That Merka still does exist in a few isolated places where the pastures are bright red rather than blue. I was fortunate enough to find such a place--also in the free state of Texas---only much further west where the average rainfall is only 30 inches in a good year. Had to flee that I-35 corridor for my sanity and well being.
Ah, West Texas...the last frontier on Planet Earth. One of the few remaining places where one can sit for an entire week and not meet another human being, and certainly not one whose life's ambition it is to clmb all up in my bidness. I recommend Cattail Falls on the south face of the Chisos Mountains, directly below Window Rock, with an unparallelled view of Santa Helena canyon. It may not rain, but it always falls.
Damon's accent wasn't too bad, but Lucas Black was a gem in his part as "the assassin Blevins". Even Bruce Derrn was OK in the role of the judge. I liked the Border Trilogy, as the three novels have come to be known. Some of Cormac's novels were bad, IMO, but at least four of them are among my favorites to reread every couple of years.
I really couldn't forgive the meddling with the storyline in "True Grit", though. The Coens really messed that whole thing up to the point of no repair. To me, that novel was the most sympathetic modern American novel written, up until its time, regarding former Confederates and ordinary people of the South. Making it into a film, that stayed so close to the novel isn't possible today the way it was in the late '60s, as we can see with the Coen's remake of it.
Speaking of true to the novel films, "Ride With the Devil" based on the novel "Woe to Live On", by Daniel Woodrell, was really pretty fine. The film wouldn't ever be made by an American producer/director. It took Ang Lee to bring it to film. If you haven't seen it, get a dvd of it and enjoy.
Ah, Bruce Dern. Nuff sed. I haven't seen "Ride with the Devil" in 20 years, but I'm a fan of Ang Lee. Probably in my collection, so I'll have to dust it off.
I thought the original "True Grit" was just fine the way it was. Filmmakers get in trouble when they try to remake stories that were well done to start with. The Coens tried to channel a different message and it didn't work with the source material.
I've only read "No Country," so I'm not up on Cormac's novels, though I know his scripts. That said, there hasn't been a sympathetic film made about the Confederacy. The narradigm is designed to keep people from looking at the fact that the Democrats were the pro-slavery faction and founders of the KKK and the carpetbaggers. Certainly today, one would never be able to tell the real story of Yankee industrialists and banksters trying to corner the market on Southern raw materials to make them competitive in global markets. Maybe one day that story will be told, but not today.
Great article. I love the imagery. It took me a minute to confirm that your Merka is the same as my 'Murca. It could be the difference between Texas and the Southeast.
Thank you for reading! You are correct that many Southeast dialects have a guttural component not present in Texas dialects. This would render as a "u" sound rather than "e". I'm not sure what the linguistic origin is, but it is likely based on the national origins of settlers in the respective regions.
Outstanding. I hate reading wonderful pieces like this because of everything I am reminded that we lost. Leaving it all was no small matter, and still stings, but that America is dead and buried. Is it too bold to suggest that the real Reset should be burning it down and starting over?
Your suggestion fits nicely with the image of my father lighting off the field full of cockleburs. I'm of the opinion that a conflagration is coming, like it or not. History teaches us that complex systems eventually reach a point where malfunctions reach an unsustainable level and they collapse. Not to worry, after the field is burned, you usually get a bumper crop the next season.
When I look at all of America's vulnerabilites, it is astonishing that the most massive attacks have been the self-inflicted kind like 9/11. No one has lit off a nuke, or sabotaged a dam, or poisoned a water supply, etc. We already have Chinese balloons floating across the territory for heaven's sake. IMO there is a divine hand of protection, and i'm forced to wonder how long that will last.
Certainly a hidden hand. For most of its history, America has benefitted from physical isolation. Canada has been a fairly innocuous neighbor, but Mexico has not. From the Mexican-American War to the current invasion, the relationship with America's southern neighbor has always been a bit dicey. Outside of that, the world's perception of the US as being a tad bit off its rocker with a lot of nukes has kept the invaders away. There's reason to think Nazi Germany was planning air raids on the East Coast, with gun sight photos on New York in the archives. When empires fall, however...
It's nice to see the word "Merka" spelled correctly. I get so tired of tin-eared commenters misspelling Merka as "murica". Where do these ninnies come from, anyway? I love the film "All the Pretty Horses", particularly the line spoken by Lucas Black, "'Cause I'm a Merkin". How can anyone hear a native Southern speaker like Lucas say that line and then assume that the word is spelled "murrican"?
A true scholar of the dialect. Hat tipped, sir. Yes, the word "merka" has a distinct short "e" before the unique Southern "r", and not a short "oo" (as in look) before the "r", and gods forbid there should ever be an "i" sound in the word. That thar is Yankee tawk. Clearly, you've been hanging around too many heathens if you've heard it said otherwise. I believe, but don't hold me to this, that Mark Twain used the proper Merka in "Huckleberry Finn". There is, somewhere, a top-quality audiobook of "Huck," where the narrator reproduces all the dialects in the book. It may be available on Gutenberg.org, but worth every penny if you have to buy it.
Hearing a mispronouncement is bad enough, but seeing the misspelling in print or online is traumatic to me. Online, yankees may go undetected until they misuse a word or express a vile opinion. Danger lurks. We must be cautious.
There are two sure-fire ways to smoke out a Yankee anywhere they hide:
1) Ask them which war Mr. Lincoln started. If the word "civil" appears anywhere in the answer, you got yourself a Yankee.
2) You'll want to verify before casting wild aspersions, because they might be uneducated. Verify by asking what the War of Northern Aggression was about. If the word "slavery" appears anywhere in the response, you got yourself a True Believer. We all know, of course, it was the Yankee Banksters and Fascists protecting access to cheap raw materials to maximize their profits.
A whole series of books, probably. I won several writing contests in grade school and high school using Moulton and Shiner as backdrops. It was heaven, even when my back was covered in cockleburs after a long day of mowing the back 40.
Great article! I've been in a '73 Ford Country Squire station wagon with the fake wood siding. That's what we used to deliver stained glass windows in Seattle when my partner and I founded Seattle Stained Glass in '76. A cop pulled us over once on the I:90 while going to Bellevue across Lake Washington for speeding. My partner, Jim, was driving (it was his car), and he told the cop we were delivering stained glass windows. The cop wanted to see the windows. He was impressed. He let us go with no ticket.
In Ireland the bar is across the street from the Catholic church and that is where everyone, including the priest, congregates after Mass.
"Moulton" sounds like a disease of a name. What was its nickname? Moldy? Grey Moulton? Moo Town?
Actually, Moulton, Shiner, Praha, Moravia, and a whole passel of other little towns all have Czech names. When I travelled through the Czech Republic years ago, I soon saw why they settled in central Texas - almost identical terrain (not to mention artesian wells for brewing).
The Germans and the Czechs keep the bar at a respectful distance, but the pub I worked at in Dublin was directly across the street from the church - the 3 Great Priorities: God, Guiness and Gruel.
Rufus: PS: There is a town near Lincoln called "Crete". It's a Czech town. A friend of mine married a woman from Crete, Nebraska. He called her, "An excretion".
Ha! I can imagine it would. Speaking of Nebraska, my adopted hometown of Tegal, here in Java, has been developing a taste for Texas culture. I may have to nurture that a bit to create something really unique, like a Jawa rodeo or something.
Rufus: My friend's wife, the Excretion, divorced my friend and she then joined the gay/lesbian community in Seattle. My friend took it poorly. He ended up having to wear long sleeve shirts for the rest of his life, if you know what I mean.
That is truly a depressing note. Men have to realize that in today's world, women are doing such things as a statement. One of my Xs tried that, but by that time, I had already converted three lesbians, so the effort was wasted on me. Us boys gotta get out there and reclaim our emotions before these harlots run over us with tractors, and back up to finish the job.
Rufus: There were/are Czech towns in Nebraska, too. There is a yearly Czech Festival in a small town near Lincoln. Runzas, the world famous Runzas, are from the Czechs. If you ever go to Lincoln, check (pun intended) out the Runza Drive-In.
Gab? Who wants to flap the jaws when one can swing a fist?
There is a fine festival in the Czecher board called Czhillispiel - the perfect mix of German and Czech, with a whole lotta Texas chilli. Nothing like a hoe-down to lift the spirits and fill the belly.
If French Cajun is more your thing, the Rodaire Club on Sunday after church in East Texas will put some zeal in your zydeco.
I know nothing of French Cajun culture or cuisine. I visited Lousy Anna once in 1971 for the "Celebration of Life (Death)" Festival in Mcrae on the Atchafalaya river. I damn near died.
Great work, Farside. One of your best pieces yet. You channeled your inner Hemingway for this one. Very evocative.
It was more like a possession, I think. It's amazing the effect of a few days at the mountain house can have on creative juices.
That Merka still does exist in a few isolated places where the pastures are bright red rather than blue. I was fortunate enough to find such a place--also in the free state of Texas---only much further west where the average rainfall is only 30 inches in a good year. Had to flee that I-35 corridor for my sanity and well being.
Ah, West Texas...the last frontier on Planet Earth. One of the few remaining places where one can sit for an entire week and not meet another human being, and certainly not one whose life's ambition it is to clmb all up in my bidness. I recommend Cattail Falls on the south face of the Chisos Mountains, directly below Window Rock, with an unparallelled view of Santa Helena canyon. It may not rain, but it always falls.
Damon's accent wasn't too bad, but Lucas Black was a gem in his part as "the assassin Blevins". Even Bruce Derrn was OK in the role of the judge. I liked the Border Trilogy, as the three novels have come to be known. Some of Cormac's novels were bad, IMO, but at least four of them are among my favorites to reread every couple of years.
I really couldn't forgive the meddling with the storyline in "True Grit", though. The Coens really messed that whole thing up to the point of no repair. To me, that novel was the most sympathetic modern American novel written, up until its time, regarding former Confederates and ordinary people of the South. Making it into a film, that stayed so close to the novel isn't possible today the way it was in the late '60s, as we can see with the Coen's remake of it.
Speaking of true to the novel films, "Ride With the Devil" based on the novel "Woe to Live On", by Daniel Woodrell, was really pretty fine. The film wouldn't ever be made by an American producer/director. It took Ang Lee to bring it to film. If you haven't seen it, get a dvd of it and enjoy.
Ah, Bruce Dern. Nuff sed. I haven't seen "Ride with the Devil" in 20 years, but I'm a fan of Ang Lee. Probably in my collection, so I'll have to dust it off.
I thought the original "True Grit" was just fine the way it was. Filmmakers get in trouble when they try to remake stories that were well done to start with. The Coens tried to channel a different message and it didn't work with the source material.
I've only read "No Country," so I'm not up on Cormac's novels, though I know his scripts. That said, there hasn't been a sympathetic film made about the Confederacy. The narradigm is designed to keep people from looking at the fact that the Democrats were the pro-slavery faction and founders of the KKK and the carpetbaggers. Certainly today, one would never be able to tell the real story of Yankee industrialists and banksters trying to corner the market on Southern raw materials to make them competitive in global markets. Maybe one day that story will be told, but not today.
Great article. I love the imagery. It took me a minute to confirm that your Merka is the same as my 'Murca. It could be the difference between Texas and the Southeast.
Thank you for reading! You are correct that many Southeast dialects have a guttural component not present in Texas dialects. This would render as a "u" sound rather than "e". I'm not sure what the linguistic origin is, but it is likely based on the national origins of settlers in the respective regions.
Outstanding. I hate reading wonderful pieces like this because of everything I am reminded that we lost. Leaving it all was no small matter, and still stings, but that America is dead and buried. Is it too bold to suggest that the real Reset should be burning it down and starting over?
Your suggestion fits nicely with the image of my father lighting off the field full of cockleburs. I'm of the opinion that a conflagration is coming, like it or not. History teaches us that complex systems eventually reach a point where malfunctions reach an unsustainable level and they collapse. Not to worry, after the field is burned, you usually get a bumper crop the next season.
When I look at all of America's vulnerabilites, it is astonishing that the most massive attacks have been the self-inflicted kind like 9/11. No one has lit off a nuke, or sabotaged a dam, or poisoned a water supply, etc. We already have Chinese balloons floating across the territory for heaven's sake. IMO there is a divine hand of protection, and i'm forced to wonder how long that will last.
Certainly a hidden hand. For most of its history, America has benefitted from physical isolation. Canada has been a fairly innocuous neighbor, but Mexico has not. From the Mexican-American War to the current invasion, the relationship with America's southern neighbor has always been a bit dicey. Outside of that, the world's perception of the US as being a tad bit off its rocker with a lot of nukes has kept the invaders away. There's reason to think Nazi Germany was planning air raids on the East Coast, with gun sight photos on New York in the archives. When empires fall, however...
It's nice to see the word "Merka" spelled correctly. I get so tired of tin-eared commenters misspelling Merka as "murica". Where do these ninnies come from, anyway? I love the film "All the Pretty Horses", particularly the line spoken by Lucas Black, "'Cause I'm a Merkin". How can anyone hear a native Southern speaker like Lucas say that line and then assume that the word is spelled "murrican"?
A true scholar of the dialect. Hat tipped, sir. Yes, the word "merka" has a distinct short "e" before the unique Southern "r", and not a short "oo" (as in look) before the "r", and gods forbid there should ever be an "i" sound in the word. That thar is Yankee tawk. Clearly, you've been hanging around too many heathens if you've heard it said otherwise. I believe, but don't hold me to this, that Mark Twain used the proper Merka in "Huckleberry Finn". There is, somewhere, a top-quality audiobook of "Huck," where the narrator reproduces all the dialects in the book. It may be available on Gutenberg.org, but worth every penny if you have to buy it.
Cheers, mate!
Hearing a mispronouncement is bad enough, but seeing the misspelling in print or online is traumatic to me. Online, yankees may go undetected until they misuse a word or express a vile opinion. Danger lurks. We must be cautious.
There are two sure-fire ways to smoke out a Yankee anywhere they hide:
1) Ask them which war Mr. Lincoln started. If the word "civil" appears anywhere in the answer, you got yourself a Yankee.
2) You'll want to verify before casting wild aspersions, because they might be uneducated. Verify by asking what the War of Northern Aggression was about. If the word "slavery" appears anywhere in the response, you got yourself a True Believer. We all know, of course, it was the Yankee Banksters and Fascists protecting access to cheap raw materials to maximize their profits.
Wow...heaven on earth....seems that there is a book in this :-)
A whole series of books, probably. I won several writing contests in grade school and high school using Moulton and Shiner as backdrops. It was heaven, even when my back was covered in cockleburs after a long day of mowing the back 40.
Great article! I've been in a '73 Ford Country Squire station wagon with the fake wood siding. That's what we used to deliver stained glass windows in Seattle when my partner and I founded Seattle Stained Glass in '76. A cop pulled us over once on the I:90 while going to Bellevue across Lake Washington for speeding. My partner, Jim, was driving (it was his car), and he told the cop we were delivering stained glass windows. The cop wanted to see the windows. He was impressed. He let us go with no ticket.
In Ireland the bar is across the street from the Catholic church and that is where everyone, including the priest, congregates after Mass.
"Moulton" sounds like a disease of a name. What was its nickname? Moldy? Grey Moulton? Moo Town?
You had a great childhood, Rufus. You are lucky.
Actually, Moulton, Shiner, Praha, Moravia, and a whole passel of other little towns all have Czech names. When I travelled through the Czech Republic years ago, I soon saw why they settled in central Texas - almost identical terrain (not to mention artesian wells for brewing).
The Germans and the Czechs keep the bar at a respectful distance, but the pub I worked at in Dublin was directly across the street from the church - the 3 Great Priorities: God, Guiness and Gruel.
Rufus: PS: There is a town near Lincoln called "Crete". It's a Czech town. A friend of mine married a woman from Crete, Nebraska. He called her, "An excretion".
The marriage ended badly.
Ha! I can imagine it would. Speaking of Nebraska, my adopted hometown of Tegal, here in Java, has been developing a taste for Texas culture. I may have to nurture that a bit to create something really unique, like a Jawa rodeo or something.
Excretion indeed.
Rufus: PS: Do the Indonesians ride the bulls at the rodeo?
I shall avoid the temptation you have presented and say only that I think Gilley's would do land office business here.
Rufus: My friend's wife, the Excretion, divorced my friend and she then joined the gay/lesbian community in Seattle. My friend took it poorly. He ended up having to wear long sleeve shirts for the rest of his life, if you know what I mean.
That is truly a depressing note. Men have to realize that in today's world, women are doing such things as a statement. One of my Xs tried that, but by that time, I had already converted three lesbians, so the effort was wasted on me. Us boys gotta get out there and reclaim our emotions before these harlots run over us with tractors, and back up to finish the job.
"run over us with tractors, and back up to finish the job."
Or, as my cousins in Longview would say, "Stomp a mudhole in my ass and then walk it dry" East Texas is a whole other country.
Rufus: There were/are Czech towns in Nebraska, too. There is a yearly Czech Festival in a small town near Lincoln. Runzas, the world famous Runzas, are from the Czechs. If you ever go to Lincoln, check (pun intended) out the Runza Drive-In.
I thought it was, "God, Guinness, and Gab."
Gab? Who wants to flap the jaws when one can swing a fist?
There is a fine festival in the Czecher board called Czhillispiel - the perfect mix of German and Czech, with a whole lotta Texas chilli. Nothing like a hoe-down to lift the spirits and fill the belly.
If French Cajun is more your thing, the Rodaire Club on Sunday after church in East Texas will put some zeal in your zydeco.
Rufus: The Irish love to talk, not listen.
I know nothing of French Cajun culture or cuisine. I visited Lousy Anna once in 1971 for the "Celebration of Life (Death)" Festival in Mcrae on the Atchafalaya river. I damn near died.
All true.
Not even a white lie in the whole thing. That's why I included links...it's as real as it gets.
I’m from a smallish town in Texas. I lived a version of your reality. It’s pretty much gone now. Too close to DFW. So very sad.
Wasn't it Joni Mitchell? They pave paradise and put up a parking lot. The world is too much with us.