an act of generosity and selflessness and hard ass work

The weekend was near perfect as weather goes but then Sunday evening clouds and wind moved in and today is overcast with rain predicted. Oh goodie, we hadn’t had enough of that last week (major eye roll). I have lots of pictures of flowers and my blooming yard but they will have to wait because I want to write about my neighbor.

Friday afternoon walking Minnie I saw that my neighbor Jose was out in his yard and I stopped to chat for a minute. He and his wife had recently planted roses across the front of their house and excavated along the side of the drive for more. Last spring I dug up a red knockout rose that was hanging on by its fingernails because it just did not get any sun. I actually thought it had died but I put it in a pot anyway and it has grown and even bloomed but I still don’t have any place to put it in the ground so I offered it to Jose. 

After the flood in 2017, Jose and his wife and his younger brother and his parents moved into a house midway down the street that they had been maintaining while they paid for the owner financed house. They fixed it up nicely, built a little apartment at the end of the driveway and Jose studied for and passed his citizenship test. I’m not sure when this family immigrated but I think they’ve been in country for quite a while. They are industrious and hardworking people many of whom do not speak english. About two or three years ago, the old couple that lived in the house next door to them died and their son sold the house to Jose and his wife. Last year the house across the street from me went on the market and one of Jose’s brothers and his wife who had moved into the original house bought it and are fixing it up. 

Anyway, when I was chatting with Jose, he said he wanted to cut the ditch in front of the shop property, which was horrendously overgrown, to help with the water drainage down to the main culvert at the end of the street and did I mind. Remember, we had just had 8 1/4” of rain in one week and while the ditch in front of his house was full, it did not overflow as so many at the far end of the street did. I was a little incredulous, would I mind if you took on that monumental job? NO! I can pay you a little which he refused, he lives on the street too, it would benefit him as well, and all those weeds slow the drainage of water and trash gets caught in it. This ditch is very deep and steep and the last time I took on clearing it I only did the section in front of my sister’s house to the left of the drive into the shop and it took me three days and it wasn't nearly as bad as now. After my sister moved in she badgered the county to keep it mowed while she poisoned the fence line. Almost five months after her death I can’t even begin to describe how overgrown it was and of course I don’t have a before picture. Let's just say you couldn't see the bottom of the ditch and barely see past the fence.  

Saturday mid morning I heard the sound of a gas trimmer and there was Jose starting to cut the ditch. I offered to buy the gas for his trimmer, he refused, has plenty of gas he said. Then his younger brother joined and his other brother mowed the part that could be mowed. These men worked all day on that ditch finishing about 4 Saturday afternoon. I gave Jose the rose and a bag of zinnia seeds for his mother and a pound of shelled pecans and expressed my undying gratitude and please if there is anything I can do for you just ask.

Jose and his younger brother almost to the end. The lots here are half acre, the shop is on an acre and a half, they cleared the deepest steepest ditch that is 3 times longer than the one in front of his house that can simply be mowed.

The after pictures. First the ditch on the left side of the drive into the shop yard, second picture the ditch on the right side of the drive. The pictures really don't convey how deep and steep this ditch is. I still need to get in there and get all those dead stalks out they cut down, most of which are taller than me, and haul them to the burn pile, but, yay, it’s raining again.

These are the kind of people my republican governor and legislature want to prevent coming to this country. These are the people Trump wants to deport. 

OK, now my tirade…I am sorry to have to admit that the republicans in control of my state have finally made me ashamed to be a Texan. Our governor and republican controlled legislature are cruelty personified. There’s the whole razor wire and barbed buoys in the Rio Grande, the take over of a park on the border refusing to allow border control access, the deployment of the Texas National Guard, and the bussing of immigrants without proper clothing or food or water or even knowledge of where they are going up north in the middle of dangerous cold weather, dropping them off on the roadside and without alerting anyone. Now our legislature has passed SB4 which authorizes police to arrest anyone suspected of being in the country illegally and judges to deport them. No proof needed, just the suspicion of being in the country illegally. Latino name, brown skin is all the proof they want. Democrats fought hard to have pregnant women seeking medical care protected from being ratted out. Biden and the DOJ sued and a district court ruled it conflicted with federal law as border control falls under the federal government. Implementation of SB4 was halted by a judge while the lawsuits claiming it to be unconstitutional worked its way through the courts and then that stay was stayed by another judge allowing implementation. The DOJ then requested the Supreme Court to void the second stay and yesterday they declined to do so throwing it back to the appellate court. Fortunately the appellate court met late last night and voided the ruling and reinstated the original ruling that halted implementation while the lawsuit is being considered. Complicated, I know. This is my best effort at explaining the process in a short and concise manner. Anyway, Texas is barred for now from implementing SB4 though there were 9 hours in which it was in effect. 

Texas used to be a great state until the republicans got control 30 years ago. Rick Perry as governor was bad enough but Greg Abbott is exponentially worse. Besides the fight over the border and immigrants listed above they have gerrymandered the voting districts making it nearly impossible to vote them out, ruined the public school system, deregulated everything, taken control away from local leaders in their cities and communities, taken away the rights of women and endangered their lives, sowed hate and violence against minorities and LGBTQ people, outlawed care for trans minors and tried to have the parents charged with child abuse, have made several attempts to acquire medical records of women and trans people who have gotten care in other states, have passed ordinances restricting travel out of state for women for reproductive care (fortunately unenforceable), and so much more. Gov. Abbott has become a de facto dictator and AG Paxton spends his time and taxpayer money on frivolous lawsuits against the federal government and other states whose policies and laws he doesn’t like. And like the RNC nationally, the two of them are purging the republican party in Texas of all those republicans who aren’t fully onboard with their extreme agenda. Abbott has been pushing for school vouchers to further decimate the public school system but democrats and some republicans who still try and represent their constituents have voted it down every time because it is unpopular with Texans. Abbott doesn’t care and he intends to force it on the population.

Us decent Texas are trying to vote them out and have come achingly close but so far we’ve had little success because of gerrymandering and voter suppression which AG Paxton brags about.