Long-Forgotten Post Unearthed

The following post languished as a draft from February 24th of 2010 until last week, when I found it while perusing the list of old posts. See, this weblog host has the list of posts in a specific database look, and one spot has a light orange "draft" next to it. It caught my eye and I remembered the post, specifically a letter to someone as a Facebook message. The contents of which relate my early observations of the transition from Brooklyn to Austin.

I've done some slight editing. I've also done some commenting, [[which will be surrounded by brackets like this]].

"
Enjoy this essay--I guess that's what you'd call it--whenever you get around to it. [[I'm always nervous sending such large letters.]]

Living in Texas: That's always one of everyone's questions, "How the hell is Texas?", those types of questions...

You want the truth? (I don't mean "you" specifically, just the royal, collective "YOU" that seems very interested in the answer to that question...the same type of question was asked about NYC at the time...)

Well, it's pretty much the same as anywhere else in America...doesn't have the density of NYC, but nowhere in the States do. Are there rednecks? Of course...but, both of us know from experience that there are plenty of rednecks in California, and I can attest from experience that there are plenty of rednecks in upstate New York. New York City, for all the buildings and liberal mindset, still had plenty of rich-ass Geroge Dubya lovers, plenty of greedy ignorant bastards who're separated from rednecks only by W-2s and zip-codes...

In New York, people say that California is laid back...being from California makes that kind of comment seem strange since that's all we know about life, and we'd say that the east coast is THE rat-race Americans are afraid to join--stupidly fast-paced, always rushing, never having enough and never being happy...it's a sad, wasted life...

But we're laid back, okay...well, so is Texas. At least Austin is definitley laid back. Austin calls itself the "Live Music Capital of the World" and the official motto is "Keep Austin Weird." Some musical acts that came from here are Willie Nelson and Janis Joplin. There are definitely more hippies than rednecks in Austin. It tends to be the liberal, blue section of a big red blot come election time, but hell, one of the most powerful Democratic Presidents ever was governor of Texas, and they still love him around here, Mr. LBJ.

Both "Dazed and Confused" and "Slackers" were filmed here in Austin.

I've heard from people that Californians are guilty of the "sin" of pride, but after a while I could see what they meant. I think it's not so much the pride as it is the air of superiority that Californians carry with them. But I've heard that same sentiment coming from Texans...and I thought what? Californians too proud? Coming from a Texan?

These people are easily the proudest of any state-livers in the States. Californians take for granted how people from other states view California, and still somehow get the idea right that everybody wants to be there...see, we think we're just so cool, and we're accidently right about most people wanting to move to Cali. What I've noticed having lived outside of the state is that not too many of us ever fully come to grips with the romantic longing and need for a heavenly place, a Valhalla of sorts, that clouldn't ever exist in reality but somehow does, just west of Nevada and north of Mexico, what it means to have a piece of supernatural hope to look towards...that's what California is to many non-Californian Americans. [[I'd forgotten how much this realization had affected my understanding of America.]]

But not Texans. Where Californians are blase, Texans are bombastic. This was it's own country, goddammit! The US was lucky we decided to join her! I mentioned once that Texas needed the American troops to push out the Mexican army, and that's why she joined the union...wanna guess how that went over? It must be a testament to my good-aura personality that no fights were started. But that's another thing: pride pushing folks into fights. Find any Californian outside the state and tell them, "California sucks! Fuck California!" and they'll say, "Whatever...you wish you were there right now." Go to most bars in the Golden State and talk trash about California and I'd guess that most people would either ridicule or ignore. Try either of those things to a Texan? Or in Texas?

Texas is big, takes a long time to cross, doesn't have such varied weather like what exists in California. She does have many many towns though. California has more people, but it also has two large population triangles that hold 90% of the population (SF-SJose-Sac)(LA-SD-SBernadino). Texas has thousands of towns all over. Texas' beaches are warmer that California's, but much uglier and muddier (the Gulf of Mexico is gross). [[Before the catastrophic oil spill evem.]]

I think my geyser of data has stopped flowing...pretty lame way to stop this correspondence, though...

I guess this might conclude Part 1 of some lame-ish essay about Texas. Sorry it's so long...maybe I'll put some of it up on my blog.
"

I love how I treat this blog as the catch all. Really, though, with my first serious post back in 2009 (about voting in the black neighborhood) having started as a correspondence, I generally always have thoughts that things like this--the observations contained in the letter--should be on my blog.

I also realized how much I cursed in this letter, and I did edit it a little, though leaving a few of the f-bombs. The sentiments, though, are honest.