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Lowcura
An introspective virtual cruise through an American sub-cultural tradition
“… nostalgia gleams with the dull brilliance of a chrome airplane on the rusted hood of a ‘56 Chevy
...daydream’s of walking bare foot on the soft grass down by the river where dragonflies buzzed all day have now decayed like the fallen cottonwoods along the gnarled paths of the Rio Embudo where free form poetry mixed with cheap beer on warm nights by the riverbanks and stories of lowered ’49 Fleetlines with flamejobs and spinners were cast into the dark wind…”
Hearts and Arrows Years later, I would hear stories I remember it this way, Magdalena. As a small child I would accompany my grandmother on her walks to or from my mother’s house, which was about a mile and a half away. We would follow a walking path along the Rio Embudo, a small stream weaving along the northern edge of the village where I grew up. There was a certain place along this walk that we always looked forward in coming to. It was there, just off the sand and gravel trail under the shade of the towering cottonwoods and heavy scent of river willow and summer heat where we would stop for a short respite. It was at this section along the river where some of the villager’s discarded automobiles sat in abandonment, a sort of village car cemetery. One car in particular attracted our attention, a faded pink 1949 Chevrolet Fleetline flipped over on its back and succumbing to the rust and ruin of cars that meet such a fate. Grandma’ would walk over to it and we would stand there momentarily, our hands caressing the fat-fendered Chevy. “Este era el carro del Levi “ she would say. We would silently pay our respects and then move on. Years later, I would hear stories about my cousin Levi and his lowered Fleetline, and learn that he had been one of the first Lowriders in northern New Mexico, the region around Española that in time became regarded affectionately as the “Lowrider Capitol of the World”. Resuello
y Alma
I began cruising when I was about 12 years old with some older cousins who would take me along on their nightly cruises into town. It was in the early 1970’s and still in the early stages of lowriding in Española, when the factions between the Hotrodders and the Lowriders were visibly displayed under the street light’s glow of shopping center parking lots and Main Street. One of my cousins, known as lil’ Joe, had recently moved back from California and had brought his passion for lowriding with him and transplanted it into the quickly forming popular pastime. Lil’ Joe would pass on down to me my first lowrider, a copper brown 1959 Chevrolet station wagon with velvet curtains, shag carpeting and a donut steering wheel. In all honesty, I never replaced the dead battery in the car and therefore never got to take it out on the cruise. Nonetheless, I’d accompany my cousins into Espa’, usually cruising with my cousin Raymond in his dropped 1955 Chevy pick-up. It was a beautiful piece of nostalgia painted a Diamond Black, rolling on baby-moon chromed rims on gangster-wide white-wall tires, with hood mounted dummy spotlights and Bob Dylan on his stereo. And, so Magdalena, there begins my story, my earliest recollections of lowrider’s and some of my own first experiences and observations from within the breath and soul, resuello y alma, of a distinct American cultural tradition, Lowriding Eran
en los dias de Los Heroes
The lowrider has always been a representation of individual expression and identity with connotations of a rebellious and non-conforming nature. The vato loco archetype became the model for the lowrider, and it was that paragon of social deviance that formed the alluring quality that sometimes attracted a young Chicano feeling the need to affirm his own social status within his proper world. In my contemplations regarding the Lowrider lifestyle, as I have witnessed it and lived it, as I have loved it and have attempted to outgrow my attraction to it, with no success - have come to recognize that the Lowrider bore not only the burden of his own individual identification, but also sustained the cultural traditions of language, religion, spirituality, allegiance to his own community and proclaimed proudly and even arrogantly his human existence in the reality of a social status smirked at by the status quo. I can recall as a young boy seeing these individuals, parked in their lowered cars in the shade down by the river or along roadside turn–around’s or cruising slowly through some dirt road weaving through the village, their slow rides bouncing rhythmically to the grooves spilling out from their car radios.
Los Heroes
los watchávamos cuando pasaban echando jumito azul en sus ranflas aplanadas como ranas de ojelata eran en los días de los heroes cuando había heroes turriqueando en lengua mocha y riza torcida Q-volé ahora nomás pasan los recuerdos uno tras del otro y mi corazón baila bendición bendición es estar contento Señor, gracias por... gracias por todo Por
Vida
“always on the outside of whatever side there was when they asked him why it had to be that way well, he answered, just because”Joey, Bob Dylan For any Lowrider, his car may be the ultimate form of expression and representation of how he views himself and wants to be seen, but the story would be incomplete if one were to showcase the Lowrider only through the marvelous and beautiful creation of the customized car. I believe, Magdalena, that the last thing in poetry is the poem, as I also believe that the last thing in lowriding is a lowered ride. The defining essence of what makes someone a Lowrider is something that cannot be relegated down to a material possession. In many instances, individuals who did not own a car or have a driver’s license or the means to earn the wages that were required to posses and maintain a cool ride were those who best upheld the ideal image of what it was to be a “lowrider”, a social misfit understood neither within his own culture nor within the Western Anglo-Saxon world to which he could not relate. For that type of individual, there was no way out. His locura was with him from the beginning to the end, Por Vida. For those who didn’t and for those who did persevere, who did not buy in or sell out, sangre joven y veteranos igual que no dejaron cae la bandera, who lived through la vida loca and came out laughing, grabbing at life’s sweet hustle, for the honor and glory of not caring to know any other way, it is in their own locura and from their own perspective that the Lowrider story should also be told
En Tu Memoria
el Leonard no le caiva que lo llamaran Lenny sandy blonde raspy voice green eyes toward the distant crazy walking out of the Allsup’s in Mora unbuttoned shirt and a quart of vodka stuffed in his jeans ¡watcha lo que traigo aqui! he said, as we drove away ¡que jodido, huero! ¿ que no tienes miedo que te tuersan? he chuckled, popped the bottle open !ponle! he said ¡ay, que Lenny! nomas los recuerdos quedan aqui te va un buen pajuelaso en tu memoria Theirs is an endearing language of colloquialisms, pachuquism’s, regional dialects and a car-culture vocabulary as colorful as a trunk-hood mural, and as vibrant as the memories they’ve painted and etched across our own everyday palettes of blandness and conformity.
El Chapulin y El Bionic me tope con el Chapulin y el Bionic en el Swap Meet en ‘burque pura ojelata vieja, tu sabes
y hay se comenzo el tripe how much did you say?
Fifty
I’ll take that one and one of these and two of those yeah, one- and one of these one of those and how much for one of these? o.k. do I get one of those for free you know, as a bonus for two of those one of these and one of those? well, that’ll be seventy-eight
I thought you said forty-five?
forty-five? One of those alone is forty-five
give me seventy-five
I’ll give you seventy
no, seventy-five Bionic stands in the hot sun wisps of hair from his pony tail cling to his sweating forehead ¡y, wachate este, que locote! ¿que tanto? Ten.Ten? Ten bueno, save it for me that’s a head lamp ring from a ’37, no? Yup Cool! hay vengo por el later How
Can I Tell You, Baby?
Well, Magdalena, I hope your interest hasn’t begun to wane by now. This whole Lowrider thing, it’s actually a many layered phenomena, when I think about it. How can one begin to describe or explain something that is so big and so small, so deep and so shallow, so high and so low, that it practically defies formal definition? I mean, could a definition such as this suffice? Lowrider
(ló’ri’dah) 1. A car culture lifestyle with its origins in
California. 2. An individual whose personal identity is manifested
through his automobile. 3. A car, truck, or bicycle that has been
modified to achieve a lowered profile.
And even if a definitive description could be applied to illustrate the aesthetic qualities and physical characteristics of the Lowrider, there are still other insights that can be presented with underlying social, cultural and psychological parallels. It’s been proclaimed that New Mexico’s cultural landscape has changed more dramatically within the last 30 years or so than in the previous 400. For the Lowrider del norte de Nuevo Mejico, whose daily life revolved around a direct ancestral lineage and tradition linked to la santa fe, madre, familia, tierra y agua- cosas nuestras y sagradas, a nurturing unconscious manifestation of spiritual sustenance formed a shield against the eminent winds of change and strengthened that inherent will of perseverance. Social commentaries and observations, equally humorous and ironic in their perspective, were interwoven into the riff-raffing, bullshitin’, teasing, dialogues and oral story reverberations de platica y caria. Wheels how can I tell you baby, oh honey, you’ll never know the ride the ride of a lowered Chevy slithering through the blue dotted night along Riverside Drive Española poetry rides the wings of a ‘59 Impala yes, it does and it points chrome antennae towards ‘Burque stations rocking oldies Van Morrison brown eyed girls Creedence and a bad moon rising over Chimayo and I guess it also rides on muddy Subaru’s tuned into new-age radio on the frigid road to Taos on weekend ski trips yes, baby you and I are two kinds of wheels on the same road listen, listen to the lonesome humming of the tracks we leave behind And how descriptive or accurate could a portrayal of the Lowrider be without exemplifying the linguistic orations of a slow-riding, time-stealing story? Are you with me still, Magdalena ¿Tiraremos otra vuelta? Bueno, sit back- turn up the jams and enjoy the ride. Easynights
and a Pack of Frajos
Rosendo used to ride the buses scoring phone numbers from rucas he’d meet at the parque or along Central’s bus stops and diners three to five numbers a day, homes he’d say, by the end of the week I know I’ll get lucky with at least one, ‘ey maybe she’ll have her own canton and I’ll drop by with a bottle of wine and some good smoke ¡ y vamonos recio, carnal! and he’d laugh, tilting his head back taking a long drag from a Camel regular and then he’d look at me and laugh again, saying ¡ iii, este vato! sometimes, I just don’t know about you, bro one night I was down at Jack’s shooting pool when the bartender yelled out that there was a phone call for someone whose name sounded like mine and I was real surprised that it was for me, you know well, it was this fine babe from the Westside that I’d met a few weeks before she said that my roommate had told her that I’d be there she said she’d been wondering what I’d been doing and how come I hadn’t called she wanted me to go over so I said, great! but that I’d like to shoot a few more games of pool and that I’d be there in a while not that I was really interested in pool anymore but, hey I couldn’t let on like I didn’t ever get those kinda calls, you know not like those vatos down at Tito’s with tattoos and dead-aim stares did leaning back against the wall flirting with some ruca over the phone laughing and teasing while the jukebox plays Sam Cooke and me sitting there watching and wondering where I went wrong going right I asked her if there’s anything she wants me to bring over some wine, maybe and she says, yeah that sounds good and could you bring some cigarettes too? so there I am going down the street being all truchas for the jura ‘cause I didn’t want nothin’ to ruin this movida, you know well, I pulled into the Casa Grande and asked for a bottle of Easynights and a pack of frajos and I sat looking through the drive-up window at the naked pinup girls on the wall and I started thinking of home, so far away and how oftentimes I had nowhere to go wishing I knew some nice girl I could drop by to visit and watch a mono with or just to sit and talk to it was a rainy night a beautiful rainy night and the streets were all black and wet neon lights reflecting off of everything and running down the street in streams of color and I thought of Rosendo and how he was going to laugh and I knew he was going to want to know everything ¿órale, serio? chale, you’re jiving, homes ¡no, serio her name’s Carmela ! serio, homes? yeah! no? yeah, deveras! ¡ iii, este vato! then I saw myself in the mirror and I started laughing sometimes, I just don’t know about you, bro “Take
a little trip,
take a little trip, with me” WAR And
no matter how many the years, how far removed, or how long the distance
from the road once traveled, what it is still is because it was, because
we were, because we still are at heart cruiser’s cruising through the
homeland. So no matter how much things change, that which gave us life,
sustained us, will always be with us, here, aqui- en el pecho, en el
corazon.
One
Last Cruise:
Taos Plaza
this morning I decided to throw one more cruise through the plaza en memoria de primo Bill y de los resolaneros de aquellos tiempos who had found their circle come together in the presence of each other like everything else around here it seems all is become memory some Saturday mornings my father would make the 20 mile trip into town we’d park at Cantu Furniture the parking lot that sits a’top the old 7-11 building off Paseo del Sur it was exciting for me then as a small boy to know that our car was moving across the roof of the store below and now, I still find it amusing how did that sort of engineering feat arrive in Taos? the other evening as I was looking for a place to park I pulled into that same parking lot and for a brief moment contemplated leaving my truck there but, for the sign that read
Customer Parking Only
All Others Towed Away! this morning as I cruised into the plaza I saw one lone, recognizable living, remnant, figure standing in faded jeans white t-shirt and Converse canvas Allstars
and a bundle of newspapers strapped around his shoulder el Paulie flat-topped, square jawed and looking 30 years still the same but,
where were you primo Bill? the park benches deserted the covered portals no longer bursting with children clinging to
their mothers shopping stride mama’s strolling elegant black hair curled red lip-stick the purse and coat was it that Jackie Kennedy period or was it Connie Francis? I look out the window ! nada! ¿que
paso con la palomia con los Indios envueltos en sus frezadas que paso con la mini-falda? I reach for the radio knob and I crank up Santana I let
the sound of the timbales snap against the vacant hollowness of memory against the plaza’s deserted facade against the songbirds mournful eulogy I notice a group of tourist’s congregating next to where the old Army Surplus used to be I look don’t look I look again they pretend not to I know I’m on trial I let off the gas pedal and cruise in slowly I lean back into the seat, lowdown and make myself comfortable controlling the steering wheel with one finger here’s one for the ol’ times baby! ! dale huelo! I remember cruising through the plaza as a teenager with the Luna brothers, Pedro and Rupert I remember Rupert bad-ass
Califas loco coming out to spend time with his grandparents whenever he was wanted by the law back in Madera I remember him leaning far back against the seat of that black ‘67 chevy sporting spit-shined calco’s with one leg up on the dashboard and finger-snappin time to War tunes on the 8-track stereo his locura, cocky and loud estilo
California, nothin’ like Nuevo’s quiet and proud back then Taosie wasn’t a lowriding town chale,
low Impalas came from Espa’ I remember Rupert blurting out the window to some Taoseño dudes staring us out “whatcha lookin’ at, ese we’re just lowriding!” well, I remember those times being mostly like that the predictable unknown lurking waiting around like some badass dude leaning back with one bent leg against the wall and somehow we’d slip through each incident acting like it hadn’t mattered whether we would or not this morning the people hanging out by the coffee shop laugh and languish their carefree tourist manner void of history, of memory neither attachment nor sentiment to time and place no scars as enduring testaments to the questions posed, the answers given
a young girl stretches out against the oncoming morning her breasts her form that figure ¡mmm, gringa! what am I thinking? I’m the writing instructor of this summer’s poetry class! I can’t think act look this way but, hell I pull my shoulder back turn my head and stare mmm, baby, baby! at the stop light
a young vato long hair and a pony tail looks at me catches the riff he
knows the movida a tight smile forms across his mouth Oye
Como Va Mi Ritmo
!bongo, boom, da! Mi Ritmo! tssssssssss_______ !! for you, carnal! one last cruise around the plaza What
does all this all mean? And
because you’ve asked me for my insights and contributions, Magdalena,
I’ve tried. ‘Though really, what can I offer you but this?
Broken-tongue stories, some thoughts, a few poems, a low-down cruise
with a panoramic view into a seemingly ominous future and a
reconciliation born out of a come what may resiliency-
¡y que venga lo que venga! Maybe
you can find a way to break it all up, fragment it, present it in a more
presentable way, wring out the blood, harness the spirit, translate the
non-translatable, remove the music from the song, raise the ride back up
and still call it low. Que te vaya bien. I couldn’t do it even
if I knew how. Es todo- un viaje por mi Lowcura, por mi Tierra
Sagrada. New
And Rejected Works I watched a droppedMetallic lavender colored ’66 Lemans Pull out of the AutoZone onto Sunset Sporting 5/60’s, 14” Cragars and rabbit ears Rabbit ears! A true period piece, man! A mid-seventies testament A real gem of the Sunday afternoon cruise A Hoochie-Coo Park, everyone’s eyes on it, car wash bitchin’ Piece
of ass finding ranfla What does all this all mean? What true literary aficionado Could understand or bare even the slightest interest In this ghost-patterned paint, chrome, and rubber observation? Will this poem Be allowed to exist alongside other genres of poetry? To say the least of its highly improbable publication possibilities In reputable established “American” poetry journals That hold in their editorial exercising power The ability to affirm and measure a writer’s worthwhile poetic existence No, probably not Yet, what I saw rolling out’ve that parking lot Cautiously avoiding the teeth gnashing, bumper scraping injuryTo a 1966 Lemans dressed in accessories from a past era And rolling literally naked to the general public mind Was in itself poetry to me A statement of personal taste Much as the interest akin to knife collecting Gun shows, or extravagant doll exhibits As well as, say, literary journal subscribers who must have their Poetic fix mailed to them every month Curbing an appetite for the compositional qualities and technical structuring Of a language that works best in literal abstraction Is this poem abstract enough? Does it carry a central theme engaging a universal dialogue? Is it eastern enough to satisfy the taste of the self-absorbing Intellectually sophisticated western palette? Will the U.S. poet laureate nod his head in approval And suggest that it at least be considered placed next To the greatest poems ever written about cats curled up on a windowsill? Hmmm, maybe, it’s just a little bit too literal Too barrio, too East L.A-ish Or just too Aztlanish There are, of course, great literary enthusiasts That could easily decipher the blue-dot, ‘67 Cougar taillight blinking like a Christmas tree, boogie-woogie rolas riffing out’ve the organ pipes, And dashboard saint protecting us From that which does not understand us, chain steering wheeled chariot With the red lights flashing in the mirror
Red lights flashing in the mirror?
Maybe it’s the poetry police- ! ponte truchas, carnal! Great literary enthusiasts who can’t even read Because nothing they were ever given to read Made sense to them either Who do not have subscriptions to anything of self-interest Great literary enthusiasts holed up in a lock-up facility Who sit waiting for their final sentence to be read to them Who without explanation and by implication are told We are simply following due process Whose hearts and souls and spirits and lives Have been censored by mainstream off-the shelf everything And who were given instead the concrete void of insulin Metrazol electricity Hydrotherapy psychotherapy pingpong and amnesia Oops, now, where did that come from? How come nothing in the great American poetry anthology Reads like the America I know? Or sounds like the chrome tipped, cherry-bombed Idle of a lowered bomba at the stoplight With a tattered page manuscript lying Under a pile of sorry assed Thank you for your interest rejection letters Carpeting the floor? For the original web page version, see: http://latino.si.edu/Virtualgallery/LR/Lowcura.htm |
¡Gracias por su
visita! home |