Don't Mess

Every person could have been many things she is not. Who you end up is the result of the choices you make, but also choices others made long before your birth.  To this end, I sometimes remind myself I could have been a Texan.  A card-carrying member of that most prideful, contentious state.  My almost identity is equal parts dodged bullet and missed opportunity.  Disturbing, yes, but also intriguing.  A very different fate that so easily could have been my own.

My mom is a Texan living in Oregon.  There are probably more Texans living in Oregon than there are Oregonians living in Texas, but she is a rare breed nonetheless.  Generally speaking, Texans don’t leave Texas. A fierce loyalty dictates you stay in state.  People simply see no reason to leave its expansive boundaries.  My mother, the loveable black sheep, did exactly that: packed her bags for faraway places like Colorado, Massachusetts and ultimately Oregon where she landed and would not leave.  And because of those choices made years before my birth, I am not a Texan but instead its antithesis: a first-generation Oregonian. 

In Oregon, Texas is not well-liked. Texas is everything Oregon abhors contained in one land mass: the Bush family, SUV’s, beef far from free-range, beer far from micro, sticky air and flatness.  There’s a widespread dislike of Texas, particularly among those who have never been and never plan to go.  The haters consider Austin the exception, a liberal oasis in a desert of belt buckles and homophobia, but prefer not to sully its name by association with the nation’s most despicable state.  Texas is the scapegoat for all that’s wrong in our country; Texas has encroached on us before and it could happen again at any time.  Cue hysteria, phobia.  Oregonians and liberals nationwide just don’t like Texas.  

When I was a kid and sometimes still today, I’m often met with thinly-veiled distaste when I tell people I’ll be spending a holiday in the land of Texas.

“Really?? Why?”

“Does your family own guns? Do they hunt?”

“Do you actually like it there?”

The answer is yes, I do like it there, but not in the way I like trendier locales like New York City or San Francisco.  I like the way Texas smells, like humid air, pinto beans cooked long in animal fat and my grandma’s Cover Girl foundation. I like driving a gigantic, gas-guzzling SUV high above the freeway even though it goes against every liberal sensibility I swear by.  I like that my cousins listen to country, and that my cowboy boots are actually from D&D Ranch and Supply. I like salty, fatty Tex-Mex from places that start with El and La. Places that are neither clean nor vegetarian.  And I like that I know how to ride a horse and elongate my vowels. 

So I staunchly defend Texas, but I do not wish I were from Texas. I like too many things about being an Oregonian, so I'm content to call Texas home once removed. Still, though, had my mother done what was expected of her, I would be a Texan. No questions asked, most likely there to stay.  If you change something crucial about your identity—the state from which you hail, for example—how much of you really changes?  That, I do not know.  What I do know is that tomorrow I'm getting on a plane heading South not West, and it's exactly the direction I want to fly.