Appaloosas

Appaloosas

Garland Mural

Dia de los Muertos

Dia de los Muertos

Shoes

Appaloosas are spotty … but attractively so. Named after the Palouse Indians of North West Idaho, they are the state animal, and are predominantly show horses. As you can guess, I found myself once again at the Will Rogers Memorial Center, at the Appaloosa Horse Club Show. I’m not sure what attracts me there so frequently – because it’s free, a love of horses, or that I have a thing about women in spurs. Probably we should not dwell too long on the topic. The picture shows riders exercising their horses prior to the show.

My day didn’t start there, however. First stop was my favourite coin shop in downtown Garland, to pick up the recently released Kansas State Quarter – I’m collecting 7 copies: one for me, and one for each of the children. As luck would have it, it was the First Saturday Trade Day in the square – that it to say, it was a craft/produce/bric-a-brac event that occurs on the first Saturday in every month. As well as the stalls, a variety of (mostly) country singers performed on a makeshift stage in the middle of the square. I’ve been going to Garland for almost a couple of years now, and have been watching it slowly transform itself from the more commonly seen effects of “downtown neglect” into an area with much more possibility. On a Saturday night, you can either pay to watch country artists at the Garland Opry, or hang out in the square to watch a variety of bluegrass pickup bands; there are coffee shops and craft shops; a couple of restaurants and a second-hand bookstore; a feed store that puts on a great fall display of hay and pumpkins – signs of vitality. The picture shows one of the inevitable murals (of which I’m now building an impressive collection!).

From there I headed towards Dallas, to the Bath House Cultural Center. I’d heard on an early Saturday morning Hispanic TV show (“La Vida”) that they had an exhibit devoted to Dia de los Muertos (the Mexican “Day of the Dead”, when they pay tribute to dead loved ones (it’s interesting how different cultures have such different attitudes to death, but that’s a subject for another time). The building itself was singularly unimpressive (although its history may not be), but the exhibit made up for it, ranging from a traditional shrine to a dead pet, to a more modern homage to one “Dr Diablo”. And not only that, but it’s right on the shore of White Rock Lake – in the picture you can see cormorants, egrets and cranes sunning themselves with the Dallas skyline in the distant background.

Later that day, back at the hotel, I glanced over to the spot on the floor where I keep my shoes, and it occurred to me that, on at least one level, they summed me up: the shoes that I wear for work (because the preferred attire is “business casual”, and I long ago discovered that it’s not worth fighting the system, and that there are plenty of ways of making a discreet personal statement without upsetting anybody); the sandals that I would always wear, given half a chance (because, hand-crafted in San Antonio, they are very comfortable, and also because I think I like to be in climates for which that footwear is most suitable); and the boots (Tony Lama’s – not the best, but certainly not the worst) that are much more comfortable than they look, and polar opposites to both the others.

I think perhaps we all have multiple personalities, in a sense – it seems as though I have at least three.