I keep in mind the primary time I traveled to Lexington. I used to be on a Greyhound bus, and my dad waited for me on the gasoline station that doubled as a spot for buses to drop off their passengers. It was a moist summer season day, and it was such a distinction from the dry and scorching air of El Paso. I seemed round and observed the very inexperienced prairie, the rising corn fields, and the scent. The scent is a kind of belongings you always remember.
On the way in which into Nebraska from Colorado (after taking a bus from El Paso to Denver), you see the extra desert-like Rockies give method to the prairies. All the things will get inexperienced hastily, and also you begin seeing seemingly limitless fields of corn. Now and again, you’d see cattle ranches with lots of (if not hundreds) of heads of cattle. “Mire las vaquitas, compadre,” a person behind me stated because the bus sped east on I-70. “Mire cómo están gordas y felices,” he stated with a little bit of crying in his tone.
My guess was that he was from northern Mexico. There had been a drought these years, and cow carcasses lined the roads all all through Chihuahua state. His accent was like mine, northern. And he rode with one other man (his “compadre”), although they didn’t cease in Lexington. (The bus route went all the way in which to Omaha, after which on to Chicago, making native stops.) He saved declaring how fats and joyful the cows appeared, in comparison with the strolling carcasses again in Mexico.
Dad welcomed me with an enormous hug. He had moved there the summer season I graduated from highschool. He had a foul breakup with a longtime girlfriend, and a cousin invited my dad to work in Lexington. At first, Dad labored processing beef. He’d don a pair of chainlink gloves, a protracted apron, and he’d use very sharp knives to chop the meat into predefined cuts. He did that for some time, together with the winter between my highschool commencement and after I went to see him. Then they discovered he was good with equipment, and he grew to become one of many plant mechanics.
You’d be stunned at how a lot equipment goes into processing beef. They kill the cow, behead it, pores and skin it, after which each single element is used for meals, medication, and even some magnificence merchandise. Nothing is wasted, and I imply nothing. And hundreds of individuals in that plant made it occur, day in and time out. The plant by no means slept.
After choosing me up on the gasoline station, Dad drove me round city in his previous van. It solely had the 2 entrance seats as a result of that’s all he wanted. “One of many guys on the plant went again to Guatemala, and he offered it to me. He purchased it from a painter.” Dad had made a lot of pals on the plant in his yr there. He stated he acquired alongside nice with everybody. However he was additionally accomplished with it. “I’m going again house quickly,” he stated. It might be one other three years earlier than he did so.
The little sleepy city of Lexington, Nebraska, was based in 1871. In 1980, the city was nearly completely White. (And I do imply “completely.”) By the tip of the century, the city had grown by half, and it grew to become “majority minority” someday within the early 2000s. At this time, greater than 60% of the city’s residents take into account themselves Hispanic, a lot of them from Central American roots, most from Mexican roots. With the Latino employees got here their households, and so they stayed to construct their American lives. Generations of American children had been born.
A kind of children was my little sister. She was born in close by Kearney, Nebraska, in 2000. She lived in Lexington for many of her life. You see, my mom additionally fell on dangerous instances in El Paso, so my dad supplied her a spot to stay in Lexington. She moved up there in 1997. A couple of months later, my grandmother and I drove my little brother to be with my mother. Nonetheless, issues between my dad and mom didn’t work out. That they had a nasty falling out, and that’s when Dad determined to go away Lexington for good. Mother stayed behind.
My mom grew to become considerably of a pillar of the group. She has all the time been the sort of one who intervenes when she sees an injustice, and he or she noticed loads of that as the bulk had been forged apart and discriminated towards by the individuals who was the bulk. That minoritization of Latino of us brought on friction, and the variations in cultures brought on much more friction. The WASPy residents of Lexington couldn’t perceive why teenage motherhood was so acceptable within the Brown group. And the Spanish audio system couldn’t perceive why the folks whose generations dated again to the frontier days felt like they had been being invaded by a overseas drive.
Mother was in the course of all of it for some time. She additionally met a person who had a number of daughters, and so they had my little sister. I keep in mind the day nicely, as a result of I drove up from El Paso to be there. It was throughout my closing semester at UT El Paso, and I used to be warned that I couldn’t miss too many days from my practicum. So it was a fast journey to fulfill the toddler, to fall in love with that lovable little child.
In the meantime, my brother grew up steeped in Lexington’s tradition, with its soccer and soccer video games and summer season festivals. Slowly and steadily, he grew to become part of that group. He then seemed to Lincoln, Nebraska, to go to varsity. And his story was written elsewhere.
However, we tried to return to Lexington each time we might. For me, it was an odd place, nothing just like the little city in Mexico the place I did numerous my rising up. For my brother, it was house, particularly since Mother and my sister had been there. For all of us, it was an incredible place to seize pupusas, tacos, and many different scrumptious Latin meals.
I discovered yesterday that Tyson Meals (the corporate that took over the meatpacking plant from IBP) plans to shut the plant by January. Over 3,000 jobs are on the road. That’s 3,000 folks out of a complete of 10,000 or so residing within the little city. I’m afraid that Lexington is not going to survive this… Or slightly, it’ll. However it’ll positively change Lexington.
After seeing what the closing of factories and metal mills did within the Rust Belt, and what the closing of factories did in El Paso. Companies closed. Native economies collapsed. However different companies flourished. Folks tailored, some even stayed. This won’t be the tip of Lexington, however it’s about to get painful for thus many there, together with my mom.
So I’m considering of you, Lexington…
