, were buzzing, have always buzzed, will always buzz ~ no matter what we do.  Ramon swatted uselessly at them as they buzzed around his unkept mud caked head, until he had no strength left and could swat no more.

     It was in the autumn of ’73, in a small town called Tecate, in Mexico, near a border patrol station, about 30 miles from San Diego.  The time was 8 o’clock in the morning, or about that time, let’s say Saturday ~ and it was this Saturday morning that Tulip was getting married.

     Ramon moaned.  A Mexican curse dangled from his lower lip and fell on his shirt.  And he blinked with disbelief as a faded purple ex-milk truck with a Howitzer M1857 (Napoleon) cannon chained to its rear bumper, swiftly rolled with a growl and a clank clank, by his red veiny nose.

     Throughout his career as thee notorious town drunk of Tecate, Ramon had sat and watched many things cross the border ~ parades, armies, the most weird of vehicles, the weirdest being in 1956 when a giant, brightly painted, hot-dog weiner on wheels crossed the border, with a handsome man’s head sticking out the top, on the man’s head a big white cook’s hat.  The man had smiled and waved to Ramon.  In ’56 this made Ramon feel good and alive, even important ~ to have a character such as this wave to him!  He’d tried to wave back, but he was too drunk to lift his hand ~ and had simply blinked.

     Now, in ’73, a faded purple, so faded almost grey (with chipped paint), ex-milk truck (and without doors on the entrances to either side of the cab), pulling an old cannon behind it, rolled by.  The driver, with long dark hair in a tangle under a gray dirty cap on his head and wearing black jeans and a gray long sleeved and soiled work shirt with half its tail out, noticed Ramon, smiled and waved to him.  This was as good as being waved to by the weiner cook back in ’56 ~ but like then, Ramon was once again too drunk to wave back.  And only blinked.

     Yet there was a difference this time.  A few years after the weiner cook had passed, Ramon had wandered into a few Budhist meetings.  After the purple truck with a cannon vision passed, and Ramon blinked, he muttered into his tequila bleached whiskers (in this year of ’73) the universal song of ‘de universe according to the Budhist faith, which is, “Nam Myoho Renge Kyo.”

     He had just enough strength to do this ~ which gave him more strength to repeat the chant again and again ’til he was standing up and screaming it.

     Meanwhile ~

     At the Mexican border patrol station a few yards away, two guards examined the cannon curiously, and the bill of sales Road showed them.  They waved him to pass ~ and he did ~ after paying them a little money.

     However, at the United States border patrol station, a few more yards away, it was not so easy.  “Are you a United States citizen?” asked the husky easy going United States border patrol man.

     “Yes,” said Road.

     “Bringing back any fruit, vegetables, or liquor?”

     “No.”

     “What do you carry in the back of this truck?”

     “My study.”

     “Your what?” asked the border guard.

     “Books,” said Road.

     “Books?”

     “Books.”

     “What kind of books?”

     “Ohhhh ~ the kind you read.”

     “Can I see?”

     “Sure,” said Road.  He stood up, turned around, unlocked and slid open the doors into the rear…

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~

     The guard peered in, saw the books, nodded his respectful bafflement, then peered out ~ at the cannon.

     “Where did you get the cannon?” he asked.

     Road handed him the bill of sales.

     The husky guard frowned over the note for a moment.  “What are you going to do with it?”

     “Give it to a museum,” said Road.

     “Does it, uh, work?” asked the guard.

     “I hope not,” Road chuckled.

     The guard kept the bill of sales and said gruffly.  “Park over to the side there.  We have to check out your truck and, uh, cannon.”

     Road frowned, put the truck in gear, did as he was ordered.

     This husky guard and a woman guard went thru all of Road’s beat up books, soiled bedding, thready clothes, and sparse kitchen ware ~ but without finding the dope that wasn’t there, or the cannon balls, gun powder, Colt 45, or stolen money that was there.

     “This is a very interesting truck,” said the woman guard as she browsed thru the silly stories that Road had written that he kept in some folders.

     “That’s because I’m a very interesting guy,” said Road.

     She nodded some sort of acknowledgment with a little smile.  Her hair was hidden in a tight bun under her cop cap.  She was older than Road.

     The husky guard examined the cannon from barrel to grease bucket.  Road yawned, pulled a cigar out of the glove compartment, bit off the end and spit it out, lit the cigar, and puffed.  The entire examination of the truck and cannon lasted what seemed like an hour ~ maybe an hour and a half.

     The husky guard, flustered, clomped into the station, came back out a few minutes later accompanied by the gray haired chief.

     The husky guard, the woman guard, and the gray haired chief all stood on the outside pavement beside Road, who sat in the driver’s seat of the truck.  He puffed on his cigar.  It was a good cigar ~ bought the night before in Tijuana.  Dry ~ and a taste all its own.

     The three guards talked amongst themselves, then turned and silently looked at Road.

     Road was yawning, watching the trickle of traffic slowly roll by.  He blew a cloud of smoke at a fly on the windshield.  He was very tired and hungover after the celebration in Tijuana the night before.  Plus he’d been driving the rest of the night into Mexico, and all the dawning morning out of it.  “Shit,” he sighed heavily, turned his head and saw the 3 guards standing next to him, studying him silently.  “Oops!  Excuse me.  I didn’t realize…” said Road.

     The woman guard seemed very friendly with her little smile.

     The other guard, cigarette in mouth, and the chief, cigarette in mouth also, glared back at Road as if he was a mortal sin.

     A long heavy moment passed.

     Flies buzzed.

     The woman guard lit up a cigarette too.

     “I don’t know what to tell you,” said Road, throwing his hands up in the air.  The cigar butt wiggled dry and suddenly tasteless in the corner of his mouth.

     The old chief jammed the cannon’s bill of sale into Road’s hand, and growled, “How about, ‘good bye’?”

     Road glanced for a moment at the lady in uniform, wanted to smile but didn’t.  “Good bye,”  he said into the chief’s steady eye, and drove away, anxiously thinking about Tulip’s wedding.

(Copyright Clyde Collins 1974, 2010)

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hounded

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https://www.borderreport.com

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old timer chronicle editor

rawclyde

!

dominus vobiscum

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~ excerpt ~

     Located at various positions around Road’s cannon were 5 wetbacks from Meh-hee-ko.

     This was Poncho and his pals.

     Poncho was the sharp hombre who’d slow danced so close with Mary the night before.  He had also slept that one cold night in the back room of the gas station in the hills.  With him that night had been Memo, who was taller, and lean and strong.

     Memo, at the moment, stepped back from the cannon’s snout, with the ramming stick at rest in his hands.

     A 13 year old boy, Cid, stood at the rear of the cannon, waiting patiently like the man he consistently strained to be, had to be, if he was to survive the hard life cut out for him on the Ramona valley egg ranch above the border where he worked long hours.  Once he had the money Road was going to pay him, he no longer would have to work these long hours ~ not for a few years anyway.  He lived below the border.

     At the moment he had an unlit stick match in his hand that shook slightly and was poised next to the cannon’s fuse.  Thus the need for patience.

     This 13 year old wetback was also lean ~ due to hard work and the absence of luxuries like over eating.

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     Juan, 23 years old, the oldest of Poncho’s pals, stood on the other side of the cannon from Memo.  The cannon was, of course, aimed bold and awesome at the church’s front door.

     Juan also worked at the egg ranch ~ and lived in Mexico.  He drove himself and little Cid to Ramona and back 6 days a week, in an old ’38 Dodge pick-up truck ~ painted black.  Juan also could take a long boner of a vacation when paid by Road.

     Scattered on the street below the cannon’s muzzle were numerous empty rice boxes.  One empty rice box was still in Juan’s hand.  This box had been the last one to have its contents spilled down the cannon’s barrel.

     On their way to the wedding, Road had stopped at a big grocery store in San Diego on the corner of College Avenue and El Gringo Boulevard, had bought all the boxes of rice on the shelf.  There was a lot of rice in Road’s cannon ~ for Tulip’s wedding.

     Road had also bought a quart bottle of whiskey and a box of cigars at the liquor store across the boulevard from the grocery store.

     As for the illegal aliens (or wetbacks), Road had picked them up at the end of the dirt road he turned down while traveling Highway 94 ~ a preconceived plan.  Poncho and his pals had hiked a short trail from Mexico to the rendezvous spot.

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    Poncho, by the way, had learned some English in Tijuana since he’d last seen Road a few weeks earlier at the Mobil gas station ~ thus piece by piece with a lot missing out he was able to tell Road about the 12 cannons in Pedro Mendez’s abandoned garlic mine.

     Pedro Mendez was Poncho’s uncle.

     And Poncho, at the moment, was sitting in the driver’s seat of Road’s truck, which was idling.

     So ~

     Road’s cannon had a cannon crew.  And Road’s cannon was aimed at the big brick church’s opened double front door out of which Tulip and he had exited.  When all the other people came running out after Road and Tulip, Road yelled, “Ole!”

     That was the signal for little half smiling, half sneering Cid to strike his match.  So he struck it across the round top of the cannon and set what flame he had to the cannon’s fuse ~ and stepped back with his ears plugged.

     Poncho gunned the truck’s engine.

     Road hopped into the cab, dragged Tulip with him.

     The people charged.

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     Rice explosively bloomed out of the cannon’s mouth ~ a forceful dry splash of wedding cheer!

     The boom was so loud that the windshield in Road’s truck cracked.

     Some of the charging wedding goers (or leavers) ducked.  Others fell over.  The rest bravely accepted the stingy wedding cheer in their faces.  One young man fainted.  Many lay on the ground afraid to open their eyes, thinking they might be dead.  Only one person was shot incurably blind by the rice: the mother of the bride, who could now add blindness to her woes and her crippled back.

     Some people have no luck.

     Memo, Juan, and Little Cid jumped into the rear of the truck, thru the rear doors ~ and the 5th crew man, a Mexican whose name was, yes, San Diego, bolted the doors shut from the inside as driver Poncho punched the truck smokey down the street.

     Tulip raised a quizzical glance at Road, as he peered at the rear view mirror.  Tulip had just heard him say softly, maybe even reverently, to the tumult behind them, “Dominus Vobiscum.”

     That’s Catholic latin for, “The Lord be with you.”

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text copyright clyde collins 1973

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from

the short novel

Road’s Cannon

the tall story of an outlaw

1973

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