Texas...Really?
I consider myself to be an official New Yorker mainly because we lived here during 9/11. New Yorkers are notoriously skeptical and suspicious about carpet baggers (save Hillary). But everyone living in the city during 9/11 automatically received amnesty and the outsiders were given permanent citizenship in this great city.
When people ask where I grew up I most often say Seattle. Even though I only lived there for five years before college, I still consider it's coolness factor far superior to Texas.
If I find myself in situations where people start talking to me as though I have no idea how WONDERFUL things are in Texas or just the south in general. Then I usually pull out the "born and spent most of my life in Texas" card. I usually do that to quite down the Texans and let them know that they don't need to go on and on to me about Texas since I already know the truth. The ruse can be played on someone else.
It's not that I don't like Texas, I do. I love Wet-N-Wild, Six Flags, Sea World, Bass Pro Shops, The Galleria (Houston and Dallas), air conditioning, Chili's, On The Border, and Dillards. These are all fun exciting things that Texas has to offer and if you throw in the Alamo, River-Walk, HS football, and a church every 150 yards I can see why Texans are so proud of what they have. It's just that Texas is just ok, it has a variety of things to offer, but it doesn't really do anything super well (except Ice Cream). Look at size for example. It is still second behind Alaska! I will give this to Texas, the flag is cool. There isn't a better state flag out there than the Texas flag. Texas has ice-cream and flag design locked up!
So why is Texas the ultimate place to live? Why is it better than any other place in the country? And you can't use the people card. There are amazingly nice and Christianly people everywhere, so that doesn't count.
16 comments:
The thing that rankles me about this whole topic is the narrow vision of Texans who insist there is no other place in the world like Texas. (Well, that's true...praise God.) It's the hubris that I find irksome. When the Apostle Paul said he had learned to be content, whatever state he was in...he actually had never been to Texas.
I was born in the South, raised on the West Coast and now live in Texas. The best place to live is....where you have the best memories. Abilene sucked before I lived there and then it became a cool place and I found myself talking others into moving there. I would not have tried to survive NYC until I was talked into a trip there and now think it is just a great, and an amazingly safe place. West Coast, can't say enough about the WC or SoCal, but it will never be home again. Temple, Texas is great for now because it is home, but with coaching as a job it might not be home for long.
We will see you on the East Coast in 2/07.
I don't know that Texas is the absolutely only/best place to live for everyone, but it's definitely my top choice. Of course, while I travel extensively for work, this is the only state where I have lived minus 2 years of my life. So maybe I lack perspective.
The people. Yeah, there are friendly people other places. But I like 'em here.
Cost of living. While Dallas, Austin, and Houston are not NYC or LA, for the type of work you can do here, they're pretty darn good metropolitan centers. Balance that against housing costs, and wow. Any time you see most attractive places to practice law, medicine, etc. (NOT the arts) based on salaries adjusted for COL, you'll find them in the top 10, if not the type 5.
No snow. Yeah, we also have the summers, but I'll take them. The only time I want to see snow is if I'm skiing down it, not to shovel it away from my drive.
4 rather different large cities. Houston, Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio. I won't open the door for people to debate which is better/best, but each city has a pretty cool and unique personality with things to offer. And you can get from one to the other within 3-4 hours by car, or within 45 minutes on Southwest Airlines.
That's enough of my ramblings.
I hear ya. The cost of living in NYC is ridiculous. But as my grandpa says "It only costs twice as much to go first class."
Byron I think you are right as well. Memories are pretty powerful, that's why I have such great feelings about Abilene and the area of Dallas I lived in during my internship.
There is one other thing that mom touched on. While NYC has everything in the world to offer, it is also a pretty harried place to live and work. Every time I step off an airplane in another city I can actually feel the "slow down" while I am still in the airport. That can be very refreshing.
I think more than anything, it is familiarity. Quite a lot of Texans have never lived anywhere else. And if they did, they were itching to get back "home" so much that they didn't give their new place a chance!
I'm a born and bred Texan -- lived here all but 2 years of my life. I love it because it is familiar and my family is mostly here. I know that I could learn to love living somewhere else, but I don't have the desire to jump out there and try.
Plus, I think we are kinda brainwashed in school that Texas is superior to everywhere else....we were our own country after all. :-)
I'm not a real prideful Texan (anymore). I used to listen to Robert Earl Keen, and have a Texas flag sticker on my truck, and a Texas flag rug in my dorm, and pictures of fields of bluebonnets hung up on the wall. You couldn't have convinced me Texas wasn't the best country, I mean state in the union, but then I visited some other states, and realized they're pretty cool too.
I think the key to believing Texas is superior, is never leaving Texas.
I confess. I am one of the Texas defenders. But when I do it, I'm not really defending Texas so much as I'm defending Austin. It's a strange and wonderful place. Arts, education, culture, great food, business, law and many, many Democrats (a thing unheard of throughout most of the state). I go there and so enjoy the "slow down", without having to deal with so much of regular, main-stream Texas. Even being stuck in traffic is relaxing in Austin.
Having lived in New York for a while now, I do believe that New Yorkers and Texans are the only people that hold such pride for the place in which they live. Good or bad, there really is no place in the world like Texas,and there's no place in the world like NYC.
i feel about colorado the way most texans feel about texas. whenever i say anything about colorado, my boyfriend interrupts me and says sarcastically, "i know, i know, in colorado the water tastes better, the air smells better..." and i say, "well, it does!!!"
The key to this whole thing is brainwashing. This one girl informed me that they actually have a texas state pledge that they say in grade school. Unbelievable. I once saw a small child get off a plane in houston, only to GET ON HIS KNEES AND KISS THE GROUND, saying "TEXAS!!!"
If this isn't a problem, I don't know what is.
I'm not sure if texans even know that they are part of something greater. I've been told that Texas could be its own country if it wanted to. All I can say to that is "you know, we might be better off."
It's true that texas has the hill country, some desert mountains in the west...
but thats it. and between the glaring lack of public transportation and the sheer size of the vehicles in texas (suburbans most notably) i seriously believe that the state of texas is solely responsible for our gas dependence and global warming.
and honestly, $100 for a mum? I'll stick with the corsage, thanks.
I think we can all agree that Texans can be over the top, but they are still for the most part loveable. However, there is nothing and I mean nothing more tiring and annoying than hearing how AWESOME Atlanta is!
Give me a room full of Texans at Billy Bob's in Ft. Worth any day over a small group of people from Atlanta.
Jeni, I think I had more Texas State History class in school than anything else. Texas takes that brainwashing stuff seriously.
Casey:
Do you think sales of the new Dixie Chicks album "Taking the Long Way" is higher in Austin than other places in the state? I would be so interested in seeing that stat. Seriously Texas turned on them big time. It makes me want to go buy their album because of it.
I have lived in Texas since I was two years old...I wasn't born here(and I don't claim that whole phrase, "but I got here as soon as I could!")I do have lots of family here, and lots of fond memories of college in Abilene...but I don't particularly follow that whole idea that there is no place that is better...I personally have never wanted to have a "Texas room" in my house...I have seen plenty of those, and it does not really fit into my personal decorating style, so I am glad that Matt ditched the Texas rug and bluebonnet pictures...
After visiting New York, I think it would be just as wonderful of a place to raise my children...and I am sure that I could say the same about many other places besides the Lone Star State
hey, we still need YALL'S mailing address(how's that for Texan?!)
This is an interesting dialogue, albeit incredibly subjective and inconclusive.
Every place has something great to offer someone - and it's typically the stuff of every day life such as hole-in-the-wall dives, local parks, favorite music venues, popsicle stands, etc.
All that aside, aren't we called to be global citizens? Isn't this all a little too divisive? I understand the significance of 9/11 to New Yorkers, but wasn't that day much bigger than one city?
The list illustrates exactly why it's fun to make fun of Texans.
All in jest, relax people.
We are all brothers and sisters in the world. Of course provided the world looks as much like the United States as possible :)
PS: I do not mean by my post to insinuate that I hold the moral or any other authority to grant New Yorker status. I think any one who has tried to find a place to live in this city should be considered a New Yorker, but I don't really have a say. It is weird to think that Levi is actually more of a New Yorker than I am since he was born here
I was born and raised in San Antonio Texas and lived in Texas until I moved to NYC at 24, and I have never been one of those proud Texans. In fact, I have a love/hate relationship with the state. Let me briefly explain.
1.)Yes, Texans are nice, but it can often feel like a fake nice, even in church.
2.)The people (generally) dress up too much, wear too much make-up, and poof their hair to extreme proportions.
3.)There is still an element of racism there. Churches are (unintentionally I'm sure) segregated.
4.)Hunting - I never got into it and don't like to see people smeared in deer blood carrying dead dear in their pick-up trucks.
5.)Conservative Republican's everywhre - I've always been a liberal and can remember wearing my Dukakis for president buttons in middle school. Most of the kids didn't get me.
Anyway, I could go on, but I should say that I'm planning on moving back to San Antonio soon. Why? Family is there, Mexican food is awesome there (not to mention Bar-B-Que and chicken fried steak), and my husband and I can afford to live comfortably in an actual house with our daughter who is due to be born any day now.
So, yes, it's a love hate thing - kind of like New York City.
I am Texas born and bred and I think Texas is great. However its NOT the only cool place in the world, and anyone who thinks so just never made it out of Texas past Okalahoma. Infact I have traveled the world and lived in some way cool places that I wouldn't mind making my home and raising children there.
Although I believe that Texas is not the only way and there are many other awesome places to live I will say that Texas is great because the cost of living, you can find and do just about anything here. We've got beaches, desert, lush forests (East Texas) Metropolitan areas, Great Music, Arts, Museums, Schools, great rivers to float, great lakes to ski on, some great scenery (if you drive far enough) and great home cookin'. Oh yeah, and Abilene....who can top good ole Joe Allen's? All of it within a half day's driving distance.
New York is great cause you have just about everything within walking distance and the public transportation is awesome. Where else can you spend the whole day shopping in Italy or China and then go out on the town for amazing cusine and a show on Broadway? New York is a truly wonderful place!
I think the people in Texas are generally nicer than in some other states and countries, but just like everywhere else you can find just as many jerks and pretentious people here as you do anywhere....they may just dress a little different and talk a little slower.
I am totally with you on the people from Atlanta. What is it with those people?
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