Texas!

Almost two years ago, it became apparent that I was going to be moving from the East Coast to Texas. No one was more surprised by this fact than I was. Living in Texas was about as high on my list of life goals as contracting rabies. Still, I found myself packing my bags and heading for the only state with an x in its name.

My original plan was to resist the fanatical cult-like obsession most people here have with the state.

But there really is a lot to like here in Houston. Take the beef, for instance. It seems that red meat is a necessary but not sufficient means of hospitality. Everywhere you go, you can't avoid being offered steak.

Most bars here don't regularly serve food, but once a week, they will have a steak night. They just wheel out a grill and start cooking slabs of beef. It's an idea both simple and beautiful.

I have a friend who is a vegetarian, which is about the equivalent of being a communist here.

  

Then there are the roads. In Texas, they love their 12 lane highways. It's very common to find yourself on an overpass where at least 900 major highways are intersecting. You always feel like 8 million cars are careening into your face.

They also have feeder roads that run the entire distance of the highways, but just parallel to them. All I'd every known were on- and off-ramps. Remarkable!

It's important to note that there is a distinct country western theme here. Despite the city being very modern and metropolitan, it's still Texas. The other day, I was walking along a city street with a friend when she exclaimed:

I'm telling you, you don't have the opportunity to say that where I'm from.

To be fair, Houston is also home to the world's largest medical center (so it's a great place to study medicine or to break your leg), the second most Fortune 500 companies headquartered in a city, the most restaurants per capita of any city in the U.S., one of the nation's largest shipping channels, 4 standing performing arts companies, and a vibrant arts scene.

But so what when you're home to the world's largest rodeo? The term "world's largest rodeo" is no joke. Imagine sitting in a giant arena, watching children cling desperately to the backs of sheep that are cantering through a giant pit of dirt (an event called "Mutton Busters").

 Next, you see what must be the world's largest American flag unfurl above you as troops repel from the ceiling amidst indoor fireworks.

Then, because it's Tejano night, the arena transforms into a giant stage where a popular Mexican musical group performs entirely in Spanish to a crowd that sings along to every word.

It is mind-blowingly awesome  (and around here, kinda viewed as normal - I recently mentioned how weird the rodeo is to a Houstonian friend, and he looked at me and asked, "What's weird about it?").

In Houston, there is also the issue of no-zoning. This means that virtually anything can be built anywhere.

You never know what you're going to get as you drive along.

As I mentioned before, my original idea was to resist falling in love with the great state of Texas. I am somewhat disturbed to report that despite maintaining a healthy sense of humor about this place, I haven't been entirely successful in sticking to the plan. I don't know. There's just something about standing up in the 7th inning stretch of an Astros baseball game and joining an entire stadium of fans in singing "Deep in the Heart of Texas..."

...that makes you feel at home.

The Perfect Picture

One day at my parents house, I noticed that a rather large cabinet filled with fine china was slowly sliding down the wall.



I alerted my dad.

We decided that the best immediate course of action was to grab bricks from outside and stack them under the cabinet's wooden frame to keep it from sliding completely off the wall.

My mom didn't take the news so well.

It was fun.

My aunt came over to help prepare for the party. Because I was conned into serving as the wait staff, she gave me a very thorough lesson about how to pour the champagne.

We made sure to warn my aunt not to go too near the cabinet because it could fall on her.

A little while later, I decided to document the festivities by snapping some pre-party pictures.



I approached my aunt, who was in the kitchen where the cabinet was. I asked her to smile for the camera. She held up her hands and flashed a big grin.

I pressed down the shutter button. There is a slight delay on many cheap digital cameras between pressing the button and an actual picture being taken. In that brief instant, someone on the other side of the kitchen dropped a pan, which clattered loudly onto the ground. Because my aunt had been warned about the possibility of the cabinet crashing down upon her, she immediately assumed this was what was happening. With a look of sheer terror, she turned to the cabinet, waved her hands frantically, and screamed loudly. That's exactly when the camera snapped the picture.

She was so far away from the cabinet.

I captured the best picture I will ever take: pure, honest terror of impending death on my aunt's face. Every once in a while, I like to dig around on my dad's computer, find the photo, and email it to everyone in the family. My aunt really appreciates it.

Mom's Mistake

My mom is a saint. She's a pure angel who floats on a cloud, gives out compliments, treats everyone nicely, and gives mean people the benefit of the doubt. It drives my dad crazy.

Her compassion and benevolence often caused my sister to cry at the dinner table.



We had to institute a no-sad-story-at-the-dinner-table policy on behalf of my sister, whose sobs routinely turned to gagging fits. This seemed to be a policy to which my mom never quite adhered.


As a child, my mom was so perfect that I can't get any good stories about her out of my grandparents. When I asked them what the worst thing she ever did was, their honest answer was that when she was in first grade, she ran out into the street chasing a squirrel without looking both ways. I had been hoping for some dirt like a story about how she ran off with the teenage son of the local mob don, changed her name to Harmony, and served as a drug mule in the 70's. Turns out, she never even puffed a cigarette.

But she did make a mistake involving a pelican once.

We were out on a dock on the intercoastal waterway, unloading the unused bait from a fishing trip, when a large pelican swooped down and landed on one of the pilings. He waited atop the barnacled post, watching us work and eyeing the frozen fish. That's when my mom got an idea.

She explained it to me with enthusiasm.

I had some concerns.

She continued to endorse the plan. She said it would be fine. She had never lied to me before, so I held up the fish, ever so tentatively.








I cried out in anguish, partially from the pain of my shredded hand caused by the sea beast's razor beak, partially from my all too close encounter with a disease infested sky demon, and partially from my loss of innocence resulting from the shattered facade that parents were always right.

My mom never got over her guilt. To this day, when she sees a pelican, she dies a little inside.

On the plus side, I did get a sweet scar out of it.

A Bad Homecoming Habit, or Nun of Your Business

As a member of the student council in high school, I felt that we spent more time trying to build floats on boat trailers than we did fostering a democratic system of self governing. Though I had envisioned tackling school-wide issues such as getting Coke instead of Pepsi in the vending machines, I quickly became somewhat disenchanted with the program.

Despite the trivial nature of the work, I was lured back into service each year by a combination of power hunger and the need to affirm that I was well liked through a formal election process. I also got pretty good at giving speeches, so running for office was usually pretty fun.

The trivial nature of student government activity was remedied by the collective intelligence and sense of humor of my classmates. We quickly realized that the zeal for winning goofy homecoming week competitions displayed by the other grades wasn't quite our thing.


This gave birth to a sort of anti-competition campaign in which we tried to lose each event as ridiculously and wonderfully as possible. I won't even get into how the boys in the male cheerleading competition lost, but let's just say the plug was pulled on the music before the dance number ended due to behavior unbecoming of the institution.

We tried to start a movement to get the cleverly titled "Homecoming Week" changed to "Semana Spectacular," but that was squashed by the administration. We also tried to substitute the usual tricycle riding contest with an ultimate jousting competition in which students battled teachers while balancing above a giant kiddie pool filled with Aveno bath. We actually did get the jousting, but the Aveno bath was nixed.

Senior year was our coup de grace. Tired of building floats to drag like mules onto the football field at halftime while the athletes pointed and laughed, we decided to pick a class theme for the year that would minimize the amount of work and effort involved. That's how we chose to become the "Boat Trailer Seniors." The float would be completed before we had even started it. We could just drag one of the empty trailers onto the field. We even had t-shirts made with a poorly drawn boat trailer on it.

The problem was, we were too immature for our own immaturity. We began to modify the original idea, once beautiful in its simplicity. New concepts spun wildly out of control. The results were phenomenal.

The boat trailer, which was originally supposed to be dragged out by listless, apathetic seniors, was now slated to be pulled by monks to the 2001 Space Odyssey theme song. Then, pirates would come running and screaming from behind the big hill past the end zone, pillage and steal the trailer, and leave a trail of monk bodies in their wake.

As you can see above, not everyone got the pirate costumes just right.

The biggest problem was that the order of monk robes got mixed up and the costume company delivered nun habits. We adhered to the adage, "the show must go on," and carried out our plan. The last minute costume change exacerbated the the violence and offensiveness of the scene. (Note: most of the nuns were actually guys in habits, and a lot of the pirates were girls, so that seemed to help - and added to the humor, I think.)



The weirdest part was that we didn't come in last place. The seniors were pretty bummed and the administration never invited that year's panel of judges to return.

Since then, homecoming rules have been amended. I guess it's understandable.

The Prom

Throughout my life, I have never been able to do anything with dignity.

Even during many of my life's major milestones, my supposed moments to shine, I have somehow ended up with egg on my face. Take the first and last Annual Extended Family Talent Show, for example. As a six year-old, it seemed like a very big deal, so I rehearsed my act for weeks in advance. When the day of the big show finally came, I stood in the middle of the living room with my aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, and that creepy boyfriend my older cousin had inappropriately invited, waiting for my cue. I was so excited that I was bouncing around like a maniac. That's when, as per usual, things took a turn for the embarrassing. My dad delivered the fatal blow. ce


That ended up being the entirety of my act that year.

Sadly, my dad was actually correct.

I also thought my high school graduation might be a time of potential dignity. Not so. Despite having practiced my speech for weeks, and despite delivering it with great aplomb, I ended up falling flat on may face.

Literally, I ended up falling flat on my face.

So when the senior prom came along, why did I ever think it would be a normal, American, teenage rite-of-passage?

It all started when I picked up my date, Tammy, at her house. Her family waved as we drove off. Of course, her little 8 year-old sister chased after a ball and dashed into the driveway in front of the car.

It was an awkward departure. Next, Tammy and I headed to the pre-party at my friend's house. We had to park down the street and then walk along the sidewalk toward his home, me in my tuxedo and she in her dress.

You know how people tend to gawk at prom kids? Well one woman driving down the street did it for a little too long and failed to see the truck stopped in front of her.

She had been traveling at about 35 mph and so the airbag deployed. There was a lot of smoke. Some bystanders had to drag her unconscious body out of the car.

We turned to walk up the driveway to the party to find that everyone was outside.


Apparently, nothing kills a pre-party like a little face-slamming-into-airbag-at-high-velocity action.

Things picked back up when the cops arrived and let us pose in handcuffs by the squad car. Our pictures ended up looking something like this:

It wasn't your typical pre-prom shoot. Finally, it was time to go. That's when we realized that we were missing something.

We waited and waited. After a while, a limo actually did pass the house. Thinking it was our limo that had simply gotten lost, Tammy took off down the street after it.
space

In a cruel twist of fate, that wasn't our limo. My friend John called and learned that they had no record of our reservation...despite the DEPOSIT WE HAD PAID!!!

We ended up calling a cab and cramming our whole group into it like one of those clown cars at the circus. When we arrived at the entrance of the prom, we just tumbled out into the street.

The prom itself was great! Tammy was a huge hit.

After the prom, everyone climbed into their spacious limos to be whisked away to the after-party. My group stuffed itself into another cab. On the plus side, as we rode to the party, Tammy made friends with the driver.

At the after-party, an intoxicated football player became drunk-obsessed with throwing me in the pool, so I basically spent the evening ducking behind pillars and clawing at the at the patio tiles. It was actually a really fun night.

No dignity, but lots of fun. It was pretty standard.