Texas

You say you’re not from Texas,
Man as if I couldn’t tell,
You think you pull your boots on right,
And wear your hat so well,

That’s right -- you’re not from Texas,
That’s right -- you’re not from Texas,
That’s right -- you’re not from Texas...
But Texas wants you anyway.

Even if that is not true, it is a nice thing for Lyle to say.
While I’m dubious whether Texas on the whole would want much to do with me, I think at least things with me and Austin are copacetic. It's a place I don’t feel out of place at all.

The rains rain warm in late November. and the trees, the L i v e Oaks; low, crowning giants they are. Their limbs are dense and make these earnest and dark marks everywhere you look along the landscape. It’s like Robert Motherwell was drunk on tequila and took a big brush to the place. It makes you blink your eyes. If you sit on a limb, and you might mistakenly think you are riding on the back of a great oxen.
No doubt, these Oaks know Life.


....
At this time when the notion of place seems to be so much of a preoccupation to me, it would almost seem beyond coincidence that a week after being in Massachusetts that I’d find myself in Austin, a place that I was all set to move to seven years back. That is, until the Lure of Learnedness led me instead to Durham at the last moment. funny, the ways that the coin flips.

But I actually had another purpose to be in Austin beyond nostalgic waxing. Really. In fact a visit to friends Bee and C. (and Thor the cat) would be all the reason enough. However I also threw in a stop to the annual philosophy and history of science meetings . You know, ‘cause why not? There could be something to it. or not. you never really know.

If you are lucky (and I always am. despite any or all evidence to the contrary) attendance to such kinds of conferences will provide some interesting juxtapositions. For example, what crafty events coordinator could have thought of a better pairing than to have the “Active Release” physical trainer’s conference take place side-by-side with the philosophy of science conference at the Raddison? People firmly inflated to the proportions of statues amongst the networking groups of cognoscenti dressed in appropriately intellectual tones of black. It was like a scene from the African savannah -- lions, zebras; hyenas, gazelle. Disparate creatures, and everything loitering together in one strange space.

In bearing witness to this, it came as a serious question to me whether there is anything really greater gained in reading “Philosophical Norms of Naturalism” than “The Art of the Lower Extremity.” The physical trainer with muscles overflowing the Ethan Allen chair in the lobby** was reading the latter, and looked downright sanguine compared to his academic counterpart sitting in the next seat. That fellow's eyes had a concertedly worried and sag-baggy look to them as he considered, with probably too much care, what Norm may ever be Natural in this natural of worlds.

For let's be clear, the trainer knows the fundamentals of the norms of nature already, like: drink plenty of water. let the leg hang loose after prolonged walking. stretch hamstrings before and following exertion. is there anything else we really need to know. you know, in the long view? Art is Practice, not Analysis, after all.


....
No visit to the Lone Star state would be quite complete without a vist to the state capitol building. It turned out that Trooper Sims, who greeted Bee and me upon entering the building, knew plenty about the place. and was eager to share.

Sure, from visual inspection alone a non-expert might be able to tell that the Texas State Capitol is taller that our National Capitol in DC (and would you have even doubted that?)

But would you have known that the painting of Sam Houston after the battle of San Jacinto hanging on the wall has him portrayed with the wrong leg broken? Or! that both Sam Houston and General Santa Ana (in the red vest) were big time morphine addicts in addition to being blood-crazed nationalists? Gratitude goes to Trooper Sims for this 411.

...
Finally and of course, STARS are the motif in these-here parts.
and I mean everywhere.

Whether you sit down..

or look up...


No, forget "Lone Stars," friends. Austin, and the capitol in particular, is a damned constellation if anything. you could go blind from the everpresent shine of this monumental branding campaign of a state that so badly wanted to be its own country, rather than just a one of 50. And yet, they have managed to buck the system at every turn anyway. I don't know, given history, might it not have been better to leave the the state alone to its Lone devices?

The city Austin at least, I consider a bright and shining.
....

** sidenote on lobbies:
Hotel lobbies are great places to learn things you may never need to know. People sit near you, they talk loud. Such voices can school you to the fact that the following things will prevent the Breathalyzer connected your ignition from letting you start your car.
Take note:

1- gargling with Listerine right before leaving the house
2- eating a sandwich with Boar’s Head brand white wine mustard
3- spraying perfume on yourself after fastening your seatbelt