An Extended Visitto a Third World Country

We consider our stay in Elgin, Texas an extended visit to a third world country.

French demographer Alfred Sauvy coined the term Third World In 1952. He divided the world into the Western Capitalist Camp, the Russian Commie Camp, and the other guys who played Russia against the USA for handouts. The Cold War is over, and definitions have changed. Steven Gillman, a collector and distributor of unique and interesting information, says Third World signifies poverty more than anything else.

But Elgin offers so much more than poverty. There are six hair salons in this town of 5,700 souls, and one of them, Lathers, offers manicures.

Mention Elgin to a Texan, and you will hear the words “Good Sausage!” Sausage, as we know, consists of pig intestines stuffed with ground animal parts masked by strong spices. Forget the facts. It tastes real good. Back in late 1800s, Herr Meyer left Germany and brought his recipe for smoked sausage to Texas. He passed the recipe to his son R.G.Meyer who opened the doors of Meyer’s Elgin Sausage Company in 1949.

World travelers know that Third World countries often have a unique and colorful culture. In Elgin, culture means two barbecue joints that vie with each other for the custom of the obese. (Hint: the link goes to the better.) It means tequila parties with open truck doors blaring an ersatz third world country’s music, rattling windows until three in the morning. It means that one can buy drugs in the middle of the street through the open windows of old 70s American cars.

The only thing that can compete with the monotonous mariachi baseline are the trains that rumble down the tracks, horns blaring at every crossing. They carry sausage, cotton seed oil, and bricks to Developed Nations

As one drives across the black dirt prairie towards Elgin, one sees cotton fields aplenty. Silas Chatfield built the first cotton gin here in 1878. A cottonseed oil plant opened 1906. It's still standing, and folks have said that it still operates.

The Southwestern Brick Institute crowned Elgin Brick Capital of the Southwest. The area boasts not one, not two, but three brick companies. We’ll let the Southwest Brick Institute, which is no longer in existence, tout the particulars:

1) Elgin Butler Company has been manufacturing and distributing quality architectural products since 1873, including Structural Glazed Brick and Tile, Architectural Trim Units, Ceramic Base Wall Units, Decorative Tile, Stone, and much more.

2) Acme Brick celebrated America’s birthday and Acme’s 116th year in a really big way – in fact over 9,000 pounds big. “Baby Clay” the World’s Biggest Brick” as confirmed by the Guinness Book of World Records™ weighs in at over 6,000 pounds and is 116 inches long - that’s one inch each year Acme Brick has been in business.

3) Hanson Brick is North America's largest brick manufacturer with a total capacity of more than 1.7 billion bricks, although nobody is certain of how many of those bricks come from Elgin, as Hanson has facilities in six states and two Canadian provinces.

Dr. Phil came to Elgin in 2002. Andy says he called it the worst town in America. That is not true. He called it Anywhere USA. The idea was to portray small town America in decay. Dr. Phil interviewed people in town, then brought everybody together at the football stadium to let them know the score. He said they were failing their children. He trotted out his usual line of teen pregnancy, drug use, and bullying. He did not point to the decaying shacks, the barrios, and the ghetto that was a notch below the plight of sharecroppers who came to town after World War II. It's all still here. Mention Dr. Phil to anyone who has lived in Elgin for a while, and you will see a face contorted in anger; you’ll hear a string of epithets. Dr. Phil yanked the blanket, but he didn't fix anything.

Blue Norther

Our Barrio in the Sausage Capital of Texas was coming to life. Old Man Winter giving us a breath of warm air. Folks sitting on the porch swing, sipping their morning coffee. The railroad crossing at the edge of the property sets a romantic tone, as does the clatter of the tin can recycling machine just down in the dip across from the Texaco. The loud donut girl was chortling, flirting with the guy who leaves his truck door open and turns the stereo all the way up to muffle the grunts and screams that will issue after they go into the house. We sit there, at our ease, talking about how sweet life can be. A thought-form ripples through the pecan trees in the orange light of dawn. “Red sky at morning sailor take warning.”

If you folks were to get up and look around the corner of the house toward the place where the railroad tracks go, you would have seen it. But nobody saw it until it roared into the neighborhood like Cleopatra’s barge towing the Black Plague. The aptly-named Blue Norther turns gunmetal blue mixed up with milky fog. It drives the clouds right down out of the sky. Fog swirls around like the smoke a magician uses to cover up his tricks. Leaves get up off the ground and dash about like a cat stuck in a slaughterhouse. The bone-chilling cold does not register until it has a chance to penetrate your skin and muscle and the soles of your boots. You’re going to be cold until you can do something substantial about it.

Darkness

These are the murmurings of darkness, of the dim light day after day as Earth tilts with Buenos Ares toward the Sun. 

Claws scrabble against the night window. A cat clings to the sill to capture heat escaping through the cracks. A Pecan smacks the tin roof, rattles down and hits a stone. It promises breakfast for the squirrels and for  white-winged doves, who promise as much to the cat.

One wonders where the opossums go during this weather. Their short fur and naked tails offer scant protection. The answer comes. Remember how enormously fat the downstairs possum got eating the cat’s food last fall? They, unlike us ignorant members of the human species, are curled up in a sleepy ball somewhere weather-tight. We humans prefer to suffer. We cannot afford to hibernate. There is money to be made, egos to be assuaged, laws to be enforced. Wars to be won, criminals to be executed, minds to be domesticated to the tune of cogs on a gear, independent souls to be shamed into conforming to the rules of slavery.

Dawn begins with bits of dirt on the hard wood floor and dark mud scuffs on the rugs. The spoor backtracks to the front door. Keep jackets and hats on that rack right by the door. You’re going to need them. Cold, damp vapors seep into your bones out there. The crunch is gone as you walk across the front yard. Sycamore leaves no longer crumble. They are wet, pasted against each other in sopping piles. They begin to rot, and therein lies Persephone’s promise of swelling seed and the scientist’s prediction of coming spring. Bend over to lift a pecan. They are still falling. Three months after the November beginning. The nut presses your fingertips, sending chills through your numbing fingers, up your arms and into your spine. You hunch. You stride rapidly to the door, track in the wet prairie soil and toss the pecan into a plastic bin. It rattles against its fellows. A stinking flame bursts from the match. Open the red lever, try not to breath as the gas flame flumps into your eyebrows. Huddle and shiver, waiting for warmth to build down from the ceiling.

MLK Day

Singing comes across the railroad tracks, then behind the venetian blinds. Dozens of voices. “We shall over come…” Peer between the slats. They are marching. Black women, their men, white school teachers, idealistic youth with wispy beards. The unexpected parade, like the clip clop of two horsemen who ride down the street in racing season, bewilders the waking mind. A woman looks at the window and smiles. She is seeing the portrait of Jesus we have placed in the window for protection in this barrio on the edge of the ghetto. Behind them, a van with loud-speakers creeps along, narrating a history of Martin Luther King. Behind the van, four black men idle on large black motorcycles, protecting the procession from low riders with loud mufflers who like to buzz the block, impressing donut girls who fuck them on Saturday night.