Professor Jacques Lacque received his Agregation de Philisophe from Sorbonne University in Paris after completing his dissertation on “Postmodernism and the Corruption of the Academic Intelligentsia.” Jacques Lacque received a lot of flacque from the academic intelligentsia about his work, so he wanted to get as far away from France as possible.
And that’s how he and his wife Marie wound up in Alpine, Texas where he taught Philosophy at Sul Ross University. Jacques grew up watching a lot of western movies and became entranced with the cowboy culture and the wide-open nature scenes they depicted. Because of the movies, he took an intense interest in the geography and geology of the western United States, another reason he was excited to get to teach in southwest Texas.
He loved the expansive vistas in the sparsely populated region. He loved exploring the Davis Mountains to the north, and visiting the historic Fort Davis, an early military frontier outpost, with its well-preserved officer barracks and stockade fence. He loved the 110-mile drive though the Chihuahua Desert with its scruffy vegetation, cactus, and wildflowers to Big Bend National Park which encompassed both the desert and vast mountain climates. He loved the Rio Grande that coursed throughout it. He liked to imagine himself galloping with other vaqueros as they escaped the Federales through the Santa Elena Canyon. He loved that Big Bend was the least visited park in the United States.
He also loved that Marfa is only a thirty-minute drive away – a scrappy, proud little town of 1700 souls, many of them innovative artists drawn by the lure of some of the greatest works of minimalist art in the world by Donald Judd, who split his time between Marfa and New York before he died. The artists lived in mobile homes that were works of art in and of themselves. He loved seeing the works of Judd at his Marfa home and at The Chinati Foundation on the site of old Fort D. A. Russell. He loved the sharp pristine lines and severe geometry of Judd’s works. He loved the massive concrete sculptures outside The Chinati Foundation.
He loved everything about where he lived except for one thing. He couldn’t understand a lot of what the people who lived there were saying. He thought his English was good until he moved here. Now he wondered.
One day, he went to the Food Shark restaurant in Marfa for lunch. His waitress said, “Hi! My name is Sissy and I’ll be your waitress. Now don’t that beat all, like you wouldn’t know I’m a waitress and why should you give a lick what my name is, but the prissy owners from up north make me say it anyhoo. Now, whachoo want, hon?” He thought she had sneezed and offered her his napkin.
“What’s that for, hon? Think I got the cooties?”
“Oh, I’m sorry, I thought you sneezed.”
“Sneeze? Ha! Oh, I just love your accent, sexy as all get out! You’re just ‘bout cute as a button! What wind blowed you here?”
“Button? Uh, well, I’m from France if that’s what you mean. I’m sorry, I’m fairly new and sometimes I have trouble understanding the people here.”
“Well, bless your heart! Whatchoo want?”
“Oh, well, um, what do you recommend?” He had a hard time making out the items on the menu.
“Oh, we got more things on that menu there than you can shake a stick at, ain’t that right?”
“Shake a stick? So, what would you recommend?”
“Steak and eggs, but we don’t got that here. Some weird outta towners opened this here restaurant with all these things I ain’t never hearda. Lemme tell ya, some of these dishes are hotter n hell, if that’s what you like.”
“Uh, no. You know, I like sauces but the other day, someone gave me a bottle of Tabasco. They said it was a sauce, but nothing like the sauces we have in France. It was, like you said, hotter in hell, I guess that’s what you meant, like a sauce made in hell. Anyway, so what do you recommend?”
“Oh, lot of people like the braised pork burrito with hummus, lord almighty! How ‘bout that? A burrito with hummus? Ha! That good? Ok, darlin’ I’ll be right back with it and a side of cheese grits just for you.”
Sissy served him the cheese grits and burrito with hummus. “You need anything else, you jes holler, cutie pie!”
Pie? Does desert come with this meal?
She came back a couple of times to check on him. “How ya doin’, hon?” After he finished, she came back again. “Didja get enough to eat? Want another one? How ‘bout a Mississippi Mud Pie?”
Mud pie? From the Mississippi?
“Ah, no. I’m ready for the check.”
“Okay, just put your card in this here thingamabobber. Tell you whut, you wanna hear more about how folks round here talk? Meet me at 6:00 Friday at the Holland Hotel up ‘er in Alpine, lord willin’ and the crick don’t rise, okay? My boyfriend, Jimmy Don, and his friends go there to drink beer after work. Boy howdy, they talk the talk, that’s fer sure, like you ain’t never heard.”
Crick? Upper Alpine?
“Yes, I would like that.” Jacque paid and gave her a big tip. He liked Sissy.
—-
The Holland Hotel is nicely preserved in a traditional western style with leather couches and mounted taxidermy longhorn heads. It has a genuinely nice bar like in the western movies and a dining room with white cloth tables and semi-circular leather booths. He showed up at 6:00 dressed in black boots, black pants, black coat, white shirt, bolo tie, and a black 1865 Distressed Stetson hat. He hoped he would fit in.
Sissy was waiting in the lobby for him. “Hey, how you, cowboy? My, but don’t you look cute as all git out!”
“Merci beaucoup,” he said, and instantly regretted it.
“Oh, stop it, you’re making me blush!” she squealed. She looked stunning in boots etched with roses, black pants, red shirt with white piping and pearl buttons, a brown fringed jacket, turquoise earrings, and a white straw fedora with a black band – probably a Stetson too.
She took his hand. “Come with me, the boys are in a booth in the dining area. Can’t wait to introduce you!”
He was surprised when she led him to a booth with men dressed in gym shoes, blue jeans, t-shirts, and John Deere baseball caps. He instantly felt out of place.
Sissy walked up to one of them and said, “Gimme some sugar, sugar!”
Sugar? He thought Jimmy Don might pass her a couple of sugar packets, but instead they kissed.
“So, Jacques, lemme introduce you all round.” Sissy said. “Boys, this here’s Jacque – he’s from France! This here’s Jimmy Don, my man I told you about. Next to him is Tank, then Junior, then Boomer.
“Well, hell boy, don’t just stand there, belly up to the bar here,” Jimmy Don said.
The bar? Maybe he meant the booth? He stuck out his stomach and took a seat.
“Hoo doggies, I ain’t never met no Frenchman before. Hey waitress! Get this Frog a beer. Whatcha want?” asked Junior.
“Frog?”
“Yeah, you guys eat frog legs over there, right? Sorry, I prolly shouldna said that. Hey, we go frog-giggin’ ever Sunday night down at the holler, wanna come along? Say, what’s your poison?”
“Poison?”
“Uh, what kinda beer you like? We all drinkin’ Bud Light here. Hey, Wanda, c’mere and take Jack’s order.”
“Oh. Well, I prefer wine.” He asked the waitress if they served Beaujolais here.
“Bo-jo what?” the waitress asked.
“Um, just a glass of red wine, thanks”
“Red wine? Really? Well alrighty then, whatever floats your boat,” said Jimmy Don, looking disappointed. “What brung you over the water to these here parts?”
Floats your boat?
Jacque told them he got a job teaching at Sul Ross – he didn’t want to say he taught philosophy. He told them how he had grown up watching western movies and liked the wide-open nature scenes in them. Then he ran out of things to say. He was barely keeping up with the conversation.
“Hey, perfesser, huh? I guess you know the big deal around here is Donald Judd, world-famous artist if you wanna call it that,” Junior said.
“Oh, yes. He’s quite famous in France with his minimalist sculptures.’
“Minimalist, my ass, that’s ‘cos he put minimal effort into it. Four square laminate steel boxes lined up in a row. Hell, my brother Bubba could fabricate that shit in his sleep down at the metal shop.”
“Yeah, okay, whatever.” said Boomer. “Hey! Let’s slam! Gotta have a brewski for this one, buddy, what say?” as he nodded toward Jacques.
Jacques didn’t know what to think and just said quietly, “No thank you, gentlemen. Please proceed.”
“Proceed? Hell yeah!” Boomer exclaimed as Wanda brought an ice bucket filled with beer.
The men all grabbed a beer and placed it in front of them. Sissy said, “Now, boys …” but before she could finish, they slammed their hands on the table three times, grabbed the beers as fast as they could, put them to their lips, tipped them upside down. Jack was astonished at how quickly the beer disappeared down their throats.
Tank finished first and smashed the empty can flat on his forehead. The others finished quickly too. “Aw, shit, Tank, ya done it again,” groaned Junior. Tank just burped. Tank seemed to be a man of few words.
“I’m warnin’ all of you, don’t go getting hammered in front of our nice visitor,” Sissy hissed.
Hammered?
“Aw, buttercup…” Jimmy Don started.
“Don’t you buttercup me, mister! Ya’ll keep this up, I’m fixin’ to get madder than a wet hen!” Sissy warned.
Wet hen?
There ensued a momentary silence until Boomer piped up, “Hey, ya’ll heard Mayor Hollerin been knockin’ boots with the new secretary?”
Knocking boots?
“Now, just how would you know that, Boomer?” Sissy asked.
“Lurleen told me she walked past the Mayor’s office and heard some serious bushwhackin’ goin’ on in there behind the closed door with Hootie,” Boomer replied.
Bushwhacking? Jacques decided to give up trying to understand all this talk.
Sissy muttered, “Hootie. Figures. Round-heeled slut.”
“Yeah, but that Hootie, she can suck the brass off a door knob, I can testify to that,” Boomer sighed.
“I tell you whut, I wouldn’t mind gettin’ me summa that new secretary. Built like a coke bottle,” Junior observed.
“Man, that gal got some bazookas on her. I wouldn’t mind me suckin’ on her tater tots,” Boomer chimed in. “How’d that goddamn peckerwood buffalo her into bangin’ him, anyway?”
“Well, I’d like to … uh, never mind,” Jimmy Don stopped abruptly.
“Excuse me, boys, gotta tinkle,” Sissy said. She looked agitated and stormed off.
“Oh boy, I just stepped in it. Won’t be snatchin’ me no snatch tonight, that’s fer sure.” Jimmy Don said. They all laughed and Jimmy Don ordered another round.
“Yep,” said Junior. “There’s only two ways to argue with a woman and neither one works.”
Sissy came back. “C’mon Jack, let’s leave before these guys go pee in the bushes in the courtyard like they done last week, then go elbow-walkin’ and knee-crawlin’ outta here at closin’ time, the dipwads. I was hopin’ they might be learnin’ some good-behavin’ ways from you, but these boys ain’t got the sense God gave a goose and dumber n a box of rocks to boot. Let’s skedaddle.”
Jacques wasn’t quite sure what to do. He felt silly thanking the men for their hospitality, then turned and followed Sissy out into the lobby.
“Hey, don’t forget to go frog-giggin’ with us!” Junior yelled. “Sissy can tell you where the holler is!”
Sissy surprised him when she turned to him in the lobby with a great big smile and gave him a full body hug. He felt a tumultuous stirring in his loins. He blushed.
“C’mon darlin’” she whispered. “I got us a room. I heard French boys really know their way around a gal. Like my peaches? Wanna shake my tree?
“Ah, well, I do like peaches, it’s true.”
She smiled dreamily, took his hand, and breathed into his ear. “Oh hush, you silly! Time’s a-wastin’, let’s go.”
Jacques followed her upstairs. Soon, as they thrashed around under the sheets, he heard their boots knocking together underneath the bed.
Merci d’avoir lu ceci!
Copyright © Johnny Clack 2022
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