Kerrville Folk Festival 2013

I recently returned from the Kerrville Folk Festival in the Texas Hill Country, which I attend pretty much annually. I’ve mentioned it a couple of times before.

It’s a phenomenon that’s not very easy to explain to people who aren’t already familiar with it. This time I tried a new variation on my standard description.

I got a new response, too.

This was a fair question, as I had left out an important part: I love aging hippies. All my festival friends are aging hippies. I’m afraid of the ones in my age group, who are much more cool and tan and alternative than I am.

It’s intimidating.

Generally, the previous generation suits me a lot better.

I’m not sure how I managed to become simultaneously forty-five and eight years old, but there you have it.

Come to think of it, I know exactly how this happened. It’s clearly caused by the genetic material inherited from my two favorite aging hippies.

Thanks, guys.

Trust Me

I like being an expert on things. If there were a way to harness this “internet” thing to regale imaginary strangers with long stories they don’t care about, I would definitely be all over that. I might even draw pictures.

The best times, though, are when you get expert status as a bonus—it just so happens that everyone else in the vicinity has less knowledge or skill in this area than the paltry amount you’ve got, plus no way of judging your own ineptitude.

A sudden snowstorm recently handed me one of those glorious moments of unearned authority. I was checking the freezer for ice cream around midnight when I noticed the snow through the window, and I went out front to look at it in case it melted before morning. That’s where I found my next-door neighbors and their abbreviated dog, staring around them at all of the weather and looking awed but apprehensive.

With a hand to my sagacious chin, I dispensed the deep wisdom of the ages.

They listened, confident in their newfound guru, as I nudged them toward enlightenment through sticking to major streets and looking for closures on the news. They had no way of knowing that I had spent the previous February frantically Googling how much road ice it would take for me to die of fear before even starting the car.

Of course, operating under unearned credentials is a risky game, and there’s always a chance they’ll figure you out. During the summer educator-training program for Teach For America, I once spent about twenty minutes as the person in the room who could draw. This is not typically a title I can claim in the presence of an even moderately capable fifth grader, so I was as surprised as everyone else by my answer to a colleague’s plea of, “Help! Can anyone draw a pet that kids have?”

However, in that rush of sudden exalted proficiency, you have to be careful not to push your luck. With everyone else thinking you have superior skills or knowledge, you can start to believe it yourself…

It’s easy to ruin the illusion.

Sometimes it’s just better not to reveal your expert knowledge in the first place. For example, the assortment of 65-and-older ladies assembled for Sunday School do not necessarily want all of their questions energetically answered.

In any case, you can definitely trust my advice on all of this. It’s pretty clear that I’m the expert.

A Word to the Wise

I have an undergraduate university diploma that, if I understand the concept correctly, certifies me as an indisputable authority on all language-related topics.

With great power, of course, comes great responsibility. It’s only right that I share with the masses a taste of the heady wisdom gained during my lifelong and continuing research. Prepare to be edified by my…

WORD TRUTHS FOR SUCCESS AND HAPPINESS

1. Abbreviations are a thing.

It took years of unrelenting canine obsession before my parents succumbed and got us a dog. Before that, I had to make do with my grandparents’ string of black Labradors. After thorough study of breed nuances, I was eventually able to tell them apart from the other varieties of dog in my life (“Wishbone” and “corn-”).

I didn’t have to wait long to use my impressive knowledge. On a Moms & Kids Group trip to the park, an unfamiliar woman appeared with a tantalizingly familiar animal, and I began a thorough investigation.

After checking all the particulars—ears, size, color, lack of fried cornbread coating—I boldly proclaimed my scientific determination:

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2. Words that start the same are not necessarily the same.

My dad worked in law enforcement for the federal government for years, and we moved to Albuquerque for his job when I was in elementary school. The feds put us up in apartment for a few weeks until we could move into our new house, and during this transition the whole family got a cash allotment to spend on meals while our kitchen implements were stuck in government storage. This allotment is called per diem, as in, “We are trying out a lot of restaurants because my daddy is on per diem.”

All grown-up-related terms pretty much sounded the same to my ten-year-old self, so I tossed them all together and picked out whatever was easiest to reach at a given time.

They don’t sound the same to fifth-grade teachers, though, which explains the reaction I got to blithe announcements that “We are eating out because my daddy is on parole.”

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3. Do not change horses in midstream.

My standard in-person, casual greeting is “Howdy.” I’m originally from Texas, and I can’t help it.

(Which is to say, I can help it, but then how would others know upon first meeting that I AM A UNIQUE INDIVIDUAL AND WORTHY OF SPECIAL NOTICE, OKAY?)

The trouble is that I’m also kind of indecisive. (Or maybe not. I’m not sure.)

Tragedy struck a few weeks ago with my new Native American coworker, when my mouth couldn’t choose between a rousing “howdy” and a more traditional “hi.” Instead, I ended up with an enthusiastic combination of the two.

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Now remember, ladies and gentlemen, that this research has been conducted by a trained professional. I cannot take responsibility for any attempts to recreate experimental conditions on your own. But please take video.

Si, Habla Ingles

A lot of Americans do not realize that New Mexico is part of their country.

I first learned this fact in elementary school, when we lived in Oregon and occasionally travelled to visit my grandparents in the desert Southwest. I announced one of these trips to my gym teacher, who was from Alaska herself and should have been familiar with nonstandard states.

I was not the kind of child who let inaccuracy slide, and I think my teacher showed a lot of restraint for someone being vehemently corrected by a seven-year old.

Sadly, this geographical ignorance persists, even in areas much closer to the state in question.

I lived in rural south Louisiana for six months while failing at teaching the first grade. My Teach For America coworkers and I had to cross the Mississippi once a week to attend training classes in another little town, and on one of these trips we met Perry the Ferry Man.

(TANGENT: I loved taking the ferry. A westerner by birth and raising, I had never seen a river the size of the Mississippi. My first day in town I drove across the bridge to Baton Rouge three times just for the heck of it, and the ferry is way better because you’re still in your car, but now you’re on a boat. In your car. On a boat. You can even get out of the car, and you are still ON A BOAT. I could say this all day: CAR. BOAT. RIVER. ON!)

Perry could tell we weren’t locals, and he came over to talk with us. He headed for my two fellow teachers, who had arrived in a truck with Illinois plates, and asked a few questions before turning to me.

I wasn’t sure what he meant at first, but then…

Now, I realize that my license plate says “Mexico,” right in between “New” and “USA.” But I had not prepared an appropriate comeback for this type of misunderstanding. I was also several weeks into a neuron-destroying cycle of sleep deprivation, so my response lacked a little punch.

Perry seemed to decide that I didn’t understand all that much English, so he spent some more time interviewing my friends. Eventually, though, he couldn’t resist:

This is where I really, really wish that I had been firing on all cylinders.

Instead, I just left the man wondering how on earth this half-mute Mexican could teach school.

As a teacher, I probably should have put more effort into American Geographic Awareness. All I can say to that is, “What did you think was on the other side of Texas?”

P.S. You’re welcome.

Super Powers, Part III.5: Not Liking Coffee, Sort Of

I am not exactly a connoisseur of coffee.

I’ve spent most of my life smugly disliking the stuff. I felt superior and health-conscious. Every warning I saw about negative effects—cardiovascular damage, weakened teeth, pre-caffeine morning stupor—inspired a self-satisfied “Not me!” I even told a congratulatory little story about my superhuman resistance:

I got all these benefits without any sacrifice—if you sincerely dislike something, you do not get Martyr Points for giving it up. This logic did not stop me from regaling others with the tale of my impressive willpower at every opportunity, though.

The trouble was that I kept tempting fate. I still liked how coffee smelled, so I would try it every now and then to see if my tastebuds had changed. It’s the same way I occasionally sample brie and V8 in case they’re no longer disgusting and I’m missing out. With every test, though, I continued to file that cup o’ joe under “gross.”

So what major life event—what monumental stressor—finally got me to drink coffee?

I realized that fat is delicious.

I bought a carton of heavy cream for the fridge at work, and it took a single cup to corrupt my once-touted purity.

(Plus I got a nifty mug like this one, and I really had to start drinking something that leaves stains so that no one else would try to borrow it.)

Despite this shameful fall from grace, I held onto a last shred of superiority: Up until recently, I was not aware of any personal standards for coffee quality. All the fuss about finding the good stuff or being the world’s best sounded affected and needy—unlike the fine gradations I recognize in ice cream workmanship, coffee pretty much seems to be coffee.

Last month, however, I faced a 12-hour, overnight drive across six hundred very flat miles. This trip led me to sample a great deal of the coffee available in the wee hours of a West Texas morning, and my palate mustered up some previously unrecognized discernment.

At my gym, the tanning booths are in between the front door and the women’s locker room. When I walk past them, the surrounding area is usually scented like tropical fruit or lavender. Occasionally, though, it smells disconcertingly like dinner.

That’s what it tastes like when you pull into a small-town McDonald’s at 4 a.m. and they pour you a cup from the pot left untouched by last night’s shift. The greasy savor of roasting skin.

I don’t have a good way to end this post. It’s hard to rebound from flesh coffee. Instead, you should listen to this song, which I heard on vacation and which is now my very favorite snake-related song of all time:

I'm on Vacation, Including from My Hobby

My laptop and I are currently attracting all of the insects in Texas.

We're sitting outside at one of the few electrical outlets that fall within the narrow beam of internet connectivity at the 40th annual Kerrville Folk Festival, surrounded by guitar-playing hippies. Neither I nor that Wikipedia link are any good at explaining why it's so wonderful to camp in the chigger-infested Hill Country heat and listen to banjos at 3 a.m., so just understand that I'm doing those things instead of posting this week.

Until I get back next week, you can spend the time thinking about the lunch I watched someone eat today: Peanut butter straight from the jar, a brick of dry Ramen noodles (Oriental Flavor), and a tepid can of SpaghettiOs. I'm also pretty sure I saw him debating whether to use the spoon on the SpaghettiOs while it was still half full of peanut butter.

Camping. Yes.