Tag Archives: West Texas

Other People’s Thoughts: Bosque County Romance

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When I first moved to Yunnan in 2000, my cousin sent with me a two-CD album of cover songs by Lyle Lovett for the purpose, she said, of reminding me of Texas. Step Inside This House became my “homesick music” over the next decade in China. The album lives and breathes home for me. If you’re not familiar with it, you should change that. Each of the songs is poetry in the form of words and guitar. I regularly included selections from the album on my playlist when I worked at Mountain Cafe — it just made me happy, in a simple way, to be in tropical Xishuangbanna, palm trees overhead and fruity drink in hand, to hear Lyle singing “Texas River Song” or mentioning places like Waco or Abilene.

Now that I’m back in the States, the songs from Step Inside This House continue to make my regular playlist. I wrote on the blog last August how “West Texas Highway” and “Ballad of the Snow Leopard and the Tanqueray Cowboy” were part of my soundtrack as I looked through my grandparents’ photos and schemed about putting together a book on West Texas. Not long after, that book began taking more definite shape, and I continue to turn to those songs for writing inspiration. As I interviewed my grandparents earlier this year, they would often have the satellite on their TV turned to the honky tonk radio channel, and many of the songs from Step Inside This House would come up, though in their original recordings, rather than in Lyle’s versions — those songs literally became a soundtrack to the book, as my voice recorder picked up the music in the background while we conducted our interviews. Then, when I spent a few extra days in the Fort Davis area after Pat and Randy headed home from our road trip in March, I mainly chose these CDs as my playlist for my solo drives.

And now, as I’m 50+ pages into the writing of the first draft of West Texas Interlude, I come to the part of the story where Bob D and Ann (my grandparents) tell of how they got married at ages 20 and 18, set off in their car for the desert, and started raising a family in the dust and drought of 1950s West Texas. How could I not think of “Bosque County Romance,” the third song in Steven Fromholz’s “Texas Trilogy” that opens the second disk of Step Inside This House? Change the names Billy and Mary to Bob and Ann, and it sounds so similar to stories I’ve heard from my grandparents. It’s a beautiful song, with Alison Krauss singing harmony.

The song is a story of love built on more than passing emotion, built on a life lived together working in the same direction. It’s the same story of love I see in my grandparents — it’s one of many things I’ve learned and seen in them that I aspire to as well.

I’d love to embed a video of it here, but alas, I could not find one. Here are a few of the lyrics instead:

Mary Martin was a schoolgirl

Just seventeen or so

When she married Billy Archer

About fourteen years ago

Not even out of high school

Folks said it wouldn’t last

But when you grow up in the country

You grow up mighty fast

 

They married in a hurry

In March before school was out

Folks said that she was pregnant,

“Just wait and you’ll find out.”

It came about that winter

One gray November morn

The first of many more to come

A baby boy was born…

 

Now Billy kept what cattle

His daddy could afford

Bouncing across the cactus

In a 1950 Ford

The cows were sick and skinny

And the weeds was all that grew

But Billy kept the place alive

The only thing he knew

 

And Mary cooked the supper

And Mary scrubbed the clothes

And Mary busted horses

And blew the baby’s nose

And Mary and a shotgun

Kept the rattlesnakes away

How she kept on smiling

No one one could ever say…

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From Research to Writing

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Once again I’ve entered into a new phase on my current work-in-progress, West Texas Interlude. Last week I made a firm step out of the research phase and into the draft writing season of the project.

It was almost two years ago that I began this phase on my first book, a middle grade novel based on the experiences of my friend Lydia in Yunnan. I’m finding, though, that this time around the writing phase is different. For one thing, I’ve been working full-time as a writer for two years now, and the day-in-day-out diligence of a writing schedule is perfectly normal to me now. When I first started writing the novel, I was staying with good friends who I would just as soon have sat around drinking coffee with all morning than hole up in their basement to type on my laptop. It was hard making myself work. Somehow, I don’t know how, that book was eventually written.

The other major difference I’ve noticed so far in writing West Texas Interlude is that the words come much easier because they are in my own voice. The novel was written from the perspective of a 13-year-old Bulang girl. I, as you might be aware, am not a 13-year-old Bulang girl. West Texas Interlude is a non-fiction project based on my own experiences and my family’s stories. It’s just me, writing, talking to my readers (whoever they may end up being). Kind of the same way I write these blog posts. I’ve been developing my voice and style long enough now that I don’t have to work to conjure them up. It’s a wonderfully refreshing feeling, fingertips to the keyboard, words popping up on the screen.

Just as I had the hospitality of several friends in Alaska and Fort Worth to give me living and office space while writing the novel, I have friends here in the Tri-Cities who have opened their homes to me to use while they are at their day jobs. I leave my apartment by 8am each day and head over to my friends’ house to set up my mobile writing office. It’s a great set-up. More so than when I’m working on freelance projects and magazine articles, I need that separation of space from my living quarters to help me feel like, ok, I’m at work now, time to get busy.

In addition to writing West Texas Interlude in the mornings, I’m also working on a new project in the afternoons. I won’t divulge all the details about it yet, but I’ll give you a photo hint from a previous post — way previous, like May 2009 previous.

 

 

Are you hungry yet? Do you use a Kindle or a Kindle app? Check back here for more info about what I’m working on as it develops.

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Inspired by “Dear Photograph”

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A couple of weeks before my final research trip for West Texas Interlude, a friend sent me a one line email: Hey, have you ever heard of dearphotograph.com? I think you should do one on your March road trip!

Not content to stop with one, we printed out a few shots from my grandfather’s slides to take along with us. Here’s what we came up with…

Monahans Sandhills, fall 1957

 

Judge Roy Bean’s place in Langtry, November 1957

 

sign at the Pecos River Bridge, November 1957

 

Kit Carson rock outside Fort Davis, 1958 or ’59

The last one is kind of fudged — we never found the exact spot, although we thought we were close.

This…

and this…

are what it looked like when we scoured our locations for just the right angle. No one really asked what we were doing, although one girl napping on a picnic table beside the road gave me a dirty look, presumably because I interrupted her by climbing on a rock a hundred feet away. Oh well.

P.S. We’ve submitted a photo to Dear Photograph — I’ll keep you posted if they use it. In the meantime, you should check out their site.

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Emory Peak in the Chisos Mountains

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The day after Thanksgiving in 1957, Bob and Ann piled the kids in the station wagon and drove from Sanderson, Texas, to Big Bend National Park. Sanderson to Jacksboro was too far a drive for the family to make for the holiday, so they stayed down on the border and made a true holiday of it by visiting the park.

Santa Elena Canyon, 1957 (notice the height of the people standing by the river, on the right)

For the last leg of my West Texas Interlude trip with Pat and Randy, we ended up at the Chisos Mountain Lodge in the national park — Bob and Ann had made a day trip of it, going all the way to Santa Elena Canyon on the west side of the park and back to Sanderson in one day, but we opted to stop for a couple of nights in the mountains. Shortly after we arrived, we went out for a 1.5 mile loop hike near the lodge and visitor’s center, taking in views of the Window below us. As we set out on the loop, we paused at the map posted at the trailhead, and I recalled a vivid memory of standing in that place with Jen and Janel a year and a half ago, after we’d finished our 5 mile hike to the Window and back. I remembered looking at the dotted lines on the map for the South Rim and Emory Peak and hoping that I would get to come back and see more of the park.

And in that moment of remembrance, I decided that I needed to make it happen. I needed to climb up to the top of Emory Peak. So the next morning, I took my laptop out of my backpack, put in a few snacks and a couple of water bottles instead, and I set off. I tried not to focus too much on the signs posted several times in the first mile of my trip, warning that this is bear and mountain lion country.

I’ll be very honest — I hope I never, ever see a bear or mountain lion. My fear of them is very rational (they’re predators!), so it’s not at all a phobia. Pretty much every step of the way to the top and back I was certain that something was about to lunge for me from the forest. I heard growling a few times (maybe). I also heard something swishing along in the brush beside me once or twice, in step with me, stalking me, stopping when I stopped. It turned out to be my ponytail swishing against the top of my backpack, but for a few moments I was sure my time was up.

Texas Mandrone and agave, on the Pinnacles Trail leading to Emory Peak Trail

For more than an hour, I hiked without seeing another soul coming or going. I was beginning to wonder if I’d made a mistake in coming up there on my own — Pat and Randy and I all felt that it would be crowded enough on the last weekend of spring break that I wouldn’t actually be hiking alone all day. Nine miles is a long way by yourself, just you and the predators. During that first hour I sang to myself and the trees and the Mexican bluejays that hopped along the trail in front of me. After that, I leapfrogged with a couple of families and passed a few other people on the way to and from the top, solitary no more. My thoughts changed from certainty that I was being stalked, to wondering will my size in comparison with the others make me easy prey, or will it make me look less appetizing (I don’t exactly have a lot of meat on my bones)?

Four-and-a-half miles later, I reached the top of Emory Peak. Technically, I didn’t go all the way to the highest point. The last 20 or 25 feet are a scramble up some rocks where you get a 360 degree view — but I and a few others in the groups I’d arrived with were satisfied to watch the brave few climb up there while we enjoyed our slightly-less-than 360 degree view. I am unashamed that I only made it to 7800 feet and not 7825.

view from Emory Peak

I sat down on a rock to snack and rest and chat with the others before heading back down, when I realized I got a cell signal for the first time since we’d arrived in the park. I had received text and voice messages, and with my phone to my ear I heard the guy next to me say, “You’re getting a signal up here? Is that why you made the hike?”

“Yeah, I came up here to check my voicemail.”

view of the Chihuahuan Desert from Emory Peak

I made it back down to the lodge without seeing any bears or mountain lions, nor any prickly pear in bloom (almost, but not quite). Sitting at the restaurant patio with cold drinks later in the afternoon, Randy told me about this article about a mountain lion attacking a 6-year-old kid in February, causing them to close all the Chisos Mountain trails while they tracked the lion — which they didn’t find. Turns out the kid was attacked between the lodge and the restaurant. I later dug around on the NPS website and found a listing of mountain lion sightings in Big Bend for the month of February — one of the seven sightings for the month was at “Chisos Mountains Lodge, room 206, top of stairs.” I was sitting on my bed in room 215 when I read this. I guess I’m just as safe on Emory Peak as I am on the way to breakfast.

(For anyone who ended up at this blog because you’re looking to hike Emory Peak, I did the 9 mile round-trip hike with a 2500 foot elevation gain in 5.5 hours — and I highly recommend it, especially if you’ve already been on a lot of the other trails in the park. It’s amazing to stand at the top and look down at the places where you’ve already hiked.)

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Other People’s Thoughts: On the Pecos River

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“We crossed the wild Pecos,

We forded the Nueces,

We swum the Guadalupe,

And we followed the Brazos”

from Texas River Song by Townes Van Zandt

Well, on this trip so far we’ve only crossed the wild Pecos and gazed in the distance at the Rio Grande, but this song keeps going through my head. As does this quote I recently read in Three Dollars Per Mile by the Texas Surveyors Association:

“The Pecos is a remarkable stream, narrow and deep, extremely crooked in its course, and rapid in its current. Its waters are turbid and bitter, and carry, in both mechanical mixture and chemical solution, more impurities than perhaps any other river in the south. Its banks are steep, and, in a course of two hundred and forty miles, there are but few places where an animal can approach them for water in safety. Not a tree or bush marks its course; and one may stand on its banks and not know that the stream is near. The only inhabitants of its water are catfish; and the antelope and wolf alone visit its dreary, silent, and desolate shores. It is avoided even by the Indians.” 

— Captain S.G. French’s description of the Pecos River from an 1849 exploratory mission for the U.S. Army

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Fort Davis, Texas

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The Stone Village Tourist Camp in Fort Davis is to quirky hangouts and people-watching what the Eleven Inn in Balmorhea was to peace and relaxation.

Before Pat made our reservation, she called me to let me know what the sleeping arrangements would be like. She and Randy got a little motel room at this renovated 1935 facility, and I got a “camp room.”

My camp room reminded me of rural guesthouses I’ve stayed at many times in China, with a separate public bathroom a few doors down from where I slept. Well, that’s not an entirely fair assessment — the Stone Village camp rooms are clean and have an aesthetically pleasing decor, so the comparison to a Chinese guesthouse does eventually break down. My room had concrete floors and stone walls, while Pat and Randy’s room (with private bath) had wood floors and finished walls.

The thing that caught me off guard when I first saw my camp room was the entryway. There wasn’t a solid door — the entire front of the room was a screen. One section of the screen opens, and a thick curtain pulls across to give the semblance of privacy. The curtain doesn’t shut all the way, and since my room faced the main driveway leading to the highway, I felt a bit like I was on display the entire time I was in the room. I was also a little concerned at first that I might get cold at night, since the desert sky was mostly clear and the temperature would drop with the sun, but the down comforter on my bed kept me very toasty all night. Overall, I had a comfortable stay and would recommend the camp room if you’re wanting to sleep in a bed instead of a tent, but don’t want to shell out the money for a private bath.

The next morning, I wandered from my bed to the Stone Village Market across the courtyard — a fun little whole foods store where you can sit on the front patio under dried chilies and wildflowers and watch the town wake up. I drank a couple of cups of the West Texas Wildfire roast from Big Bend Coffee Roasters in Marfa (with agave nectar and organic half-and-half added), wrote a few postcards, and savored the lazy morning before getting back in the car for our next destination: Sanderson, Langtry, and the Pecos River Bridge.

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Balmorhea, TX, pop. 435

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It took me approximately 5 minutes after our arrival at Eleven Inn in Balmorhea to decide I wanted to come back and stay a few more days. We weren’t even planning to stay in Balmorhea when we first marked out our itinerary for this trip for West Texas Interlude, but every hotel in Pecos is currently booked solid by oil companies doing new drilling. Ironic that I’m taking a trip to visit towns once prosperous in the 1950s that have supposedly been in decline for decades because of the end of the West Texas oil boom and the building of I-20 to replace old Highway 80…and we couldn’t find a hotel on I-20 because of a new oil boom.

The boom worked in our favor by sending us to Balmorhea for the night. There are eleven rooms at Eleven Inn, each with its own quirky furniture and chenille bedspread. My room had a fuzzy stool at a wooden desk, two “distressed” nightstands (certainly not distressed to make them appear shabby chic, but distressed naturally over the years), a comfy bed, and a tiny tv perched on the top shelf of the closet. I never turned on the tv, but opted to listen instead to the glorious quiet of a motel courtyard located away from the highway. This morning I heard a rooster and what I think might have been the motel owner singing in the yard.

We made a stop at the state park and the famous pool filled by San Solomon Springs — 1 million gallons of water per hour gurgle out of the spring into the 3.5 million gallon pool, whose overflow heads to Balmorhea Lake and nearby irrigation channels. Tiny fish bumped against our toes when we dangled our feet over the concrete edge into the water that maintains a constant 72-76 degree temperature year-round.

Before leaving this morning for Fort Davis, I checked with the owners of Eleven Inn to see if they would have space for me to come back the following weekend. No worries — spring break will be over by then, and I should be able to come and sit for a while. Pat and Randy will head back to Denton on Sunday, but I think I’ll stay behind and enjoy the quiet, write in the mornings, hike in the Davis Mountains in the afternoons, and stare up at the star-filled sky at night.

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Monahans Sandhills

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You really should roll down a sandhill if you get a chance. Afterwards, be prepared to find sand in your pockets, in the cuffs of your rolled up jeans, in your ears, in your belly button, in between your teeth, and stuck to the chapstick on your lips — but it’s worth the experience.

photos by Randy Hatcher

We brought along a cardboard box and a couple of lids from plastic containers to use as sleds, but had no luck getting them to slide down the dunes. Everyone else we saw (including a girl in a styrofoam box) had a similar problem: you get going a little ways, and the edge of your sliding device plows into the sand and gets stuck.

The visitor’s center has plastic disks and surfboards available for rental, but they also have a sign posted saying they cannot guarantee disks or boards will slide. I’m just not willing to risk attempting a slide on rented gear without such a guarantee.

(Thank you, Aunt Pat, for playing in the sand with me — and thank you, Randy, for being a wonderful trip photographer.)

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Headed West

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It snowed again the week I left Washington, but spring was evident when I arrived in Texas. The backroads of Jack and Wise Counties are lined with wild plum trees in blossom, and at my grandparents’ 0$ Ranch the redbuds, peach trees, daffodils, irises, and lilac bush are blooming.

My grandmother and I spent some time looking through a dresser drawer full of memories and came across a few stray papers of interest. One was the hospital bill from my father’s birth, July 27, 1951 in Pecos, Texas. The other was a receipt for the Pontiac Catalina my grandfather purchased new in 1952. The car cost a little over $3100. My dad cost $123.

This weekend I head out on the big road trip that will be my last hurrah for research on West Texas Interlude, the nonfiction book I’m writing to accompany my grandparents’ photos of life on the road working for Conoco in the 1950s. On the itinerary are Monahans, Pecos, Balmorhea, Fort Davis, Sanderson, Langtry, and Big Bend National Park. My aunt is determined to roll down one of the sandhills at Monahans — I’m still undecided as to whether I’ll join her or stand at the bottom to take her picture. At the end of a long week of driving, we’ll end up at the Chisos Mountains in Big Bend, where I’d wanted to stay in 2010 when my friends and I were diverted to the campground on the Rio Grande instead. This time we have a reservation at the lodge, so hopefully nothing will keep us from a couple of nights in the mountains to end our trip. I can’t think of a nicer place to debrief and write notes on a week’s worth of travel and research — and hopefully sneak in a couple of good hikes while we’re at it.

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January Research Trip

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I’ve just about caught up with sorting through photos and notes on scraps of paper and in my little spiral at this point on my second research trip for my work-in-progress, the nonfiction book West Texas Interlude. I spent most of last week at my grandparents’ place in Boonsville, before my aunt and I headed out on a two day trip to West Texas.

As happened on my first research trip in November 2011, many of my best recordings and notes were made while driving to doctor appointments for my grandfather or hovering behind my grandmother while she stirred something on the stove. I’ve done quite a bit of driving in the counties near where they live, as well as riding around on the Polaris Ranger or walking on their place. I haven’t seen as many deer as I did last fall, but a few are still hanging around. One morning I saw the largest jackrabbit I’ve ever seen, bouncing out of the brush near where I’d pulled over my truck on the gravel road. My grandmother and I spotted the red-tailed hawk that we’d seen a couple of times in November, and I couldn’t begin to count the cardinals that have flitted back and forth in front of me on the road or in the front yard, their vibrant feathers brightening up the dull browns of a January landscape in Texas.

Over the weekend, my aunt and I found ourselves in Stamford, Aspermont, Snyder, and Sweetwater. We were on a quest to find rent houses, an apartment, a motel, a couple of churches, an elementary school, and a roadside park where my grandfather played baseball on the Conoco team in 1950. We took photos all along the way, less for me to post online, more to show my grandparents (who would have come along for the ride if they could).

My favorite house that we found was this one in Aspermont (pop. 1021). A couple of ladies we talked to at the Pony Espresso cafe near the square in Aspermont surmised that this is the one where my grandparents rented an upstairs apartment as their first home after their wedding in 1950. Wouldn’t it make a perfect haunted house in a movie?

I love the dormers and the quirky diamond-shaped windows.

Alas, my grandmother took one look at the photos and announced that this was not the house where they lived. Our new friends at the Pony Espresso knew of no other house in town that was large enough to be divided into apartments that fit the bill, so we’re left to assume the house is gone.

Back to organizing photos and transcribing interviews…

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