For the Sake of My Legs

The one by my desk is black, maybe with some speckles of gray. It has wheels and arm rests and a lever to adjust the height. It is touted to be quite ergonomical, and though I find it more comfortable than others, I hate this chair.

During a weekly meeting today, I sat in a different one than I normally do. It was wooden with a slightly rounded back. I didn’t really like this one much either, but sure enough, my ass was glued to it for about two hours during that meeting. When I stood to walk up the stairs and begin sitting in the aforementioned chair, I realized that I hate the wooden one as well.

When it was time for me to return home, I walked down the stairs and sat down (again) in the seat of my car, which is really another name for a chair that can sometimes be comfortable enough to sleep in during long road trips. I sat in this one, made from a dead animal, for the entirety of my commute home through traffic and traffic lights. When I walked in my front door, the first thing I saw was my couch–a long blue chair, really. Though I felt tired from a full day of chair-sitting, I couldn’t bring myself to lower my butt cheeks onto the fabric.

My cat dozed for more than hour in a big plush chair in my living room. He does this for the majority of the day, I’d say, for at least 8 hours. I wonder, how can he allow his body to become part of this chair for so long? Is he being paid to sit in this chair? His eyes are closed and he looks more peaceful than I ever do while sitting in my chair(s). Does what you think about,  not think about, or dream about whilst in the chair make a difference?

After a long slumber, the cat is now running wildly from the kitchen into the living room, bounding off furniture, and doing it all again. Later, I myself ran and walked around outside. I strangely felt as if I were a human, a real and alive being.

—

(I just realized that I was sitting in a chair, a white metal one with a vintage cushion, while writing this entire story.)

A Most Familiar Feeling

I sit on a blue plastic seat in the laundry mat near my home. As my jeans, underwear, and shirts wash in two machines, I still think about the two dollars and fifty cents cost per load and how much it will cost to wash all of my clothes, towels, and sheets, as well as dry them. Though it won’t be as cheap as using the filthy laundry room at the apartment complex near my cottage, thoughts of recently oil-stained red shirts convince me that the laundry mat is my only option.

With 33 minutes until washer-to-dryer switchover, I open the most recent issue of The New Yorker, which came in the mail a few days late. I want to read almost the entire magazine every week that it comes, but time to do so just fades away in a blur.

I graduated from college almost a year ago, and have since been working the standard 40-hour week in an office across town. I often realize that many adults in the United States work much more than that, 50 or even 80 hours a week. This thought creeps into my head more days than not, and it causes my mind to silently blow.

The pink cell phone in my purse vibrates to inform me that its time to dry the clothes, which I do and then go home where I will try to have a quick practice on guitar before going to bed. With still so much that I want to do today, I long every day for more time to do it. In my dreams, which I think about almost every minute it seems like, I have more time to do those things because my “job” consists of doing those things — and for less than 40 hours a week. This last bit, especially, never fails to make my parents, and pretty much everybody older than me, laugh with the wisdom of an American capitalist, a certain knowledge that I apparently have not yet acquired.

Which is more frightening — the thought that I will have to do the incredible to prove my parents wrong, or the thought that I might someday agree with them?

The Song Remains Unwritten

As I walk down the cracked concrete sidewalk to my one-bedroom house, I become far away from Austin traffic, my 9-to-5 job, and the incessant news of the economic recession. At the Wilson Street Cottages, I am closer to what life is really about.

Several times a day I walk this path that separates the two rows of cottages. Along my way, I often encounter my friendly neighbors sitting on their porches and their cats sleeping on worn lawn chairs. The smell of food cooking and incense slowly burning can be smelled in the air and the sound of instruments and voices seeps out of the cottages’ old wooden walls. This peaceful and laid-back environment exemplifies a lifestyle rare in our modern and growing city and with an affordable price, it is also a home for many local musicians. Owner Mitch Ely, however, has had something else in mind for the land on which the cottages reside–a new condo development.

“For them, it’s all about the aesthetic of the neighborhood,” says Miranda Brown, a resident for five years and musician in several bands, including Crooked Fingers and AC Newman. “It’s not about making Austin an affordable place to live for musicians.”

Tucked away in South Austin, the Wilson Street Cottages have always had many artists and local musicians as residents, including Stevie Ray Vaughan and Carolyn Wonderland. At $495 a month, the rent is affordable for creative people who have low-paying jobs. The cheap rent is an essential part of the atmosphere but the real reason why we love it here lies in the people.

“I like my neighbors and I like that I know who my neighbors are,” Miranda says to me as a small gas heater in her bedroom provides us with a little warmth on a cold December night. This atmosphere and community are hard to find in other residences, she adds.

My next-door neighbor Scrappy Jud Newcomb, a musician in several Austin bands including The Resentments and Ian McLagan’s Bump Band, likes the affordable price. A long-time Austin resident, Scrappy says he is not aware of any other dwellings in the city that resemble the cottages, and it’s that atmosphere that keeps him here.

“I like the energy in the air,” he says. “There is no denying that this is a unique place.”

Because of the condo project, residents have spent years with the looming threat of demolition. Scrappy says that when he moved into the cottages about five years ago, there was talk that they were to be torn down soon. But Ely Properties had to plan the development, get permission from the neighborhood planning team, and find a way to get the residents out.

Our demolition blues were eventually replaced with thoughts of relocation, however, when resident and musician Charlie Faye joined with non-profit Design Build Alliance and planned to move the cottages and start a new musicians’ enclave.

But during the past holiday season, there was another change in plans when my neighbors and I received notes from Ely Properties scotch taped to our front doors. I returned home on New Year’s Day to find mine sitting on the old brown bench on my porch. The notes informed us that Ely is indefinitely delaying the once imminent condo project “due to current economic conditions.” A revised development date has not been set and no changes are forecasted for at least six to 12 months.

This notice was not expected yet not surprising. Sitting on my porch drinking a glass of wine one evening, I am glad that I have more time with this home and small community. Several of my neighbors passed by and we chatted about the most recent news. Dan, who works for the Austin Housing Authority, said he was happy, and Deanna, a waitress and bass player, is also happy and feels hopeful that somehow the current land can be purchased.

When Ely eventually begins the condo development, Charlie and the alliance plan to continue their musicians’ community project. They are looking into buying land to put the cottages on, including the current land in South Austin, though that seems unlikely given it is rumored to cost more than $1.5 million.

So once again we residents do not know the future of our home—a familiar uncertainty. Even when Ely decides to start his 62-unit condo project, making the old Austin a little bit harder to find, the spirit of the Wilson Street Cottages will continue on. Just as Austinites today still reminisce  about creative landmarks lost in the march of time, such as the Armadillo World Headquarters, Raul’s, Les Amis, and more recently, the Showdown Saloon, so too will people continue to remember this place. With the work of Charlie and Design Build Alliance, hopefully the cottages will exist in a form other than memory, though not on Wilson Street, but somewhere inside Austin city limits.

—

For more information, photos, and updates on the Wilson Street Cottages, please visit its Myspace page by Clicking Here.

*Editor’s Note: To be fair, I did request a comment from Ely Properties. However, the manager who I spoke with, whose name I believe was Charles, refused to comment. He also refused to give his last name.

Time Past The Time Ahead

Surely this is his second favorite time of the day. First would be the evenings out on the ranch, when the entire family sits on the front porch. In second place, these cool and breezy mornings when the sun rises to feel so nice against Hercules’s oil coated fur.

As he stands with his four sturdy legs on the concrete sidewalk, his eyes scan the many cats and kittens romping about. The early birds continue to chirp overhead and the moos of fat brown cows reverberate through the vast land surrounding the yard. In the distance, car sounds serve as a reminder of the modern world that is so different from the life Hercules knows.

The youngest daughter of the family, the one he sees so seldom, sits outside this morning on the swing. Always friendly and caring, Hercules walks slowly over to her. The weight of his huge body puts much pressure on his joints and tendons as one rough paw steps in front of the other. He does not run across the hundreds of acres of pastures as he did when he was younger. Now he is an old, sick dog.

Close enough to see her clearly, Hercules’s face forms what can only be a smile. His thick tail swings back and forth with the weight and speed of a pendulum ticking away the sands of time.

Because he wants to say hello and have a silent yet meaningful conversation, he sticks his massive head into the daughter’s personal space. Tail still wagging, his eyes gleam so bright in the warming sun. She pets him; she talks to him; he responds through unspoken words.

After a few minutes of the attention, she goes back to reading her book and Hercules walks away. He strolls a few feet and then curls his head and neck around to look at her. Small black nodules dot the sagging skin of his hound dog lips, as well as larger ones all over his body. His stomach, the biggest it has ever been, protrudes like a fully rounded tomato.  Inside of Hercules, the thick and mighty fluid of disease runs in and out of his cells, his blood and his bones.

As he looks back at the daughter, she glances up from her reading. His eyes find hers to connect through an unexplainable magnetism. Though he is a Red Bone Hound, Hercules becomes a human as he and the daughter begin to communicate. She knows about the cancer. He knows that she understands. With her big, brown eyes stuck on his, she tells him she loves him and that it will be okay. He says yes, yes it will. Then he looks away from her and looks at the ground.

He carries his faltering body and tired soul over to the soft mat by the front door. He plops down, stomach dragging him towards the innards of the earth. He rests his head and his eyes remain open to watch over the ranch. Twelve years ago, Hercules was born on this land and soon he will be dead, buried with the dry Texas soil underneath an old oak tree.

Getting Caught Up In The Rapids

She sticks out like a sore thumb. An older white-haired woman dressed in a sparkling green blouse and matching green capri pants. The people around her are young hipsters, hippies, punks and nerds. But she is there, seeming not to notice that she is as different as those around her notice that she doesn’t fit in.

When she sits down at the table in the corner, she dusts leftover food particles off the surface. She does not look annoyed or disgusted, but instead has a little smile. She does not have any food or drinks with her. Until an even older man walks up with their iced lattes. He has a smile on his face that explains the grin on hers. Somehow, though the two seem to be in their ’70s, they are so, so young.

They are just getting to know each other. A young student-type in the corner next to them sits alone. He keeps his eyes down, reading, with his thoughts not leaving his own mind. The two older people are talking, constantly. Their thoughts, memories, actions leave their minds to be expressed in the human language. Now the student is old. The couple continues to be young.

Their eyes are in contact the entire time they speak with each other. Topics of conversation range from river rapids to weddings to other people’s children. He doesn’t have a car, she loved the music at the wedding, where, perhaps, they met for the first time. They laugh, use their hands to illustrate what they are saying.

Though this couple initially seemed lost and out of place, somehow they more perfect in this coffehouse, and in this life, than the rest of us do.

Ewwchi

The quaint house tucked away on the side of the road seems so discreet and humble — a hidden gem of a restaurant. In the sky above, its reputation looms as a large cloud, invisible yet tangible.

Driving there, I even feel a little nervous. While I chat with my family and boyfriend and weave in and out of South Lamar traffic, many thoughts are going through my mind and my stomach. Am I about to have the most delicious culinary experience of my entire 22 years? Am I even prepared for this? Will my white blouse and long linen shorts be appropriate attire to wear when dining at the best of all Austin’s restaurants?

As I pull my annoyingly nice rental car into the parking spot, we make a quick joke about the valet parking option when a large parking lot sits 20 feet from the restaurant. Shutting the doors to the brand new red Jetta, we begin our Uchi journey as we walk up a sidewalk path surrounded by gravel and rugged shrubbery.

The interior is nice, fancy yet casual, and we are seated right away. On the way to the table, the boyfriend scopes out the food on the other diners’ plates.

First positive: A family of five sits near our table, laughing and having a great time. I think, ‘Well, if the kids like the food then it should be a great place.’ We all know that children have the most honest of taste buds.

My parents, boyfriend and I look over our menus. I see some intriguing sushi rolls and also some cooked dishes my father, a 60-year-old cowboy, should enjoy as well. He says the swordfish sounds good.

Our friendly and pretty server arrives at our table and proceeds to speak to us for a full 10 minutes after we inform her that this is our first time ever to dine at the number one restaurant in Austin. She explains that their dishes consist of small portions so that everyone can share and experience a variety of tastes. My mother was a little confused with whether there were appetizers and entrees and became increasingly perplexed when the waitress answered, with something along the lines of, “We don’t like the world appetizer.”

Because I assumed the small portions would be more like what I wish every restaurant would serve thus lessening the U.S. obesity epidemic, the idea of smaller portions was not a negative point.

Then our lovely server brought out the first dish, a shiromi nabe, and we all experienced the first negative of Uchi.

The portion-size of our shiromi nabe was not small, as our server had implied. No. It was minuscule. About two inches wide, two inches long and two inches high. And there were four of us that were to share that tiny little piece of seared…amberjack, was it? I can’t really recall because I only had one bite.

After the waitress sat the dish on the table, we all exchanged looks that were part sarcastic smile and part surprised eyebrows. After I tried to cut the tiny piece of fish into even smaller individual portions with my wooden chopstick and failed, I just took a bit of what I could get. It was good.

Basically, all the food was good and interesting. And very expensive. The sushi was okay — not as good as other sushi I’ve had in Austin. (I.E. Kyoto) The only thing I really thought tasted great was the tempura Japanese pumpkin, which I had a 3 inch piece of, and no more. The last dish of the evening, the swordfish, cost about $18 and was enough for every body to have a bite. My dad had two.

The best part of this Uchi experience would definitely be the reactions of the persons sitting with me at the table. My mother and father had quite some trouble getting their chopsticks to work well enough and both ended up stabbing the food with the slender end of the stick. I finally got them to agree to eating the sushi with their hands. It was also quite an interesting experience to figure out a way to divvy up the small portions into even smaller ones

After my mother paid the $105 tab and the 20 percent tip, we all got back in the car so I could drop Mom and Dad off at the empty parking lot where they parked their truck and horse trailer. During the drive, we reflected on the dinner. I think we all felt the same about Austin’s number one restaurant.

I suppose what really bothers me about Uchi is not the food or the portions or the prices. It is its pretentious reputation as the best restaurant in Austin, with an Iron Chef-winning owner and food that is simply divine. I suppose that for me, Uchi represents the Austin of the future — one of high rises, expensive boutiques, BMWs and newcomers whom people call “yuppies.” This is not the Austin I live in and is not the Austin I want to become apart of. But just as another building gets torn down and Enchanted Forest is closed, places like Uchi thrive in the negative change which some call progress.

So, as I write this “review” of sorts on Uchi, the most prestigious of all Austin eateries, which I just left about three hours ago, please keep one thing in mind. I sit here in my dusty green chair with a belly full of half of a Freebirds veggie burrito, guac, no cheese. It cost about three bucks.

Dragging On

As Kerry Awn walks north on Guadalupe Street in Austin, his ears fill with the swishes and roars of the four-lane road to his right, fast with traffic. In front of him, behind him, and to his sides, masses of students walk to class, to their apartments, to their jobs. Not yet summer of 2008, the Texas weather is hot, but not hot enough to make Kerry sweat as he walks down The Drag wearing blue jeans and a thin white long sleeve shirt.

Besides his hair color, now more gray than brown, Kerry looks almost exactly the same as when he was an art student at the University of Texas more than 30 years ago. Similarly, the soiled and cracked sidewalk underneath the press of his old white sneakers is still the same as it always was.

Pausing from his straight-ahead walk, Kerry stops and moves out toward the street. His feet remain on familiar ground but his memory momentarily goes blank as he stares at the strip of storefronts and restaurants that is The Drag. The place where he once partied and hung out is, for a moment, an unknown blur.

Everything in front of Kerry has changed so much that he cannot remember what used to be.

Back to walking, Kerry tries to summon up the past. As he passes a CVS sitting in between Metro coffee shop and the Co-Op Art Store, he recalls that it used to be the old Texas Theatre. Now it’s just another chain store. But look, you can still see the old marquee.

Further north, Kerry takes a look at the two-story red brick building, home to Austin’s Pizza, Wish clothing boutique and Sprint – nothing like when it housed underground newspaper The Rag, an abortion clinic and a draft counselor in the early 1970s.

On around the corner of 24th Street, Kerry sees a two-story retail center on Nueces. A tanning salon and a campus real estate agency take up the top floor. On the bottom, a Smoothie King and a Starbucks.

“The whole corner used to be Les Amis, — the hangout spot,” he says with eyes squinting in a smile.

“You could smoke your cigarette, drink your beer and write poetry. It felt like you were in Paris.”

Back then, green plants grew everywhere and trees stood beautiful over the red tarp covering the patio. The waitresses and cooks smoked pot in the back parking lot and drank wine while cooking up curried vegetables and brown rice for $1.85. Many evenings, the Les Amis crowd would sit at a round table and play strip poker until every body was naked.

But in 1997, manager Newman Stribling could not afford to pay a rent that was three times more expensive. So after 37 years as The Drag’s main café, Les Amis was closed and torn down to make way for Starbucks.

It has been more than a year since Kerry Awn actually stepped out of his car and walked up and down The Drag. Why would I? I have no reason to come down here any more.

***

Kerry Fitzgerald, an art student at UT, wants to paint something beautiful on an outdoor wall after seeing murals all over buildings in California. It’s 1974 in Austin, Texas and Kerry believes that the Lone Star State’s capital city needs some of the same.

Kerry and his roommates and fellow artists, Tommy B and Rick Turner, pick a space that would be great for their plan: On The Drag at the corner of 23rd and Guadalupe stands a large flat wall.

Because the University Co-Op owns their concrete canvas, they go to the Co-Op board meeting with a model of what they have in mind. First time, the board says no. Second time the board says no. Third time the board finally says yes and supplies them with the acrylic paints to do the job.

Every day for the next six weeks, Kerry, Tommy and Rick leave their West Campus abode, departing from the neighborhood of frat houses, apartments and old homes. Once on Guadalupe, The Drag welcomes them with its forces of frivolity. Two women dress up in lacy vintage prom dresses and dance in the street. Another woman walks down the sidewalk topless holding her boyfriend’s hand. Roland DeNoie sells avocado and sprouts on whole wheat from Salvation Sandwiches’ small rolling cart.

At the Renaissance Market, the three painters set up white ladders and scaffolds and bring in buckets of paint. Most days Kerry wears his usual white T-shirt, cut off blue jean shorts held up by a striped belt and aviator glasses. When it gets hot, he takes off his shirt.

At first the vendors aren’t very happy about this new presence on their “reservation.” After years of lining The Drag with blankets and tents to sell their goods, the city held a vote and in 1973, and designated the Renaissance Market as the vendors’ official area. But with some time and beautiful artwork, Kerry and the guys win them over.

Day after day, the mural forms like a fetus in the womb. Vibrant colors of blue, green, red, yellow fuse together to create a life-size postcard of Austin. The capitol building, UT tower, The Ritz downtown, and more all form a curve around the centerpiece of Stephen F. Austin holding an armadillo instead of a gun. After all, with the Vietnam War still drudging on in its fifteenth year, The Drag culture embraces peace and love, not war.

Once Kerry and the guys have completed the mural, everybody who sees it just loves it. Even the Co-Op, initially hesitant to the entire idea, loves what they’ve done and wants to buy the ownership rights. So the guys sell their Austin creation to the University Co-Op for the price of $1,000.

***

Between the present-day Chipotle and a vacant building sits The Drag’s multi-unit, mega-structure, beaming in its grandeur — the University Co-Op. If walking by the Co-Op at nighttime, one can see a subtle burnt orange glow seeping out from behind the big black letters.

Through the eight front glass doors, a sea of burnt orange longhorn memorabilia washes over each customer who comes in as soft pop plays quietly on the speakers and the cold air smells like everything new.

In the middle of the large first-floor room, an expansive array of items makes up the “Graduation Headquarters.” A leather Fossil longhorn purse costs $118. A large burnt orange rolling suitcase with a white longhorn in the middle costs $49.

To the left of the centerpiece, the room fills with stacks and rows of longhorn pens, key chains, magnets, mugs, folding chairs, lunch boxes, towels, mats, hammers and pool floats. An average college student who enjoys a little bit of alcohol every now and then might enjoy the17-foot spread of koozies, shot glasses, beer mugs and champagne glasses.

Up the 23 steps to the second level of the Co-Op, longhorn-themed women’s clothing and accessories spread across the entire floor: Jeans, purses, tank tops, sports bras, workout shorts, bikinis, pajamas and longhorn maternity.

Ten more steps up to the mezzanine level, one can find all the necessities to create the perfect UT-themed game room. A Longhorn gas pump gumball machine costs $1,795 or perhaps one would prefer the Longhorn nostalgic chest cooler for $1,295 full of UT bottled water for 99 cents each.

Across the floor, children’s clothing dangles from the tiniest hangers, such as the longhorn onesies for 18-month-old babies. In the Co-Op Cheer Kids section, parents can find the perfect outfit for their young daughters, a $35 cheerleading suit made by Nike in Thailand.

Back down the 10 steps of the mezzanine level, the 23 steps of the second level, and another 18 steps down to the basement, sit all the books at the University Co-Op Bookstore. But at this time of year, all the shelves are completely empty. Too late for the frenzy of buying books and too early to sell books back during this late spring semester afternoon, only two students stroll around the basement.

***

Tatiana Young has a queer prom to attend in 17 days and she needs something bright to wear. Something very glittery. As she walks down The Drag with her friend Abigail, she stops by Blue Velvet Vintage and takes a gander at what they’ve got.

From outside, she can see a disco ball spinning with mannequins dressed in vintage garb dangling underneath. As she enters through the door, which is always held open by a small rock, the warm air inside smells of dust. She passes a wall covered with already-been-worn shoes, boots and hats. Perhaps the pair of alligator skin shiny silver heels will go nicely with her dress.

With her long and wavy dark brown hair sitting under a wool conductor hat, she browses through the clothes racks, making her way to the back of the shop. Her short skirt reveals a black tattoo that traces the circumference of her Hawaiian brown upper thigh. The Indie French pop tunes of April March are playing loud, but not too loud, over the speakers. Tatiana likes the music she hears.

She files through the vintage dresses that drape from hangers looking for a ‘80s style prom dress. If she decides to purchase one for her queer prom, she will be giving 40 percent of her money to the owner of Blue Vintage – for store supplies, rent and utility bills. The other 60 percent will go to a local consigner, like Lori Jones, who sits behind the cash register on this drab Wednesday afternoon in April of 2008.

Wearing a poofie red skirt, a black T-shirt and black flats, Lori shows men’s swimsuits to a customer. Her deep red purple hair is pinned back with a lime green bow barrette and she wears a black bat ring on her pinky.

Since 2002 Lori has been working at Blue Vintage, where she sells her decorated lighters, magnets and light switch covers. She buys plain light switch covers for cheap at Breed’s Hardware up on 29th Street. Then she paints it with enamel and lays down sheets of photocopied designs. Doing this can take a week.

Lori also re-sells clothing at the store, which she finds “thrifting,” or digging through estate sales, yard sales, whatever.

“I go everywhere,” she says.

Each of the seven or eight consigners has his or her own colored tag. Purple tags hang from Lori’s clothes and accessories. Some days, Lori will not see a single purple-tagged item bought. This isn’t really a bummer, though, because she, like most of the others at Blue Velvet, has another job.

When she’s not helping out the few customers that stroll into the store, Lori sits behind the counter, drinking Red Diamond Fresh Brewed Iced Tea, and talking with her friend, Mitch.
Reminiscing about The Drag, she remembers the summer she worked at the Co-Op for one day and almost every transaction was at least $400.

“UT is a brand,” Mitch chimes in after hearing Lori’s story.
As Mitch sits behind a computer, wearing a fitted light blue T-shirt, a blue baseball cap and a small silver hoop earring in his left ear, he can’t help but speak his mind about the current state of The Drag. After moving back to Austin in 2005, he noticed things had changed.

“It’s the Co-Op. The Co-Op is killing everything. The Co-Op and Starbucks. It’s slowly killing the local feel,” he says.

Taking sips of her iced tea, Lori acknowledges that rising rents and competition from big chain stores and corporations make it hard for some local businesses to stay open. She knows this is a reality Blue Velvet will eventually have to deal with.

“Of course rent is going to go up. If it’s too much, then we’ll just go somewhere else.”

***

Outside the sun shines bright on the old wooden planks of 2610 Guadalupe St. Inside the room is darker, with the only light coming in through two dusty windows, a few yellowed light bulbs and the glow of neon beer signs.

Being the middle of a weekday, Texas Showdown Saloon is not full of loud and drunk college kids. On this Thursday afternoon, a few old regulars sit at the bar and a handful of college-aged guys play pool at two of the three green felt tables. The only noise filling the establishment is the smooth twang of Pasty Cline’s voice, the sizzling of juicy meat being cooked on the grill, and the clicking of shoes on the dirty cobblestone floor.

Past the ancient arcade games, past the booths, wooden tables and benches, past the marlin hanging on the wall, past the old timer’ tin signs that almost completely cover the wooden walls, past the American and Texas flags pinned to the black ceiling, sits the bar in the back right hand corner of the room.

Dozens of pint-size red plastic beer mugs hang from the ceiling over the bar and grill area. Only the regulars can drink out of these. On the bar, a cash register sits draped with a long white piece of paper that reads:

$1,000 REWARD
TO THE CUSTOMER
(NO BROKERS OR REAL ESTATE AGENTS)
THAT FINDS A NEW
HOME FOR
THE TEXAS SHOWDOWN SALOON
IF YOU HAVE ANY GOOD
IDEAS FOR A NEW LOCATION,
CONTACT EDDIE MACK AT
EDDIEMACK78666@YAHOO.COM

The fate that local businesses on The Drag worry about daily, has hit one of the only two bars left on the street in the face.

“It’s not about rent,” Doe Montoya says as she grills thick globs of ground beef into hamburger patties.

“We would pay as much as we could to stay open.”

Her long black hair falls down over her black T-shirt-covered body and she talks with a smile that still has hope for something to happen. She works at Showdown full time, over time really. So when the bar closes on May 25, she doesn’t know what she will do.

It’s not just that she won’t have a job. But because the landlord is closing Showdown to make way for something newer, something fancier, Doe is reminded of all the other independent Drag stores that she’s seen replaced by chains and corporations.

As she cooks up burgers and fries, manager Eddie Mack takes beer orders from the people standing in line. Chris Luchey and John Mosely have been here since 3 o’clock for “happy minutes,” a 15-minute college kid heaven when all domestic drafts cost only 40 cents.

Looking at the piece of paper that hangs from the register like a unexpected and unwelcome eviction notice, Chris and John plan where they will go to drink beer and play pool. Maybe Hole in the Wall, a couple of blocks south on The Drag. Or maybe Posse East or Crown and Anchor in North Campus.

Chris, a statistics student, still has time to decide what to do with his life. But John, a history senior, will graduate in less than a month and feels scared about having no idea what he’s going to do. But they don’t think about that right now. All that matters right now is that whoever loses the next game of pool is buying the next round of beer.

After getting their beer from Eddie, Chris and John walk back to the pool table. The dwindling beer line at the register reveals Tom Painter, sitting on a heavy metal barstool and drinking from one of the Showdown regular’s mugs.

Wearing starched blue jeans, a gray long sleeve shirt and brown loafers, Tom sits with his wrinkling hands cusped around his mug. Every now and then, he raises the glass to his mustache-covered upper lip to take a sip of dark beer. For Tom, it doesn’t really matter what kind of beer he drinks, just as long as it is cold.

Tom started drinking beer here 27 years ago when the Showdown first opened. And now he’s old, too old. His body fails him sometimes, but his mind never does. Some days are better than others and today he’s surviving.

A retired national guardsman, Tom doesn’t live in Austin anymore, but dwells in hot and humid Thailand. Yes, just as humid as Texas, but hotter. Though each year he flies 18 hours back to Austin to do his taxes, he calls Thailand home. But every tax season, he comes back to Showdown at least once.

The past at Showdown was good for Tom. He often used to spend time at the bar during the ‘80s. He and his group of friends would meet to drink beer and socialize. Now, all the others in the group have died. Tom is the only one left.

Back then, the bartenders would draw ten numbers every day and if they drew your number, you got free beer the whole day. Tom sometimes bribed the bartenders to pick his number. Once he drank 17 free pints of beer. He felt awfully proud of himself until another guy drank 25.

But that was then, Tom says. Things change and now Showdown is closing and there is nothing anybody can do. You can’t stay in the past. You’ve got to move on.

***

It rained in Austin all Sunday morning. Hail dropped down into the streets and cracked as it hit the pavement. Now that the storm has cleared off, the temperature still feels a little too cold for almost-May in Texas.

Down here on The Drag, the sun is starting to shine for the first time all day. Strong winds blow dried-out brown leaves onto the sidewalk and up into the air. With the many clouds filling the once blue sky, the rays have to fight for their space to shine down their warmth.

Students wear light sweaters and jeans as they return from shopping trips, carrying orange bags full of goods from the Co-Op, and white and teal bags from Urban Outfitters. As they pass the completely empty Renaissance Market, hot coffee in white Starbucks cups warms their cool bare hands through a thick java jacket.

Though the spring semester of 2008 at the University of Texas is coming to a close, The Drag doesn’t stop. During the semesters of the past, The Drag has been a river of culture for UT students and Austinites. But as the semesters of the future come and go, people will get older and the times will keep changing.

Most likely, the businesses on The Drag will continue to play musical chairs, with old ones leaving for new ones and the recent ones leaving for even newer ones – the nature of American capitalism. As the nation continues to massively remodel its past, some say we are killing the good. But a question lingers — Is this new development progress? Is it really better? Whatever, the answer may be, The Drag isn’t dead yet. Because memories of what it used to be still remain.

A Strange Experiment

Crunchy.

Peppery.

Then as my teeth break through the waves of crispy golden breading and penetrate the layers of white flesh, a juicy moistness abounds.

Chicken.

Pollo. Poulet. Gallina. Frango.

My eyelids lay down flat as my mouth moves up and down. I breathe in and out, in and out, deeply through my nose. The juices run over the small raised bumps on my tongue and slide down the hill of my throat.

This tastes good, I think to myself.

As I chew, I hold the chicken strip in my hand and bring it near my eyes. I want to inspect it. I want to examine its insides. I roll the strip around so that I can see what lies in the middle of all that breading. The strings of white meat pile on top of each other–the fabric of what was once a living chicken.

So yes, I think about that chicken, that chicken who I’m sure had a great personality but was ruined by the destitute life of small cages, never ending pecking and chopped off beaks.

Yes, I think about this.

But I also keep on eating.

It tastes good, I don’t deny that to myself. But the deeper I breathe in through my nose in order to fully extract every individual flavor, I realize how absolutely strange this piece of meat tastes. I am distracted and somewhat grossed out by this.

My hand, holding another strip, plummets down from my mouth, away from my teeth.

And into the small cup of watery white gravy.

“What is in gravy?” I ask my boyfriend, who was rather excited to buy his vegetarian girlfriend her first meat in two years.

My third and final strip sits in the orange and white striped box. I see the greasy wrapper underneath it. It looks so alone there in that big box. I take it out, rip off a little piece and eat it with some ketchup. I give the rest to the boyfriend.

So what got into me? What made me decide to eat a meal of meat after two rather easy and well-enjoyed years of tofu, veggie burgers and vegan cream cheese?

I don’t really know.

Maybe I wanted to see if I missed meat. Maybe I thought it would taste like the most delicious food item that I have ever digested. Well, after eating my $5.29 chicken strip basket, commonly known as Whataburger’s #6, I don’t miss it. And though it tasted good, those breaded and fried strips of chicken do not even compare to Magnolia Cafe’s veggie ruben.

So on this first day of the rest of my life, I pick up where I left off and improve further upon that. As time goes by and little in front of me is certain, my belief in abstaining from eating meat and animal products shall remain a constant.

www.vegan.org

The Salad Bar of Life

“Have I told you my story?” my mother asks me as we walk from Jason’s Deli to her white spaceship-like minivan.

Her voice is soft and excited and shy. I am my mother’s youngest daughter. I am graduating college in two weeks. She will cry. She will say, My baby is grown now.

When I graduated from high school, she reacted in a similar way. And graduating from college officially makes me an adult. She can no longer think otherwise.

“No,” I tell her and keep walking to my passenger door.

Once we sit on the cloth seats and shut the doors behind us, I ask her to tell me her story. As I approach my unclear adult future, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what I should do with my life. I anticipate her words.

—
Standing in her beautiful dark green gown with a cap and tassel on top of her long and flowing dark brown hair, Delsa Roche thinks about her future.

Graduating from Baylor University with a degree in accounting, she already has a job doing the books at a nearby hospital. When she applied for the job months earlier, she had no working experience. Well-off parents gave her all that she needed. So when the hospital hired her, she felt overjoyed. As she sits in her seat at her graduation ceremony in Waco, Texas, she thinks, I should keep that job.

Graduation is behind her and the future is wide open. Delsa sees many great things in this opportunistic time. First would have to be William Stafford. They met at a bar a few years ago, and she still loves him.

Then Delsa would like some nice furniture and an expensive vacuum cleaner. Some things all of my own. She stays at the hospital, buys her furniture and vacuum cleaner. In a year or two, her and Bill will move to Harker Heights, where she will work at a CPA practice. Then her and Bill will begin their series of moves. They will have children. They will end up living on Delsa’s childhood ranch outside of Florence. They will be happy along the way.

—
Pulling her van out of the parking space, my mother talks of how she went into the job market, working in her chosen career field and made money. She had enough money to buy the things she wanted.

“But,” she says, “I never did anything.”

She wishes she had.

We’re pulling onto the freeway now. She tells me not to worry too much about careers. Do whatever you want. Travel, work at a restaurant, or write if you want. Just don’t regret not doing something.

At this point, I sit in the car seat and it’s hot and I point the AC vent so that it pours coolness onto the oil of my skin. I smile. I never knew what my mother did when she was moving on in life as I am now. I never expected her to encourage living so freely.

I take her words and swallow them. I want to, but for some reason don’t, thank her for making me feel okay about every thing that I have been thinking.

Life’s Goal

A café. Large and spacy but full of cozy love. Couches, round tables, interactivity. Plants everywhere. Beautiful art on the warm walls. All the employees smile, laugh, speak with customers about how their day has been. They make their day better.

They make their whole week better.

Windows to let the light shine in and help the plants grow. A patio for people to absorb the sun that helps them feel alive.

Music. Of all kinds. Live and on the stereo.

Poetry readings. Story tellings.

The food. Oh God, the food. Delicious, healthy, local.

People eat the food and go, “oh…yes!” They hang out for hours, talking with each other, drinking glass after glass of malbec and chianti and shiraz. Beer too. They talk about how good the food is.

They talk about how good this life is.