My dad’s list is short and simple. He loves the Marines, his grandsons, menudo on Sundays, and Clint. If pressed, he’ll own up to loving the Cowboys but admits they’ve lost much of his admiration, largely thanks to Jerry Jones. It’s best not to get him started on Jerry Jones.   

Daddy is a sentimental man plagued with nostalgia for his hometown: Clint, a hamlet of about 1,000 Texans just downriver from El Paso. He reminisces about picking cotton as a boy with his siblings, baling hay with his dad, Sunday church, and cruising the back roads of the neighboring farm towns.  

Eighty-seven years old now, Daddy still sees Clint as it was when he was growing up. He sees cotton fields, pecan orchards, irrigation canals (where he played and learned how to swim), Don Poli’s corner store, the San Lorenzo Church, and those dirt roads. He remembers the train blocking the main road in the heart of town during the most inconvenient times, and a tractor further slowing that same traffic when all anyone wanted was to get home.  

Daddy doesn’t live in Clint anymore. He’s in an assisted living facility in the city, El Paso, but he visits for family gatherings. Each time, he asks his daughters “¿Mijas, y mi pueblo?” Without fail, he wants to know what has happened to his town.  

(Courtesy/Christina Franco)

He sees that many of the cotton fields are now housing developments. He remembers the farmers who used to own the land, their fields now rows of cookie-cutter homes. He recalls the braceros who worked the fields as they tried for a better life. He can still point to an old adobe bracero house, now crumbling because of neglect, and tell us who lived there.  

Daddy hearkens back to his own blood and sweat working in the fields. He remembers his aching back, battered hands, and sore knees. I don’t have to look too closely to recognize the scars of years of manual labor on his now-wrinkled hands. 

He also sees the for-sale signs on some of the farms that remain. We talk about how the farmers he knew had to sell. He tries to understand the reasons. We talk about climate change and the lack of water. We discuss the younger generations not wanting to farm anymore. We talk about how it’s difficult for them to find work and how costs are too high. Always, he loses his train of thought and tells me about the old owners who could speak Spanish just as well as the braceros. “Es verdad, mija, igual como nosotros.”   

And so Daddy worries. He worries about Clint. He worries about the families still trying to farm there. He worries about the people who live in Clint who stay because they prefer small-town life, many of them in Clint because their parents and grandparents had lived there too. Daddy notices pecan orchards being sold off for industrial parks. He sees the empty warehouses surrounding the town, recently built but not yet leased. And he wonders what purpose they serve when the pecan trees are now gone.  

Daddy reminds me that trees bear witness to all of Clint’s residents and their stories. To him, they are his contemporaries and share his experiences.  

I tell Daddy that Clint is experiencing what so many rural towns in America are experiencing. I tell him about the millions of acres of farmland lost to development over the past few years, and how recent studies estimate that nearly 300 million acres of farmland across America will change hands in the next two decades. I tell him about the ever-expanding footprint of urban development. I tell him how younger generations want to move to urban areas. I try to comfort Daddy by telling him Clint isn’t alone. It doesn’t matter, though. “Mija, solamente me importa Clint.”  

I’ve inherited many things from my father. I have his terrible eyesight and his gray hair. I have his stubbornness and need to share unsolicited opinions. We both love Vicente Fernández and Mariachi Vargas de Tecalitlán. We were die-hard Cowboys fans back in the day. We both enjoy the drum beats of the matachines as they dance at the San Lorenzo Fiesta in August. We love the gorditas the old ladies expertly make, their hands masterfully shaping the masa. We like chicken on the disco (tractor disk) and homemade chicharrones.   

I’ve long shared my dad’s love of Clint and the nostalgic lens through which he views the town. Growing up, I got to see it more like how it existed when my dad was young. I cruised the same dirt roads he cruised as a teen pachuco. I looked forward to my drive home from college or work, getting off I-10 at the Clint exit and driving down toward North Loop, the lush green welcoming me home, an oasis in the desert.  

I, too, worry about the disappearing farmland. What will happen once those orchards on North Loop are sold for another massive, sterile, industrial park? I’m heartened when I see a new pecan grove being planted, like the one on Fenter Road. But young orchards are rare now. I make sure to point to that grove on Fenter when Daddy gets misty-eyed.  

These days, more and more Town of Clint meeting agendas contain items for discussion that deal with new developers and their plans for this small town. Many residents share my and Daddy’s concerns that the Clint they love will soon be totally paved under and built over. 

My family has resided in Clint since the early 1900s. Many family members have moved on, but many remain. Those who have moved on still visit, usually for the San Lorenzo Fiesta, and feel like they’ve come home. Those of us who’ve stayed are fighting to keep Clint as a place they’ll recognize. 

It may be nostalgia motivating us. Sentimentality in overdrive. But for me, it’s how I honor my dad, the salty Marine who no doubt adds the word Clint after God, Country, and Corps. 

The post ‘Mija, Solamente Me Importa Clint’ appeared first on The Texas Observer.

The second of three Hutchinson Community College players has left the Gophers 2026 recruiting class.

Safety Michael “MJ Graham said late Tuesday that he will de-commit from the U class for next year. He pledged to the U after a visit earlier this month. Graham, of Oklahoma City, joined fellow Hutchinson (Kan.) player, receiver Derrick Salley, in backing away from the U. Salley made his decision public earlier Tuesday.

“After a thoughtful conversation with my family I will be de-committing for the University of Minnesota,” Graham wrote on X. “I like to thank all the coaches and staff there, and I appreciate them for believing in me and giving me a opportunity!”

Meanwhile, Hutchinson defensive tackle KJ Henson is still in the Gophers’ class on Wednesday morning.

Graham, who is listed at 5-foot-11 and 190 pounds, is considered a three-star recruit, per 247Sports.

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By JILL LAWLESS and SAM McNEIL, Associated Press

LONDON (AP) — The Russia-Ukraine war has seen almost four years of failed peace plans, blueprints and high-level summits. A new U.S. push to end the fighting has set off the latest flurry of diplomacy, with American, European, Russian and Ukrainian officials all trying to shape the outcome of Europe’s deadliest conflict since World War II.

Tilted heavily toward Russia’s aims, the U.S.-backed proposal presented to Ukraine last week set off alarm bells in Kyiv and other European capitals. Ukraine and its allies offered a set of counterproposals that revamped the plan’s points. Ukrainian and European leaders expressed optimism about the talks’ momentum, but awaited responses from Washington and Moscow that are crucial.

“I think we’re getting very close to a deal,” U.S. President Donald Trump said Tuesday. He said the proposals had been “fine-tuned” and announced he was sending his envoy Steve Witkoff to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin next week.

A contentious peace plan

Based on talks between Washington and Moscow, the 28-point plan presented to Ukraine calls on it to cede its entire eastern region of the Donbas to Russia, which invaded its smaller neighbor in February 2022. The plan would put a 600,000-person limit on Ukraine’s military and bar Ukraine or any other new member from NATO. It also would rule out NATO troops in Ukraine and does not commit the U.S. or European nations to Ukraine’s defense if Russia attacks again.

Russia would commit to no more attacks on Ukraine, facing sanctions if it violates that pledge.

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Ukraine and its European allies said the plan rewards Russian aggression and scrambled to offer counterproposals aimed at shifting the balance toward Ukraine, such as lifting the cap on Ukraine’s military power, leaving open the question of future NATO membership and postponing discussions of territorial concessions until after a ceasefire.

U.S. and Ukrainian officials met Sunday in Geneva, with both sides calling the talks constructive and promising to produce a revised peace plan.

U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll met Russian and Ukrainian officials in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday, but Putin’s foreign policy advisor, Yuri Ushakov, said the new peace plan was not discussed in detail. He said that while Moscow had seen a copy of the proposals, it had yet to receive the document through official channels.

The fragility of the process was underscored by a leaked transcript of a call in which Witkoff appeared to coach Ushakov on how to win Trump’s support for a peace plan. Moscow denied leaking the conversation, details of which were first published by Bloomberg News.

The White House did not dispute the veracity of the transcript, and Trump described Witkoff’s reported approach to the Russians in the call as “standard” negotiating procedure.

Ukrainian officials said they hoped President Volodymyr Zelenskyy would travel to the U.S within days to meet Trump, while the U.S. president said he could eventually meet both Zelenskyy and Putin, but not until more progress has been made.

Bolstering Ukraine’s security

Amid worries in Europe that it is being sidelined in peace plans, allies of Ukraine who have pledged to underwrite and guarantee any ceasefire — the 35-nation Coalition of the Willing — held a video conference Tuesday attended by Zelenskyy and U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

About 20 countries in the coalition have agreed to join a post-ceasefire “reassurance force” for Ukraine. The plan foresees European allies training Ukrainian troops and providing sea and air support, but relies on U.S. military muscle as a security guarantee.

Trump has not explicitly committed to providing that backup, but the leaders of Britain, France and Germany said after Tuesday’s meeting that attendees had agreed with Rubio “to accelerate joint work with the United States to take forward the planning on security guarantees.”

French President Emmanuel Macron, left, attends a video conference of the ‘Coalition of the Willing’ on Ukraine at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2025. (Teresa Saurez, Pool Photo via AP)

War-weariness could aid peace efforts

The latest push for peace comes as Ukrainians are exhausted after almost four years of war, with the country’s cities and energy infrastructure pummeled by Russian missiles and drones.

People watch as emergency services personnel work to extinguish a fire following a Russian attack in Kyiv, Ukraine, Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Dan Bashakov)

Both Russia and Ukraine have suffered hundreds of thousands of dead and wounded, and along the front line Russia is making slow gains and at huge human cost.

European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said sanctions on Russian oil and gas were starting to bite, putting Moscow under pressure.

“They want us to believe they can continue forever. This is not true,” she said.

There are also domestic troubles for Zelenskyy, dealing with a corruption scandal in his administration — and for Trump, facing rifts within his MAGA movement.

A residential building is seen heavily damaged after a Russian strike on Kyiv, Ukraine, on Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)

Jim Townsend, a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, said the Russians likely perceive Trump as impatient and unfocused, and will deploy delay tactics to avoid concessions.

“This could just be a real mess. The Russians don’t feel any pressure. They think they’re going to win if they hold out long enough. The pressure’s all on Zelenskyy,” he said.

McNeil reported from Brussels.