Category: Essays

Maybe it’s a Texas thing, but whether I’m listening to guitar pickers under the big oak tree at Lukenbach on a Saturday afternoon, or cruising the aisles looking for bargains at Fredericksburg Market Days or watching fish jump in Oso Bay down in Corus Christi, or swimming at the dam in Hunt, Texas belongs to me, and I belong to it. This is my kind of south. Now I once had a friend from Tennessee who disputed the “south-ness” of Texas. I will attest to its southwesterness, being just a couple of miles down the road from George Strait’s horse barn, but it’s south all right. But Texas is “southern” in its love for land and its history. In my south, you can trust a cowboy. You can serve your company beans and jalapeño cornbread on your best China. Saturday night’s for wearing your broken in boots to listen to Willie and dance at Floore’s Country Store. In my south, people aren’t too busy to talk about nothing. You get the friendly finger wave driving down any country road and you can call up the corner grocery and ask if they have any fresh tamales. In my south, we sit outside on the porch at Halloween and watch out for our neighbors’ kids. In my south Texas sky, you can still see the ripe orange moon sitting pretty in a nest of stars. We might laugh at ourselves during a watermelon seed spitting contest or a sandbelt tool race, but we love our flag and our earth and our “southern” way of life. Gaylynne Robinson