In The New Brownsville, It's No Outlaw Massage Parlors, No Plastic Bags and No Lazy-Assed Men...

By JUAN JONES
Brownsville Bureau

BROWNSVILLE, Texas - A few weeks back, we got a note from a city commissioner here seeking shoes for the town's poor people. Then came a torrent of resident pleas asking for help in rounding-up a herd of animals no one wanted, but everybody abused. Kicked and knifed them, even - terrible cruelties that reached Mayor Pat Ahumada. He made it his charge to say enough is enough.

This morning, the town at the Edge of the American Universe wakes up with a new, toothy ordinance aimed at rubbing-out operators of illicit massage parlors.

Later this sun-scorched month, it wants its citizens to disdain plastic bags when shopping, shopping anywhere, whether at the grocery store they've known for all these years, or at the panaderia, at the Tex-Mex joint, at the corner convenience store.

As someone named Kelly Tipton, interim director of something called Healthy Communities of Brownsville puts it in the morning edition of the local newspaper: “When you’re walking out with a taco you don’t need a plastic bag.”

Slowly, inch-by-inch, breadth-by-breadth, dream-by-dream, wish-by-wish, itch-by-itch, this bordertown is moving forward, doing its Life Impulse, trying like crazy to escape its recent past - a history so stained that to throw buckets of white paint on it would only render a muddy canvas equally as ugly.

"We got rid of (the pseudo-Porno Blog) El Rocinante, too," said one woman waiting on a hair dye specialist at a downtown hair salon. "That's big progress. Brownsville is on the Comeback Trail. We're the new Miami, a town wanting more and more and more. Watch us fly, watch us take-off on a flight to someplace better."

That new mood in town is moving like one of those California wildfires, burning ground not used to seeing any sort of action, already rolling over do-nothing citizens used to another era of endless siestas, birongas and let-the-vieja-work. "The days of Brownsville men beating their wives, not paying child support and hanging out at the city library using free computers are over," said a longtime resident. "We want everybody to do their share, to do something. We're damned tired of Brownsville men being mantenidos. Fuera con ellos!"

At a gas station, we ask an attractive woman in an orange sundress about the town's trend and she says: "Our men have been the problem around here, the obstacles to progress. That's why I always date guys from McAllen. They have their own money and they pay for meals. Yes, I want change, and I want it now..."

Indeed, it is a strange time in Brownsville. Many here want new shoes for the Kiddoes and errant dogs off the streets, yes. But they also want to do away with plastic bags and men they openly and with some gusto characterize as "huevones, pendejos y perdidos."

Welcome to the New Brownsville...

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