The Vargas Cow vs the Train

                                       

                                       By kiki

In the Simons Brickyard most people had animals of all kinds, chickens, roosters, pigs, rabbits, goats and cows. Some of the animals were slaughter for food. Pigs who were slaughtered were soon made into tamales and chicharróns. A stolen goat made great birria on a Saturday afternoon when men were drinking, and it didn't matter whom goat was stolen. Some chickens were saved from having their neck twisted because of their ability to lay eggs. Others were not that lucky. The cows were saved from been slaughtered because people needed milk to drink.

The people that lived in El Hoyo (the hole) would take their cows, goats and other animals to a meadow that laid up a hill by the railroad tracks, at times you could see ten or more cows and goats grazing in the tall grass that grew in that beautiful-meadow. In late spring-early summer the grass would grow about 3 feet tall, tall enough for some serious romping by the teenagers (know what I mean?) that were supposed to be keeping an eye on the livestock

One day in a late 1940’s summer one of the Vargas girls, don’t remember which one of the girls it was, had walked the Vargas family only cow up the hill to pasture. Soon after reaching the meadow the Vargas girl met her boyfriend Jess, and within minutes they were romping in the tall grass. The cow with nobody to keep an eye on her made her way to the railroad tracks, I guess she wanted to see how the people on the other side of the tracks lived. As the cow was standing on the tracks a South Pacific Streamliner passenger train came roaring down the tracks, I still remember that it was heading east. The cow didn’t move and the train didn’t stop. The stampede of people was on as soon as the word got down in El Hoyo that the Vargas cow had been killed by a train. People by the dozen were running toward the cow, some of the people with knives in both hands were sharpening them against each other as they ran to get their piece of steak for that night dinner…We missed out!