Wednesday, August 05, 2009

Quintessentially Texan - 1


If you have had the opportunity to travel about and live in other places you may have noticed that there is something unique about being a Texan, no matter where life has taken you. It doesn’t matter if you left the place after graduation and never went back, or if you left & returned, or if you never left at all…there is just something special about being a native Texan.

When people elsewhere discover that you’re a Texan, they’re nearly always intrigued. If you are back east, they think your Texas accent indicates that you are not too intelligent; however, if you take stock of those who would render such a judgment, you generally observe that they haven’t got anything more substantial going in that department themselves.

On the other hand, if you are “out” west, depending on whether northern or southern “out” west, you might have observed that those folks tend to be oblivious to much of anything—drugs explained it pretty well a few decades ago and maybe that’s still a valid explanation.

It seems that in the fly-over middle, folks either stay put or want to go east or west…mostly west, I think. Better weather there.

Of course collectively we’re a country of mutts…but once our early people reached Texas, we magically became Texans and thereby, mutts no more. As a distinct society, we Texans are quite young. Those of us who are able to trace their heritage to the first Texans of the 1820-1830’s are usually no more than 4 or 5 generations removed from the pre-statehood period—my great grandfather was born a couple of years before Texas won its Independence—that’s just 4-generations back, including myself. Great grandpa wouldn’t have been old enough to join General Sam, but his daddy would have.

And what other state will supply you with an heirloom birth certificate to help you proclaim your heritage? No wonder the others are intrigued.

H-m-m, Farrah was a Texan...did you know that?



Adios