Tessie D

I could tell from the first day that I met Angel — before anyone told me anything about him and his educated family — that he had money. His jeans, his boots. They were worn but not worn out, like the rest of us at dairy. They didn’t have patches where they’d been snagged on…

Angel has started coming by before work in the morning. I came in early on Tuesday to get some paperwork done on the quarterly taxes, and Angel came by the office. He asked if I regularly came in early, and I fibbed, telling him I did. I don’t know why I said it. I mostly…

For the past few days, Angel has been coming into the office for lunch with the other dairyhands. He is just as kind and sweet as I remembered him from the carnival. We all sit in the backyard under the large oak tree at a rectangular picnic table. Mrs. Olsen sometimes comes over from the…

Last Friday, the boy from the carnival, Angel, started working on the dairy. I’d gotten to the office early, well before the sun had come up, since it was Friday, and I needed to work on payroll and have everyone’s checks ready by the end of the day. The morning was quiet, just the sounds…

I’ve been thinking a lot about Momma, Daddy, and Annie lately. I miss them so much sometimes that I think about getting in the car and driving home. But, I know that what I miss isn’t just them but a certain time with them. I want a time machine more than anything, to go back…

It’s starting to get cooler during the day, and for all the misery that we have to endure in the summer, there is nothing more beautiful than Texas in September and October. Since I was starting to get a little stir-crazy in the office, I decided today that I would take a walk down the…

Yesterday was Thursday, which means everyone heads to Stephenville after dinner to Bostocks, a bar all the college kids go to across the street from their campus. A few of the younger dairy hands have invited me to come along, but it’s an hour there and back. And while the college kids can just walk…

One of my first memories is riding in the back seat of our family’s Oldsmobile station wagon through southern New Mexico along I-10. We were somewhere between Deming and Lordsburg, and Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton were singing about islands in a stream. Momma, Annie, and I were returning home to Sierra Vista, Arizona, after…

I grew up on a farm… maybe it was a ranch? We had cows (like a ranch), but we also grew hay (so an agricultural product, like a farm). Well, I say “farm” because “ranch” sounds way more fancy than anything that I ever knew. Still, I grew up on a farm. So, working on…

I’m in the office by myself most days. I have a lot of time to think. Everyone is nice. Mr. Olsen — the man who owns the dairy — is, I’d guess, in his sixties. He is tall with lots of grey hair and a big pot belly. He wears overalls every day with a…