Canutito encounters a vegetarian ‘Tejano’
Un día in the summer, Canutito found una jara that had fallen del weeping willow tree en la yarda. He bent down yla pepenó and while he picked it up, al mismo tiempo he stripped it de sus branches and he decided que it would make un real fine caballito. Canutito tied un string halter en su caballito, straddled the stick horse y salió galopeando all the way down to la acequia donde hizo dip the tip of the stick en el agua as if he were giving un drink of water a su caballo.
As he was dándole agua a su caballito, Canutito noticed que un hombre with a great big hat was looking at him and smiling desde el camino. The man was wearing botas de cowboy y una belt buckle grandotota. He tipped su sombrero at Canutito and he called out: “Howdy, pard’nr.”
“Jare dusa,” Canutito replied, and then he amended it to say: “How do you do, sir.”
Then the Texan came un poco más close and he asked the little boy, “Are you playing that you are a ‘buckaroo?’ ”
“No,” Canutito replied, “I am being a ‘vaquero.’ ”
“That’s la misma cosa,” the Texas cowboy replied, “nomás que en Tejas we pronounce ‘vaquero’ as ‘buckaroo.’ Now tell me, what do you call ese cordel halter en tu caballito?”
“I call that a ‘dogal’ just like mi grampo taught me,” Canutito replied.
“Whenever I lasso a cow in Texas, I call it a little ‘dogie’ porque tiene un halter around its neck and snout.”
“Eso es muy interesting,” Canutito said, un poco unsure.
En ese momento, el cowboy de Tejas le hizo un loop a su cabresto and he swung the rope around his head. He threw the rope playfully and caught el stick horse de Canutito.
“I just lassoed tu caballito with my lariat,” he smiled.
“I can tell que what you call a ‘lariat’ comes de la Spanish word ‘la reata,’ ” Canutito said, “and when you give it a turn you call it un ‘dally Walter’ which I think viene de las Spanish words for ‘dale vuelta.’ ”
“Eso hace make a lot of sense,” el cowboy Tejano said. Then he asked him: “Do you mind if I mosey on over and sit by you?”
“Sure,” said Canutito, “But in Spanish we say ‘vamos’ whereas in Texas you say ‘mosey’ or ‘vamoose.’ ”
El cowboy Tejano laughed. He said, “I guess que los New Mexico cowboys y los Texas cowboys are almost identical. We both use formas de las mismas words. We probably eat las mismas cosas also.”
“Oh, we probably do,” Canutito agreed. “A mí me gusta comer good things like meat and chile con carne.”
El cowboy Tejano hesitated un poco and then he said, “I am a vegetarian.”
Canutito couldn’t hacer wrap su mind around that strange statement. He just couldn’t understand cómo era posible ser de Texas and be a vegetarian a la misma vez .It was like saying que una persona era un vampire pero que he didn’t drink blood. No hacía any kind of sense, so he asked him, “Why don’t you eat carne de vaca en Texas? Es parte de su heritage.”
“La carne tiene mucho colesterol,” el cowboy Tejano replied.
“Mi grama always says que you can take todo el cholesterol away de la carne if you drink café caliente with it; entonces the hot coffee hace melt away toda la manteca from it.”
El cowboy Tejano smiled and said, “In Texas, I just drink iced tea.”
“¡Chale!” Canutito said. “I thought que we were muy similares pero if you are a vegetarian, entonces you can’t be a real cowboy como yo.”
“Entonces, I’d best be on my way,” said the cowboy Tejano, “I’m hungry por unos alfalfa sprouts yun poco de tofu,” and he rode off into the sunset en su Cadillac. …