October 29
I stopped Squatter tonight beside a dirt farming road northwest of Celeste, Texas. It’s a beautiful name for a town; you have to give the Texans that much. It even flows well with the name of the state. The smooth, unaffected assonance of the “e” calms the pronouncer. I imagine a privately contented populace, a town composed of people who go about their daily lives in seemingly unremarkable fashion. They farm, sweep, drink, relax, fight and make love like people anywhere but on closer inspection you find a wisps of smiles lurking at the corners of their mouths, for in Celeste lives a different breed of Texans, a breed that does not need the compulsive boasting by which the rest of the state is stereotyped. A quiet people who view showmanship with genial amusement. I have never known a woman named Celeste, but if I did she would have light blue eyes that sparkled with a merriment I scarcely understood. She would laugh without demeaning her object and her feet would barely touch the ground. She would smile at my confusion as I stumbled for words upon meeting her. Maybe tomorrow when I drive into Celeste, Texas tomorrow I will find a jubilant parade led down Main Street by this happy young woman, her head garlanded by a wreath of oak leaves as she reaches into a Folgers can and throws rose petals to laughing little girls.
At any rate, I am enjoying Texas so far. It’s easy to find country music on the radio. The skies are big and there are few parking meters. The nights are enchantingly temperate after the chill of the Bighorns. I write now with the door open and wind blowing through the camper. The farmland in this northeastern part of the state is a bit more crowded than I would like, but then, one can’t stay in Kansas forever. At least I have found no bentonite in Texas, the “Hell Shale” that made navigation of muddy roads in Wyoming, Nebraska and Kansas too dicey for Squatter’s street-tire supported bulk.
I am making lots of friends on the Texas roadways with my slow but aggressive driving and my Kerry-Edwards sticker. Maybe tomorrow I’ll find Crawford on the map and head that way. I also want to purchase a sticker demeaning the University of Texas Longhorns, preferably one that refers to the team as “The Masticators,” a name The Old Man invented. Then I can be sure someone will key my truck.
Citizens of Texas have long boasted of having joined the US by contract, unlike any other state, and for this reason John Steinbeck once formed an organization entitled “Friends for Texan Secession.” Although the club did little but socialize, and although all of the members of which I am aware – meaning Steinbeck – are dead, I have declared myself an honorary member. But my membership is mostly symbolic. I confess here that I think I’m coming around to this state.
Texas, I’m sure, is relieved to know it has my support.
* * *
I just had to discipline Chap for disobeying the “stay” command, a command he has executed to perfection for several weeks now. He damn sure knows what it means, but he kept jumping out of the camper after orders to the contrary. Each time he disobeyed I picked him up and threw him back inside with a harsh verbal reprimand – “what the f___ do you think you’re doing?!?” – which would be light punishment for most dogs. Then I’d walk away to test him, and four times he stepped back out. I don’t know what happened to the dog. He and I have been in sinc recently. Maybe it was the full moon or the impending thunderstorm, but I feel like hell for punishing him. I know I was right, but somehow it’s a poor consolation.
The storm is here now and is raising hell. Chap is cowering under the table, whether from the storm or my perceived wrath I’m not sure. Tonight Mother Nature is flexing her biceps. The rain lashes the camper like a thousand angry teamsters with a sound so furious that Chap would have to shout for me to hear him. The bass of thunderclaps carries through the machine-gun like pelting. The wind rocks the truck on its chassis, side to side, front to back with such ease that I worry we might be in for a tornado. There wouldn’t be much I could do about it. In the last tornado story I heard a funnel cloud carried Dorothy and Todo from Kansas to a strange land. Maybe this tornado is the return ticket she never used – maybe it will take Chap and back to Kansas. Who knows? But I’m being melodramatic. There is no tornado. This is a pretty impressive thunderstorm, though. It is turning out to be, as Willie Nelson says in his appearance in Larry McMurtry’s Texasville, “a real turd floater.” As long as it’s not a camper floater I guess we’ll be alright.
At any rate, I am enjoying Texas so far. It’s easy to find country music on the radio. The skies are big and there are few parking meters. The nights are enchantingly temperate after the chill of the Bighorns. I write now with the door open and wind blowing through the camper. The farmland in this northeastern part of the state is a bit more crowded than I would like, but then, one can’t stay in Kansas forever. At least I have found no bentonite in Texas, the “Hell Shale” that made navigation of muddy roads in Wyoming, Nebraska and Kansas too dicey for Squatter’s street-tire supported bulk.
I am making lots of friends on the Texas roadways with my slow but aggressive driving and my Kerry-Edwards sticker. Maybe tomorrow I’ll find Crawford on the map and head that way. I also want to purchase a sticker demeaning the University of Texas Longhorns, preferably one that refers to the team as “The Masticators,” a name The Old Man invented. Then I can be sure someone will key my truck.
Citizens of Texas have long boasted of having joined the US by contract, unlike any other state, and for this reason John Steinbeck once formed an organization entitled “Friends for Texan Secession.” Although the club did little but socialize, and although all of the members of which I am aware – meaning Steinbeck – are dead, I have declared myself an honorary member. But my membership is mostly symbolic. I confess here that I think I’m coming around to this state.
Texas, I’m sure, is relieved to know it has my support.
* * *
I just had to discipline Chap for disobeying the “stay” command, a command he has executed to perfection for several weeks now. He damn sure knows what it means, but he kept jumping out of the camper after orders to the contrary. Each time he disobeyed I picked him up and threw him back inside with a harsh verbal reprimand – “what the f___ do you think you’re doing?!?” – which would be light punishment for most dogs. Then I’d walk away to test him, and four times he stepped back out. I don’t know what happened to the dog. He and I have been in sinc recently. Maybe it was the full moon or the impending thunderstorm, but I feel like hell for punishing him. I know I was right, but somehow it’s a poor consolation.
The storm is here now and is raising hell. Chap is cowering under the table, whether from the storm or my perceived wrath I’m not sure. Tonight Mother Nature is flexing her biceps. The rain lashes the camper like a thousand angry teamsters with a sound so furious that Chap would have to shout for me to hear him. The bass of thunderclaps carries through the machine-gun like pelting. The wind rocks the truck on its chassis, side to side, front to back with such ease that I worry we might be in for a tornado. There wouldn’t be much I could do about it. In the last tornado story I heard a funnel cloud carried Dorothy and Todo from Kansas to a strange land. Maybe this tornado is the return ticket she never used – maybe it will take Chap and back to Kansas. Who knows? But I’m being melodramatic. There is no tornado. This is a pretty impressive thunderstorm, though. It is turning out to be, as Willie Nelson says in his appearance in Larry McMurtry’s Texasville, “a real turd floater.” As long as it’s not a camper floater I guess we’ll be alright.
posted by Jeb Butler at 2:48 PM
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