13 Dec 2020 - Graham
previously: postcard 2: mississippi
The vast open plains of Texas look brown and barren. Of course. it’s actually full of life. Though I mostly saw the evidence of that life by its absence: In dozens of little towns of closed donut shops and barely open seed+feeds. In roadkill of all sorts: coyote, deer, rabbit. In oil derricks, sometimes dipping their beaks into the earth and sometimes not. In cotton fields, dusted with the remains of the harvest and dotted with beetle-like pickers finishing the work.
It should have been difficult to take a wrong turn, since Route 380 goes all the way from Denton, TX to Roswell, NM. But of course, while debating whether to stop at the first still open general store, I missed a left turn. When I returned 20 minutes later, I rectified my error and bought a coffee. The lady in front of me was dishing some juicy small town gossip, yet all I could think about was her lack of mask, and I was much relieved when the clerk let me cut ahead so I could dive out the door.
next post: postcard 4: new mexico