Day 2...land of leaning trees

The Trip, Day 2

The Panhandle Wind...  This would be good to play in the background as you read this entry.  A little theme music that played through my mind as I wrote it.

I was up this morning early, waking to the sound of the Harley Davidson that was parked a half dozen doors down from me.  It sounded something like the bomb dropped on Hiroshima…or at least how I imagined it would sound.  I repacked my bags, policed up the room to make sure I forgot nothing important, then straddled the beast of a bike.

I was on the road by 8AM with a freshening breeze out of the southwest. Did I say freshening?  How about just short of howling!  By 8:30 I was fighting a 20mph headwind that would stay with me until I got to my sister’s house in Tahoka, TX. 

The wind is nothing new to me.  I grew up with the ever-present wind and the things that come with it…primarily sand and dust…but also tumbleweeds and the occasional thunderstorm/tornado.  The wind was just…there.  We didn’t think about it.  Most of the time it was blowing and unless you wanted to be a hermit you had to get over it and learn to be outside with it.  The trees in my home county all lean to the northeast because of the prevailing southwest wind.  If I had been a Native American I would have referred to Lynn County, Texas as “the land of leaning trees.”

 

I feasted on the breakfast I remember most as a young kid growing up…a cinnamon roll and a Dr Pepper.  It might not be the perfect breakfast, but it is certainly one of the best.  I ate mine sitting on a bench outside the donut shop sharing space with a farm worker who probably didn’t have a green card and whose English was as bad as my Spanish.

I crossed over from Oklahoma to Texas and felt like I was coming home.  You can take the boy out of Texas...but for all my life I will be a Texan.  Lots of smart people have written pages of explanations for this phenomenon, but I don’t think they ever really hit the nail on the head.  You are either a Texan or not…and if you are a not-Texan I can’t explain it to you.

 

Wind aside, it was a beautiful day to ride.  Everything was green from the recent rains.  In fact it was green all the way from Denver.  Not only were there blooms everywhere, but there was also standing water in the playa lakes that dot the countryside.  When the playas have water life is good.

I rolled into Tahoka, got a shower and started a load of laundry…I didn’t know when the next time I would have access to a free washer and dryer and I want to have clean clothes options on the trip.  Then I rode to my brother’s house in Lubbock and visited with his family (two daughters and a son).  The oldest daughter (Myessa) lives in Australia now and brought her two beautiful boys with her…Quinn and Leighton… along with her husband, Patrick, on a visit to the states and I didn’t want to miss the chance to see them while they are back in the US.  My motorcycle was a big hit with the kids and I was on the way to hero status…but my sister, Claudia, called and asked me to come home and stay with a young man from her church whose mom is in the hospital and dad was with mom. 

 

 

I had to hurry home so Claudia could hustle herself to the ER…she was diagnosed with shingles and was in quite some distress…it was manifesting adjacent to her eyes and an ophthalmologist was needed to make sure there was no chance of eye damage.   She came home feeling better and went to bed…then so did I.