The subject of rail travel in the USA came up, prompting me to remember this dust magnet that sleeps on a shelf in our living room, my mother’s handwritten notes still inside.
It speaks of railroads in a different country, more than 100 years ago.
Gold on silver, this calling card case was a gift to my grandmother,
Ruth Maverick, when she was a little girl, sitting in the lap of the president
of Mexico, Porfirio Diaz (1877-1911).
Her dad, my Great Grandfather, Oliver Newell, owned and developed
railroads in Texas, and became friends with Diaz when helping him to greatly
expand Mexico’s railway system. Mexico had 416 miles of track in 1876, a total
of 15,360 miles of track by 1910. Goods,
services, people, and business flowed freely for the first time, helping to
bring Mexico into the twentieth century.
I remember Grandma telling me of the railroad car her dad,
Oliver Newell, owned, sometimes riding in it overnight on junkets into Mexico.
She and Grandpa Maverick both grew up in San Antonio, with
close ties to Mexico and the beautiful culture there.
Bathing me when I was very little, I remember her singing
softly to me of cockroaches and marijuana.
Even at that young age, I thought it to be curious subject
material.
Spanish:
La cucaracha, la cucaracha,
ya no puede caminar
porque no tiene, porque le falta
marihuana que fumar.
Ya murió la cucaracha
ya la llevan a enterrar
entre cuatro zopilotes
y un ratón de sacristán.
English:
The cockroach, the cockroach,
can't walk anymore
because it doesn't have, because it's lacking
marijuana to smoke.
The cockroach just died
they are taking it to be buried,
among four buzzards
and a sacristan mouse.
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