Bob the Horse Travels: Knox City, TX

Air travel is destroying geography. We climb on board at one end, and off at the other end, and for the entire journey we have no landmarks, no sense of direction, and, thanks to in-flight entertainment, even a dulled sense of distance. Little wonder that many people would be unable to point out their destination on a globe. Highway travel is becoming much the same; although it's true that there are landmarks along the way, highways across the United States are homogenous enough that this Home Depot looks pretty much like the last, and one town blurs into the next.

The car I rented this time had a navigational system, although I didn't explicitly ask for it. So, rather than take highways, which are simple to navigate without a passenger, I decided this weekend to travel the back roads, still in search of Texas. I picked Knox City on the map, and the "least use of highways" option from the menu. Note that I had no intention of actually going to Knox City, but it's my firm belief that, if you're going somewhere, it's a good idea to have somewhere to go, otherwise there's a tendency to lose the plot. (Sidebar: the word "city" has lost something in the translation from British-English to American-English. In England, a conurbation has to have a cathedral (or, as in the case of Liverpool, one cathedral and one "spare", an early example of what is now called a "disaster recovery site" in Information Technology); in the US, the definition has been slightly relaxed, so that a city preferably, but not necessarily, should have a gas station).

This part of Texas is almost completely flat, in every sense of the word. In my eyes, there is very little beauty in the landscape, not even of the rugged kind. And the lack of complete flatness means that even the awesome vastness fails to inspire awe, because, even though you know it's there, you can't see it. The landscape, such as it is, is littered with broken stuff. There seems to be little incentive to restore or recycle: when a new road is built, the old one is left to fall into disuse; when an oil well dries up, the iron eyesore is left to languish; when a new tractor or car is bought, the old one is left to rust in the yard. Future generations will pay the debt for this careless husbandry. When I first came here, I noticed the slogan "Don't mess with Texas" everywhere; I assumed it was a statement of Texan aggression towards the "lesser" states. In fact, it was introduced a few years ago to inspire Texans to clean up the environment. So, at one time, it was worse than it is now!

So I headed towards Knox City, passing through Loving, TX, and numerous other small towns. When I reached Olney, "The Home of the One Armed Dove Hunt", I decided to call in at the Dairy Queen ("America's STOP sign") for ice cream (despite having lived in the US for a number of years, I never had ice cream from DQ, a national icon). As I stood at the counter, scanning the menu, the spotty youth on the other side advised me: "There's no ice cream, if that's what you're looking for". "But DQ is famous for its ice cream - that's what they do!". "Not if the machine's broke they don't". "How about a milk shake?". "Nope".

Fortunately, I could get a chocolate milk shake at the Sonic Burger down the street. If you think there's nothing to do in Tiverton, you should try Olney, TX! Oh yes, and the one armed dove hunt? You can't make this stuff up, and in case it's too much for your mental imagery to handle, I'm attaching a piccie of a mural on the wall in the center of town showing two one-armed guys toting guns, presumably ready for dove hunting. Trust me, if you go there on May 2nd, it will be in full swing. I wanted to go into one of the local stores to ask about it, but I have this silly personal rule: when in rural Texas, don't say or do anything to upset the locals. It's more a matter of self-preservation than of sensitivity, and I didn't think I'd be able to do it and keep a straight face. So I'll probably never know what was the inspiration for this truly unique event. I guess if you're a dove, the best you can hope for, if there has to be misfortune in your life, is that it is to be shot at once a year by one-armed men!

Olney also featured a little "cafe" which, even if it had been open, would not have tempted me at all.

On the way back, I stopped at a roadside stand in Mineral Wells selling "new crop pecans". They are creamy and delicious. I spoke to the owner, who told me that she and her husband had been running the business for 40 years. I asked a question that had been bothering me ever since I came to Texas: how come you see these oil pumps all over the place (and I associate oil pumps with millionaires), but they're on land occupied by just a dilapidated trailer home? The answer is that, when you buy land, you only buy the top bit, and what's underneath belongs to someone else. So there are a few people who own the rights to pump oil, and they are indeed millionaires; but there are a lot more people attempting to scratch out a living from what's on the surface. When you think of a ranch in Texas, you think of J.R. and South Fork, and it's true, there are a lot of places like that. But there are many more that are just decrepit shacks or trailer homes in the middle of vast tracts of scrub.

I may never get to see Knox City. I doubt the inhabitants are bothered by that.