As I've mentioned on occasion, I used to live in Texas. I didn't really care for it -- I'm just not a heat and bobbycue kind of person -- but I could see why people like it there. There's a certain pleasure in seeing the enthusiasm with which native Texans -- some imports, too, but mostly native -- just enjoy being part of that state. I've never felt that strongly about anyplace I've lived (well, a certain guarded pleasure in being a Nyawker, but even then, not really; I just liked being able to mention 'getting a slice and an egg cream' and have someone know what I meant). Texans, though, just like being Texans. I think they like it just for itself, though I suspect that the bemusement with which other states view them -- particularly the North -- gives them a secret pleasure, too.
Once, I was talking with one of our secretaries, a native, and I said Alice, tell me -- what is it about Yankees that you don't like? What is it that drives you crazy about us? Because she'd made it perfectly obvious how she felt. She wasn't mean, wasn't rude, just let it be known what she thought. She gave me a brilliant smile, and she said Well, Bill -- wayull Biyull -- it's because y'all are assholes! Oh. Can't say that I was too thrilled about hearing that, but, you know, that kind of enthusiasm is invigorating -- as long as you're not the target of it. I was once in a barbecue place there -- a friend had said he was going to show me a real barbecue place - and while we were in line, and I was looking at the place, all greasy and smoky, he asked if I'd ever been in one before. No, I replied, they don't have these where I come from. Where's that? he inquired, and I said that I'd been born in New York City. At that, one of the people at a table looked up from his ribs and said, quite clearly, Well, there's another one. Not hostile, you understand, just -- exasperated. Got another varmint here, dammit.
I don't know as I'd move back to Texas if I had the chance, but I might. There's a lot to like about it. And, of course, there's lots that I don't know about it. Their old advertising slogan - Texas: It's Like A Whole Nother Country -- is true. There's places there I've only heard about, and I've wondered: is it really that rural/desolate/Texan? Take, for example, Lubbock. I know very little about it, because I've only been in its general vicinity, when I was going from Colorado/New Mexico, headed east. But I have this image of it as somewhat of a hardscrabble place, somewhere that has little in the way of amusement for people from the big city - Austin, Dallas, Fut Wuth. And absolutely nothing for Yankees (they said, with a tight smile). I don't think I'd like it there, but I kind of think I'd like people from there. I just think they'd be real people -- not much for fripperies, slick advertising, and such. Worn jeans, weathered faces. In that, they'd be my kind of people. Okay, maybe not the gunrack and NRA sticker/ Bush supporter part, but still: good people. (I can just hear them: whut khan of weed you smokin', boy?)
I have to admit, my opinion's biased: I just got a comment from someone in Lubbock -- someone named Bill, yet! -- and I thought Wow! A comment! And from someone I've never heard of before! That made me feel good.
So, I'm thinking kindly about Lubbock, and Texas, today.
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