Jofield mentioned this song on 26-Apr-2000.

This is my transcription from a recording at YouTube. Although the "video" shows the cover of the album "The Best of Jim Ringer: The Band of Jesse James," the track list at AllMusic.com doesn't include this song.

The song has an unusual pattern of internal rhymes. To clarify the structure, I have place all the rhyming words at the ends of lines, although this leaves some leftover short lines that don't rhyme anything. So be it.


TIJUANA
Jim Ringer

L.A.'s such a big town,
I thought I might go down
To Tijuana.
L.A. would never miss me while I'm gone.
I heard a mariachi band.
Tequila helped me understand
Their music,
And a dark-eyed senorita asked me home.

I asked her where she come from.
She told me she was born
In Cincinnati,
But her mama had been Mexican by birth.
She got led off by someone's lies,
But TJ'd opened up her eyes
Completely,
And now she realized what home was worth.

She said she'd been a flower child,
Grown weary from the many miles
She'd traveled since she left her dad and mama.
She never did intend to stay,
But found it hard to get away.
Well, that happens ev'ry day in Tijuana.

I woke up the next day,
Thinkin' I might stay
In Tijuana.
There was no one waitin' for me in L.A.
I felt her body start to stir.
I woke her up by kissin' her
And told her
It was time for us to meet another day.

She said she had some bills to pay,
And maybe I could see my way
To help her.
Everything she owed was comin' due today.
I told that I guessed I could,
And that I really understood
Her problem,
So I gave her twenty, then went on my way.

And now L.A. seems a smaller town,
And I get tired o' hangin' round
The beaches and the bars and Cinerama.
I wonder if I could 'a' stayed.
Well, wond'rin's no good, 'n' anyway,
That happens ev'ry day in Tijuana.

- - -
The story reminds me of a scene in, IIRC, Rabbit Run by John Updike, which I read a long time ago: a woman who didn't seem to be a prostitute asks the narrator for money after sex, in a manner that allows them both to save face. I wonder if this is a common occurrence--or did Ringer read the same novel?