A Texas Road Trip 1.1 (Day 1, Stop 1)

Here I am returning after another long absence.  My plate has been very full lately.  I was again inundated with work for several days before my trip and the work piled up and came thundering down upon my return.  Then I was advised that the buyer for my farm has been approved for financing through the USDA in a program which supports young adults in the agricultural industry.  So now I've been involved in the many things that will need to be accomplished to close escrow, which on a farm is about five times more complicated than if you're just buying or selling a house.  Environmental studies and land surveys are just a part of the process.  It could take possibly as long as two months for those things to happen.  The ultimate outcome will of course result in my returning to Arizona, hopefully by Thanksgiving and surely by Christmas.  I have taken a temporary leave of absence from my work to help me deal with all these issues.

So here goes with that Texas road trip I promised you a few weeks ago.  Normally I just edit a bunch of pictures and throw them in a bucket and sort of draw them out randomly but this time I've decided to show you what I saw in chronological order.

My first stop was in Teague, Texas, 130 miles west of home, and my only purpose was to see the Post Office mural which I had heard about.  Its title is Cattle Roundup and it was painted by Thomas M. Stell, Jr., in 1940.  Upon first glance one might think this was an appropriate mural for this area of the state but upon closer examination,  many of the details are not authentic.  Teague itself is considered a part of East Texas and the landscape portrayed by Stell doesn't exist.  Stell was a native of Cuero, Texas, and taught at the Dallas Art Institute and surely was aware that saguaro cactus does not grow in Texas.  The armadillo is also out of place in a plains locale and I can't imagine a mother vulture putting her nest of eggs on top of a rock out in the hot Texas son.  The cowboy's boots look more like Dutch clogs than cowboy footwear.  And the baby saguaro is almost laughable.  It's definitely an interesting piece and Teague is no doubt pleased, as it should be, that it is one of the elite towns that has a Post Office mural.

As I left the post office I noticed a mural just across the street on the side of a large building portraying the early days of Teague when the railroad was an important part of its economy.  As most towns, Teague evidently had a nice depot with a hotel within a short distance.  The mural seemed to be a bit faded but I was happy I had stumbled across it.  Today Teague has 3,500 residents and seems to be a quiet little town.

As I drove over the railroad tracks and out of town I glanced to my left and there was the depot!  Obviously restored and very beautiful, there was a big train engine parked there and when I went back to explore a bit I realized the engine was running.  Before I left it actually backed up a few feet!  A note here about the photo.  When my computer crashed not too long ago I naturally lost my Photoshop program which I primarily used to run some Topaz filters.  I eventually found my Photoshop box but the disc was missing and it still had one use on it.  I had the serial number and I know there is a way to download it from the web but I searched for longer than I usually spend doing anything and was unable to find out how to do that.  While I was looking around on the web I ran across a program called Smart Photo Editor, opened a trial version of it, and while playing around I came up with this wacky shot of the train and the depot.  This is really out of character for me but I decided to pay for the program and I had a lot of fun for too many hours yesterday playing with this new toy.

And sitting right next to the depot was the Teague Hotel.  I think I found a couple of jewels in a little town that most people only pass through!

I'll try to spend a couple hours visiting your blogs today.  Then I must go see about getting new tires for my truck in anticipation of a trip to Arizona!