Nothing Much Ever Happens in Muleshoe

    

My oldest two grandsons at the Mule Monument in Muleshoe.  Note the Lowake Steakhouse tee shirt on Ian.  I am doing my best to introduce the boys to the finer things in life.

     Muleshoe, Texas, is near the New Mexico border, about eighty miles northwest of Lubbock and that makes it fair game for this blog.  I have lifelong friends in that part of Texas—friends who have never, ever bored me.  That’s about all I really expect from friends—let me enjoy your company and please don’t bore me.

     In Muleshoe, most everyone is a farmer.  Those who don’t farm are involved in some business that caters to the needs of farmers.  Some of the farmers own businesses in addition to their farms.  Charles Flowers told of one guy there who owned a furniture store.  Flowers was concerned with the mark-up on furniture—farmers are always concerned with everyone else’s mark-up.  Charlie said, “The store sets there empty, with not a single customer in sight, and Ole Willie Isaac has paid for three farms with it.”

     Muleshoe farmers, as all farmers everywhere, work hard most of the time but a lull in their activity comes after the crops are harvested and before spring planting.  Annual maintenance is necessary on every farm, and this is a really good time to repair equipment, paint barns, fix windmills, and drink whiskey.

A second picture of my grandsons in Muleshoe--the grain elevator is just to the left , next to the railroad track.

     In downtown Muleshoe, the S.E.Cone Grain Elevator stores grain sorghum from the harvest.  Ralph Abernathy is the manager there and his busy time coincides with the local farmers, as does his slow time.  My friends, Buck Campbell and Charles Flowers, enjoy loitering around the elevator office during the slow spells each year.  They like this because their wives think they’re off working and they won’t have to paint the house, or plant shrubs, or whatever chore the little woman can come up with to make sure they don’t get into some kind of mischief.

     The elevator office is a big open room, with a long counter across the front near the entry door, a large conference table behind the counter next to Ole Ralph’s desk, and a coffee machine with several heavy cups on a little cabinet in the corner.  Buck and Flowers grab a coffee cup and sit down at the big table.  Ole Ralph pulls out a half gallon of Black Jack from the bottom drawer of his desk and fills all three cups.  Then, they let nature take its course.

     After several cups, and the mandatory discussion of the prospects of rain, the idiot politicans in Washington, and the shape of the new gal at Tom’s Satellite Lounge in Clovis, the boys get restless.  Maybe it is time to go back over to Clovis and see if they really are that big.  If so, they need to go pick up Ole Benton.  Robert Benton, a friend from high school, farms a couple of sections west of Dimmit and is a swell fellow to get drunk with.  Ole Ralph puts a sign in the window indicating that he is at the doctor’s office in Lubbock and will be open tomorrow.  The well-used sign is almost worn out, old and dog-eared.

    After spinning by Benton’s farm and learning that he is playing golf in Dimmit, the boys head toward the golf course, Buck driving his wife’s Cadillac.

     There are reasons that you have not seen the Dimmit Country Club on the Sunday afternoon broadcasts of the PGA Tour.  To start with, it has only fourteen holes.  The developer ran out of money and never finished the course.  No one in Dimmit seems to mind and several young people from there were astonished when they went off to school and discovered eighteen holes on the Texas Tech course in Lubbock.

     Then, the topography in Dimmit leaves something to be desired when compared to other links.  The Ole Boy who built it had only a small Caterpillar, and he simply scraped up some dirt to make the greens, planted grass on them and quit.  The places where he scraped the dirt became natural sand traps, and there is absolutely no danger of any water hazard in that part of the world.  They planted fourteen trees, one for each hole, but the drought took them.  All except one.  One got cut down when it blocked a shot for Ernie Nydegger.  Ole Ernie just went to his pickup and got a chain saw and cleared a path to the green.  The rules out here are pretty liberal.

     Our boys, having the foresight to bring along the Black Jack and coffee cups, were feeling no pain.  They looked out across the course and immediately spotted Benton and another fellow, easing their golf cart up to the twelfth tee.  Buck took the direct route to the tee box, bounced across three parched fairways and a small sand trap, slid sideways on the cart path and stopped next to the little mound.  This attracted the attention of the two golfers.

     “Benton, put up that six iron and get in here.  We’re going to Clovis and run the whores.  You ain’t got a hair on your ass if you don’t come on with us.”

     Ole Benton nervously held up both arms and said, “Boys, boys.  Hold on, hold on.  Allow me to introduce our new minister.”

     Buck put the Cadillac in low gear and cut a donut in the rock-hard fairway.  As they sped away, Ole Ralph leaned out the back window and shouted, “Baldy.”

As the sun sets slowly in the west, we leave the peaceful little farm community of Muleshoe.