Cinderella Runs for County Judge E Mas

Her full name is Cinderella Guevara, and the county is Presidio, more on her race later. 

  My five days so far, in Marfa Texas population 2100, was full of little everyday occurrences that we don’t experience in the D/FW metro area. Por Examplo (for example) have you ever bought a Frito pie at the cemetery? I had not, but I have now (see flier below). Dia de los Muertos is celebrated with, well, los Muertos at the cemetery. And as the flier reads below, the funds collected are for the actual upkeep of the cemetery. 

By A Govea

   Little Joe music played in the background, while people visited their loved ones and enjoyed menudo and corn in a cup. I could not help but notice a large plot with Dallas Cowboys swag along with more traditional cemetery stuff flowers etc.(picture below) Initially I was kinda reluctant to venture too close as I did not want to be disrespectful especially since I am not familiar with cemetery festival etiquette. However, I was soon made to feel welcome and told to take as many pictures as I wanted. Courtesy of MS Portillo the family matriarch and wife of Richard Portillio that was laid to rest in 2021. Ms. Portillo shared that her husband died of Lou Gehrig’s disease after a nine-year battle. And said that she cared for him herself until the end. I asked about the Cowboy swag, and she said her husband was a lifelong Cowboy fan. And so, to that end, why not in death. 

   I could not help but feel her sense of pride in the upkeep of her husband of 43 years final resting place. And untimely what would be her final resting place and for their children. This would be a final resting place for the whole family where they would be together …. forever. Pero she laughingly said no pets allowed as one of her kids had suggested. At night, the cemetery is lit up with luminaries that the family brought or bought at the festival. It is truly a celebration of life and the promise that it does not end in death. 

  Before we attended the celebration, we attended mass in Alpine population 5,815 which is thirty miles west of Marfa. Our Lady of Peace is a small church but bigger than the church in Marfa but tiny compared to my home church in Keller. Both my wife and the atmosphere were like a step back in time. We felt that it was like the churches we attended back in the 1960s in Lubbock. And it is not just because of the building, but also the people. There was no fancy attire, no fancy jewelry or in fact no fancy cars. However, there were smiles everywhere of families gathered in prayer and thankfulness. The priest was young maybe thirty and of Mexican heritage with an accent to match. 

  His sermon was about Zacchaeus the tax collector and his awakening to Christ and his sinfulness. Zacchaeus was a wealthy man but isolated from the company of the people in his village. His pride and love of money kept him separated from what he thought were people lesser than him. We all need to be mindful of ourselves, the priest preached. He confessed that as a newly minted priest he expected to be assigned to a large Cathedral church. He reasoned his command of the English was better than most of his peers. And he was after all top of his class, surely the Bishop would see that and assign him accordingly.  

  So, when he was told he was coming to Alpine he had to hide his disappointment. Why couldn’t the Bishop not see what everyone else saw in him. Especially since it was clear as day. Well long story short after two years in Alpine he knows that he is where he exactly needed to be. So, the moral to this story is we don’t know it all and a little humility is good for all of us. 

End of Part 1 next week Did Cinderella win? And Halloween in Marfa