Honey and Mexicans

Honey and the Mexicans

(a fictional story from times gone by)

The people we (“we” meaning me) live with are not normal. If you saw them at the chicken fights at "The Emporium" on Saturday night you might think they look normal. They kind of fit into that element of larger sweaty people with tattoos and most of their teeth. But if you had to go to church with them on the two occasions that takes us to church: Easter and Christmas, and listen to them in the car lecture one another on the words that one CANNOT use in church (“You cannot use the f-word in church) or the priest or pastor or rabbi or whatever that guy up front is called will get really upset… remember two Easters ago?”)… if you had to listen to this you would realize they are not normal.

And no matter how many times you request that they NOT put the honey in the fridge they do it anyway. They will leave milk on the counter all night; they will push aside the open container of melting ice cream to be sure to get the honey to put in the fridge.

As you know after honey sits in the fridge it WILL NOT come out of the container. It takes hours for it to get warm enough to use again.

 “Hey, who put the honey in the fridge!?!?” you ask the two nearly full grown people sitting in front of the TV. One belongs in your house and the other one visits non-stop so he also belongs in your house.

In unison from the family room where two sit watching TV in the middle of the day, “I dunno”. They grin at each other because they said it at the same time… “Hey dud we said that at the same time!”

One throws a potato chip at the other and it careens off his head and falls to the carpet.

“Hey guys don’t throw food!”

“It is okay the dogs will get it.”

There is a swirl activity on the floor as group of ankle tall dogs growl and fight for the fallen chip. It looks like one of those scene from the old Tarzan movies where the piranha boil the water in a frenzy as they eat some poor animal or person who enters their South American river.

Me: “What are you two doing?”

Them: “Watching Oprah.”

Me: “Watching Oprah? What do you two care about Oprah?”

Them: “There are some nice chicks there sitting in the audience”.

Me: “You are watching Oprah for the shots of the ladies in the audience?”

They completely ignore my question and one says to the other, “Dude, we should like go there. It is in Chicago.”

Them one to the other: “They don’t let guys in”.

Them: “Dude, look there is guy right there.”

I have to interrupt, “Why don’t you go and find jobs?!?!?”

Them: “All the Mexicans have all the jobs.”

Me: “Jose, you are a Mexican.”

Jose gets off the couch and addresses me as though I am a human being. And maybe he is serious, but it is hard to tell...

Jose: “Mr. A, I told you before the term is not Mexican it is Latino. I am a Latino.” He is pointing to himself with two hands for some kind of emphasis.

“Me: But Jose, you said ‘all the Mexican’s have the jobs’. You used the word Mexican.”

Jose: “Mr. A, I am Mexican so I can use whichever word I want, Latino, Mexican, whatever, but you are white, so you have to say Latino or you offend us Latinos. It is like when Black people use the ‘n-word’. They can say that but we can’t say that. It is the same thing.”

Me: “So who put the honey in the refrigerator?”