Article: Weird weather and wild horses

I know every drought ends on a flood. It’s one of my favorite sayings. So it came as no surprise when we got over five inches of rain at my house a couple of Saturday’s ago. Around five in the morning I heard the patter of raindrops with lightening in the distance. By six, the pounding sounded like someone beating a drum on the roof. Thunder and lightening provided counterpoint, like the cannons in The 1812 Overture.

Even so, when I got up around 7:30 and looked out the front window I was amazed to see that Garlic Creek, which runs across our property, had already risen over its banks and flooded the driveway. The creek has been dry these past two years; I’d almost forgotten it could carry water. As I looked out the front porch, raging waters engulfed our gazebo, perched precariously on the far bank and stretched all the way to cattle guard in the front.

For the next two hours I stood on the porch admiring the downpour and contemplating feeding the horses. The two in the back have a run-in where they can get out of the weather. I knew they were huddled there waiting for food. Thing is, it’s in the very farthest corner and slogging through the rain and mud figured to be pretty unpleasant. Nevertheless, I had to do it. The reality proved the premonition. The three in the front had to wait for the creek to go down, I didn’t get to them until well past noon.

The flood seemed like a good sign, with hay up to $10 per bale, we could use some grass growing around here. I can put up with a lot of mud to save some money. But then came the ice and the freezing rain. Those three equines in the front pasture don’t have any real cover, just a few scraggly trees that have lost all their leaves this time of year anyway. Normally they’re fine. I kept a horse in Missouri and in the winter I’d find icicles hanging from his chin and a hard crust of snow on his back. Horses can take the cold.

It’s not like that here. It hadn’t gone down to freezing much even at night before that ice storm. The horses were still wearing their fall coats, more like fluffy sweaters than down parkas. The cold hit them harder than I’ve ever seen. The only thing I could do was clean out the garage and let them hang out in there for the duration. I didn’t like the idea but I couldn’t come up with anything better. So I threw a bunch of hay on the floor, liberally mixed it with grain and invited the horses in.

Horses do not make good garage guests, let me tell you. They messed up the whole place. Food everywhere, trampled-on hay, horse manure. The garage looked like a barn! But I felt a better looking out the kitchen window and seeing their long faces lined up. At least they were dry if not exactly warm.

I could tell the weather had warmed up when I saw only one horse high and dry in the garage. A quick search of the property revealed incriminating evidence. The flood knocked the fence down where it goes over the creek and hoof prints were on both sides. The other two were gone, escaped onto sixty acres of cedar elm, oak, mesquite and juniper.

As I tramped through the woods tracking the rebels, the sounds of falling ice and creaking branches surrounded me. The weight of the ice had knocked down a lot of dead wood and caused low hanging limbs to hang even lower, blocking my path. I called to the missing horses but, of course, they didn’t answer.

Finally I spotted them, frisky as foals, running along the fence behind the neighbor’s house. No doubt they were visiting his horse. Tails in the air, they galloped toward me looking for breakfast. I locked them back up in their regular pen and filled their food bowls. They were knee deep in mud but hungry as horses.



Photo: View out the front porch of my house during the flood.
Photo: View out the front porch looking to the left. Somewhere through those trees is where the fence went down that the horses escaped through.
Photo: View out the front porch to the right. Our driveway runs along that right fence and through those raging waters.
Photo: This is poor little Phoenix with freezing rain in her mane.
Photo: Here is Buzz eating hay in the overhang of the garage. Notice all the icicles.
Photo: Phoenix has taken Buzz's place from the last photo with Buzz and Chesapeake in the garage. They always stand facing out. In fact, I saw them back in rather than go in and turn around.

Article: My father's memories

One of my projects for the new year is to compile a passel of slides I inherited from my father.

Dad died when I was in high school but we hadn’t lived with him since I was four. He worked for UNESCO as a professor and spent much of his life teaching in Latin America. When he died. I didn’t have the sense of immediate loss that many children would. Instead I mourned what might have been. Dad was living in Sylmar, California at the time, less than two hours drive from our house. Once I had the freedom of a car, I hoped to develop a real relationship with him. His death put an end to that dream and I have always resented him for that.

My slide project didn’t start out as something I did for myself. I was going to compile these memories for my younger brother for his fiftieth birthday coming up in March. His reaction to Dad’s death was different from mine. He developed something of a hero worship of our father, pulling all of his meager memories together to form an image of a man who may never have existed. I knew Stephen had few photos of Dad or of our early childhoods. A photo album would be the perfect gift for him. Then last year Stephen died suddenly.

As Stephen’s birthday approaches, I decided to go ahead with the project. I imagine him sitting down with his kids, who are about the same ages we were when our father died, opening the album and pouring over the ancient images with them. He’d spin tale after tale, weaving what few memories he had into the tapestry of a person, his father, a great man. Even though he won’t be there to do that, I thought he would still want his children to know our father as much as possible. So I began scanning in the slides.

I have maybe three-hundred images, paper-mounted and color distorted. I haven’t taken as good care of them as I should for they are scratched and dusty. In the margins of many is Dad’s elegant handwriting giving a simple explanation of the image. On one he wrote “Beauty and the children.. Oct. 1955” I stopped when I read that and examined the photo. My mother, with pins in her hair, sits on the edge of a bed talking to her two oldest children. It’s not a very good photo and not flattering to anyone in it. But it is Dad’s life, distilled into tiny bits and frozen forever.

Gradually, as I’ve gone over my inheritance, I’ve realized I should have done this years ago. Not just because I could have given it to Stephen rather than to Stephen’s children but because it has given me something I missed. I missed knowing my father the way these slides let me know him. I missed day-to-day life with him. I missed knowing what he loved and cherished. He took a series of slides of the UC Berkeley campus where both he and my mother attended college. I wish I’d had those shots when I went to Berkeley. I’d like to stand where he stood to take the photo. I’d like to imagine him there as a young man living in a foreign country and meeting the love of his life.

Another group of slides focuses on a trip to Death Valley he took with my grandfather. I’ve taken my children there many times. It’s one of our favorite places. Is that something I got from him? And across all the years, a moment is captured where he plays with baby Stephen and a rubber giraffe. There’s no way Stephen could have remembered that. Except the photo would have given him that instant. He could have looked at it and known his father loved him.

It’s a lot of work scanning and repairing the slides but it is worth it. In a way, I am scanning and repairing my own life.

Photo: A scanned slide that my father took of his five kids in 1962. This is what it looked like before I started working on it.
Photo: The same photo after extensive repair. From left to right: Stephen, Melanie, Sylvia, Cynthia and George.
Photo: A rare shot of the family with my father's parents. Taken in 1955. This is after I repaired it.

Article: Puzzling fascination

During the course of our New Year’s celebration this year, I brought out my trump card--possibly the most beautiful jigsaw puzzle in the world. I placed the box on the table and waited for my family to cluster around, awed at the vivid image of a classical Japanese painting depicted on the front. We, in the course of a few hours, could recreate that magnificent artwork out of a jumble of irregularly shaped pieces of cardboard. How could anyone resist?

I’d like to say that all settled in and brought the incipient masterpiece to fruition in one glorious display of family unity and shared interest but, to my complete surprise, the assembled crowd quickly dispersed. Some moved off to get something to eat, others to refill their drinks and, sadly, a few just sat down to watch TV. I broke the box open and splayed the pieces across the table. No one remained. Dejected, I rejoined the party that seemed to have moved to a room without a puzzle.

Over the course of the next several days, I completed my gorgeous Japanese puzzle, virtually alone in my efforts. As I placed the final piece into the last hole, I was overcome with a feeling of accomplishment. I stood back to admire my creation. Beautiful! So much bigger and brighter than its portrayal on the box.

That feeling drives me to complete jigsaw puzzles. All I need to do is spend a few--read that many--hours pouring over a thousand or so pieces and I know I can capture it again. I can sit back and admire a work of art that I have created. And it’s not like creating real art, which is a hit or miss affair. As I worked on my puzzle, my son struggled to create a mosaic tile picture frame. He didn’t complete it before he left but I could tell he was already disappointed in it. Real art is like that, it requires talent and perseverance and even then might not live up to expectations. Jigsaw puzzles never let you down.

I did a 3-D puzzle last year. It was a small globe. Although I’m pretty familiar with what the Earth looks like, that was about the hardest puzzle I’ve ever done. Never mind just trying to make it all hold together! If the pieces weren’t numbered, I’m sure I never would have completed it. The two-thirds of the world that’s water all looks pretty much the same on a globe.

Once I did a map-of-the-world puzzle where the pieces were shaped more-or-less like the countries or states they depicted. I’m not sure if that qualifies as a jigsaw since the pieces were not interlocking which definitely added to the difficulty. And some of the pieces were tiny. Those eastern states don’t amount to much even when several of them are combined on a single piece.

The Japanese understand the appeal of jigsaw puzzles better than most Americans. The stores where they are sold often have large displays of jigsaw puzzle frames. In the US, I think most people laugh when they see a framed puzzle.

I left my completed Japanese puzzle out for about a week before I realized no one was going to come marvel over it. When I opened the box to put it away, I found a foil packet and a sponge. I couldn’t read the directions but I assume the packet contained special puzzle glue so I could immortalize my work in the Japanese tradition. It was a temptation.

Pulling apart each piece of my puzzle hurt. How painstakingly I had created this beauty! With such effort I had tried each piece, eager for it to find its home. Now they were so much flotsam adrift in a plastic bag. I closed the lid on their pathetic state of increased entropy. As always, chaos wins.

Photo: Detail from the beautiful Japanese puzzle I recently completed.
Photo:The completed Japanese puzzle in all its glory along with a couple of more memorable puzzles from my past, stored as jumbled masses in their boxes. The Rosetta Stone puzzle was purchased at the British Museum in London where the real Rosetta Stone resides.
Photo: 3-D globe puzzle given to me by my son. Without the numbers you can see on the backside of each piece in this photo, I never would have been able to complete the puzzle.
Photo: This puzzle currently sits on the mantel in the livingroom of my home. It might not look like much to you but it was a major accomplishment for me.
Photo: The map-of-the-world puzzle I did. Luckily it depicted native animals from each region, including the seas. That made it much easier to piece together.
Photo: Detail from the animals of the world puzzle.

Article: Happy New Year!

The holiday isn’t over for my family. We eschew the standard celebrations to focus on the turning of the calendar. As the glittering ball falls in Times Square--delayed one hour--we blow horns and pop poppers. By 12:10, the floor is completely covered with confetti. Then we sit down to exchange gifts.

It wasn’t always this way. I was raised non-Christian. By that I mean that while we didn’t believe in any gods or supernatural phenomena, our heritage was Christian. My mother’s family was some sort of German Protestant and my father’s was Greek Orthodox. My grandparents even had me baptized. But neither my parents nor later my stepfather were religious. Still we put up a bright aluminum Christmas tree every year and celebrated in the Christian manner.

I continued the tradition with my first husband who hadn’t given religion enough thought to know what he was. When Coral was born on December 23^rd, I put her bassinet under the tree for a Christmas photo. The kids’ father didn’t have much of a sense of humor about social norms and Christmas was on the boring side while we were together. After our divorce, it got more fun. One year I hid the presents and told the kids Santa was sick. The Easter Bunny stood in for him but didn’t understand that the presents were to be left under the tree.

Then I met Rick who is non-Jewish. He is, however, more Jewish than I am Christian. He said it made him uncomfortable celebrating Christmas. He was raised Jewish and his mother and sister are followers of the religion. They wouldn’t like him celebrating Christmas. It didn’t matter to me so we switched over to Chanukah.

Chanukah is a beautiful holiday. The kids loved eight days of gifts. Candle races were a big event each night as we tried to guess which would last the longest. But most nights of Chanukah fall on workdays and Rick’s work ethic is warped. He couldn’t make it home at dusk for Chanukah dinner. After a few years I told him we weren’t celebrating his holiday if he wasn’t there. We were switching back to Christmas.

Rick couldn’t get home in time for Chanukah but neither could he celebrate the Christian holiday. We examined our options. I loved the thought of celebrating the solstice. The official start of winter, to me the solstice symbolizes its end. The days grow longer bringing the hope of summer Coral opposed the move since December 21^st, two days before her birthday, seemed no better than two days after. Even when she was small she resented the proximity of a major celebration to her special day.

The solstice was out anyway because it falls before Christmas so we’d have to face awful crowds while shopping. Also, it could fall on a workday--we knew that didn’t work.

The logical choice was New Year’s Eve. Gift shopping could be done the week after Christmas, taking advantage of sales, and New Year’s Day is a holiday. We set up our own unique tradition. We decorate the living room top-to-bottom with ribbons, streamers, New Year’s banners and a silver ball hanging from the fan in the middle of the room. While we wait for midnight we play games, have silly string or marshmallow gun fights, race windup toys and other crazy stuff.

At midnight we shoot off as many poppers as we can. We clink glasses full of champagne or sparkling cider. We yell and hoot. We turn the fan on and start the ball spinning--normally trailing a heavy cargo of silly string and streamers. Then we get down to the serious business of present opening.

Everyone spends the night at our house. It keeps them safely off the road and allows us to continue celebrating in the morning. The new year dawns on a day of play and family fun. It’s the perfect holiday for us. I hope y’all enjoy yours as much. Have a happy and safe new year!

Photo: New Year's decorations before the comencement of celebrations.
Photo: Everyone has to wear a silly hat. Here are Coral and Celeste comparing choices.
Photo: Monica and Celeste divide up the poppers for the big moment.
Photo: Every year I take a photo of Philip and Coral holding the photo I took of them the year before. The new photo then goes in front of the old photo in the same frame. If you look deeply enough, you can see all the way back in time.
Photo: I'd like to think Celeste regrets her part in the making of this mess but I'm sure she doesn't.

Article: The graduate

December 23^rd marks a big day in my daughter Coral’s life. It’s her twenty-sixth birthday but that’s not it. It is the day she officially graduates from UT Austin with an M.A. in Linguistics. She’s not going to her graduation ceremony but she has already started celebrating.

Since she officially finished all school related activities on Monday, Coral has made two broad pronouncements. The first is that I should allow her to wear her lip ring in my presence. I will never be happy about that lip ring so I don’t see how that’s going to happen. The second is that she will resent me forever for making her complete her degree. She says the only thing the degree is good for is to allow her to write M.A. after her name. Like all mothers where education is concerned, I know she will thank me in the end.

Coral has had an interesting academic career. She started kindergarten a year early due to the timing of her birthday and our financial situation, I couldn’t afford another year of daycare. She attended kindergarten at a private school where age wasn’t the only criterion for entry and started public school with the first grade. I remember it like it was yesterday.

In the weeks leading to the big day, I explained to Coral about what the first grade would be like. I bought her new clothes and school supplies. We visited the campus with her brother serving as tour guide since he had just finished the first grade and knew all about it. “Don’t worry” I told her, “I’ll drive you the first day and help you find your class.” She humored me for a while but eventually dealt the death-blow of five-year-old independence: “I’d rather take the bus.”

I looked into her steely blue eyes and saw no fear, no uncertainty and no dependence. On her first day of public school, Coral boarded the school bus with other kids from her daycare and went off without a backward glance.

Although the youngest child in her class, she was usually the tallest during those yearly years. School was easy for her. She did well and had lots of friends. The first hint of trouble came between the second and third grades. At that point she announced that she’d decided to take a year off. Since she was a year ahead in school, this would not be a problem according to her reasoning. It was a blow when I explained things didn’t work that way.

After Coral graduated from high school, she wasn’t particularly interested in college. She went to live with her dad, working a little and partying a lot. Then at nineteen she went to Venezuela to do a Spanish emersion program. She came back with a goal. She began attending junior college and got straight A’s. After that she attended UCLA where she received a B.A. with a major in Linguistics and Spanish, graduating with honors.

When Coral started the Ph.D. program in linguistics at UT Austin, I was the happiest mom in the world. She got an apartment near campus and continued to get straight A’s. But gradually her attitude changed. Her enthusiasm for linguistics began to cool. She no longer believed linguists applied scientific methods or critical thinking to their field.

She dropped her plan for a Ph.D. and decided to go for an M.A. Without the love for the field she had felt earlier, even that came into question. The last couple of quarters were particularly hard, not due to the material or the work but for lack of motivation. That’s where I came in. Mothers are made of motivation for their children and I’d been coasting while Coral supplied her own.

Finally it's over. Time to party. Time to reflect. Time to lament the worthlessness of the degree. I don't agree, over the course of her carerr, I'm sure her M.A. will bring opportunities and better pay. In fact, it will s tart paying off soon as she collects her graduation gifts. She's not going to be resenting me then. I'm hoping she'll thank me, if not for the degree then at least for the gift.

Photo: Five-year-old Coral graduating from kindergarten.

Article: Where the action is

I was driving up I35 in southern Oklahoma a couple of weeks ago when I spotted an intriguing sign. Traffic was crawling due to snow and ice so Sheldon and I decided to follow a whim and headed for Pauls Valley.

Pauls Valley is a cute little town though I’m not sure where the “Paul” or the “Valley” comes from. Part of the town’s charm stems from its many brick streets, more than any other city in Oklahoma. But the real attraction is the world’s first and only Action Figure Museum. The allure of such an unique museum drew us like a magnet.

We drove the snow covered brick streets to the museum eagerly but painfully slowly. We found our destination easily but were intensely disappointment to discover the museum was closed. Closed! Lousy snow. I knew I hated that stuff, all fluffy and sparkling and dangerous to drive in. “Closed due to weather” read the sign on the door.

But what goes up must come down, so Sheldon and I dropped by the museum on our drive back to Texas. Luckily it is open Sundays from 1:00 - 5:00. As we walked up to the door, Sheldon commented that our visit would take all of five seconds. Admittedly neither one of us owns a single action figure, but I knew Sheldon was wrong. What I didn’t know was how wrong he was, we spent about three hours in the museum. Sadly, during that time they had not one other visitor. Maybe it was the weather.

After paying the $6 per person entry fee, we were treated to a guided tour by an extremely well informed man. We saw thousands of figures and he knew what each one was, what year it was made and how many points of articulation it had. Points of articulation are a big thing for action figures, an indication of their value and collectability. Primitive figures have shoulder and hip joints that allow the limbs to swing back and forth and not much else. A good figure has movable wrists and elbows--possibly a posable finger or two--and can grasp a weapon or other talisman.

We marveled at the “Bat Cave” with its multiple versions of Bat Man, Robin, the Bat Mobile, even trusty butler Alfred. There was one of those ride-on toys that you see in front of grocery stores too. When I was a kid I always wanted to drop my quarter into the horse version but here I forked over the money for a ride on the Bat Mobile. It played the music from the old Bat Man TV Show.

The main attraction was the “kid’s room.” Our guide explained that it looked like the room of a 27 year old “boy” who still lived with his mother. Sheldon and I nodded knowingly, we were sure he was describing himself. This display contained more action figures than I imagined existed. The floor was completely covered with an intricate tableau of good verses evil action figures. The wall plastered with figures still in their original packaging. The most interesting item to me was “The Robot” from the TV Show Lost In Space. It rotated, waved its arms and said, “Danger Will Robinson!”

Along with several of those grocery store ride-ons, kids could enjoy a table set up with loads of figures they can play with and a dress-up area with masks, capes, feet or hair of cartoon and comic strip characters. Annoyingly, everything was kid-sized but Sheldon and I cobbled together primitive costumes.

We had a great time and only left because of the long drive we faced and the fact that the museum was closed. If you’re in the Pauls Valley area or you love action figures, I highly recommend a visit. You can find out more at: http://www.actionfiguremuseum.com. Click on the poster to get to the actual web page.

Photo:
Brick street in front of Action Figure Museum. Notice the snow and ice. Those are my tire prints.
Photo:
The front of the Action Figure Museum. That's Sheldon taking video of something that doesn't move.
Photo:
Part of the big room display. The whole thing was cramed with action figures so thickly that you couldn't even grasp what was going on.
Photo:
This is "The Robot" from the Lost In Space TV show. He waves his arms and says "Danger Will Robinson!" when a light is flashed on him.
Photo:
This is a balrog from The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. This is one of the action figures they are most proud of.
Photo:
Another shot of the Balrog action figure, this time fighting a Gandalf action figure. They are all to scale according to the movie. The Balrog even lights up and makes some kind of roaring noise.
Photo:
This is me dressing up as some kind of action figure. Note how many points of articulation I have.
Photo:
This is Sheldon trying to look "super." Good luck with that!

Article: Oklahoma is not OK

Sometimes I think I’d like to move to the area of the country north of Dallas and south of Oklahoma City. Probably not many people think that way but it’s something that crosses my mind periodically. Living here on the edge of the Hill Country, it’s hard to imagine why anyone would fancy the dreary, unadorned planes that lie along the northern border of our state. There’s only one explanation: horses.

Of course, horses and ranches abound in Texas, it’s not like north of Dallas has any monopoly there. I’ve got my little plot of land in Buda and a small herd of the critters myself. But, much as I like Hays County, it’s not the center of equine activities that the Red River valley is and sometimes I long to be closer to the action. That happened again earlier this month as I contemplated my drive up to Oklahoma City for the National Reining Horse Association finals.

If you haven’t seen a reining horse in action, you really should check it out. Go to www.nrha.com to find out more about reining and when and where upcoming shows will be held. But the thing is, it’s no coincidence that the finals are held in Oklahoma City. That northern edge of Texas and southern boundary of Oklahoma is where all the big reining horse trainers are. Towns like Aubrey, Pilot Point, and Tioga Texas along with their Oklahoma counterparts are home a disproportionate number of great reiners. I’m not in that league but, well, sometimes I think that if I lived in the right place things might be different.

I know it’s just a crazy dream and my trip last weekend made that blatantly clear. I’m not saying I didn’t enjoy the show. It was great. Beautiful horses, lots of action. But the weather! Can people really live like that?

The drive started out well enough. My friend Sheldon and I left work early, around 5:00 on Thursday evening and headed north up MoPac expecting to be slogged down in rush hour traffic. It was windy and bitterly cold but the traffic just didn’t appear. When we hit I35 just south of Round Rock, we breathed a sigh of relief. The worst was over and it wasn’t that bad...or so we thought.

We made good time all the way up to Ft. Worth. We stopped for dinner in the northern suburbs and it was there that we got our first real sign of trouble. A thin dusting of icy snow covered the median and lawns. Dallas and Ft. Worth don’t seem so far away, it always amazes me that it snows there. Sheldon was for turning back, even though he lived in Minnesota for three years he seems to be afraid of the snow. I pointed out to him that it wasn’t snowing now and probably hadn’t snowed since the morning. The roads should be cleared.

The drive from Ft. Worth to the Oklahoma border probably took us two hours even though it’s only about fifty miles. The roads became progressively more and more icy. We assumed that, as a state, Texas wasn’t prepared to deal with winter weather. Things would get better once we entered Oklahoma. Again our expectations proved false. The eighteen miles from Marietta to Ardmore took another two hours. We were now traveling in a caravan of mostly eighteen wheelers and going a whopping five miles an hour. We decided to stop for the night.

The morning dawned crisp and very cold but the sun was shining and I thought the ice would soon melt. It didn’t. Another five long hours passed before we reached Oklahoma City. We left the freeway and traveled on some smaller highways after leaving Ardmore. Most drivers don’t have any qualms about tailgating even when they’re driving on ice and can’t possibly stop. It seemed safer to drive on roads that weren’t as clear of snow but had a lot less traffic. We mad a couple of short stops too, mostly to gawk at “winter.” The snow and ice made for a beautiful landscape.

That drive was all I need to remind me of why I live in Central Texas. Pretty as it is, I can't stand the snow. And while I saw some horses out romping in their snowy pastures, the one time it snowed here my horses huddled beside the barn just waiting for it to pass. If I ever do achieve the level required to participate in the OK City NRHA finals, I know now that I won't be able to go. As bad as it was driving a car, I can't imagine pulling a horse trailer.

Photos:
An ice-encrusted tree at a rest stop near Ardmore, OK.Close-up of the tree. It sparkled like glass.
An ice-coated barbwire fence.
Sheldon loves the snow. However he wore his riding boots which don't give much traction on ice.
My little vehicle, Grisie. She hates the snow too.
This is what Grisie and I saw on Friday morning. Trucks and cars stacked for miles and hardly moving at all. You'll notice that I took this shot while driving.
Once we left the main highway, we saw some interesting sights. Like this stack of old cars outside a junk yard in Lexington, OK.
How clever to make an old Volkswagon into an enormous black widow spider!

Article: Enchanting day at Enchanted Rock

Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, saw some of the most beautiful weather of the year. I can’t understand anyone spending that day shopping. Since my son Philip’s nuclear family went to his fiancé’s grandmother’s house for the holiday, he was free to spend the day with me. We decided to get up early--though not as early as the shoppers--and head to Enchanted Rock State Park.

Enchanted Rock is a gigantic granite dome located on RR 965 north of Fredericksburg. According to the Texas Parks and Wildlife website (www.tpwd.state.tx.us/spdest/findadest/parks/enchanted_rock), the dome rises 425 feet above the ground and is one of the largest batholiths in the United States. A batholith is an underground rock formation that has been exposed by erosion. There’s a lot of impressive erosion going on at Enchanted Rock. The rock looks like it is sloughing its skin.

Since the weather was so nice, Philip and I decided to take my little Jeep Wrangler with the windows off. We used the back roads, traveling through such towns as Sandy, Willow City and Eckert. The miles wore by in a shifting tableau of cattle, small streams, goats and live oaks. This area is spectacular with wildflowers during a good spring but it’s a very nice drive any time of the year.

Eventually we wound our way to the park. Our fantasy that everyone else would be shopping or sleeping off their Thanksgiving “cheer” was shattered immediately. There was a line of cars waiting to get it. Luckily it moved fairly quickly. Once parked, I got my camera gear and water packed up, and off we went to climb the dome. Unfortunately everyone had the same idea. A long trail of colorful dots, the bright shirts of fellow climbers, wound up the side of the great rock.

In my opinion, the point of hiking is to get some time alone with nature. Given the number of people on the so-called Enchanted Rock, that wasn’t going to happen. But there was another granite dome right next to it, not quite as large but way less populated. We decided to head up that one.

The domes are not hard to climb. They’re fairly steep but the rock is rough and there’s plenty of traction if you have a good pair of sneakers on. I stopped at multiple places to take photos of the jumbled rocks that litter the smaller dome. It was at one of these stops that I focused my camera down slope. This reminded me that I’m afraid of heights. Suddenly the rock did not feel secure at all. I might plummet to my death at any moment. Luckily Philip has absolutely no such fear. With his guidance and occasional hand-holding, I made it to the top.

The view was wonderful. The air was clear and cloudless. Scrub forest stretched over the hilly countryside below us with little sign of human disturbance. Some trees even displayed a Texas version of fall color. We sat on a boulder and watched a spiny lizard while butterflies and birds flitted by.

Later we made our way carefully down the least steep section of the rock and into a canyon with a small stream. Dragonflies danced above rippling water. We continued our hike around the back of the dome, past a stock pond and a scenic overlook and finally to the parking lot. We’d spent about four hours in what Philip jokingly calls “the tawdry beauty of nature.” Now it was time to head back home.

We used to go out to Enchanted Rock all the time when the kids were little. Now it seems we don’t have time to do things we used to enjoy. As we left, Philip commented that he is going to bring Celeste, his eight year old daughter, out as soon as possible. Maybe all we need is a little reminder about what is important in life.

A train of people heading up the official "Enchanted Rock".
The view looking up the rock we chose to climb. Notice the two standing rocks. I had Philip climb those for a photo.
Here are the standing rocks up a little closer.
Now there's Philip on top of one of the rocks!
Taking this photo reminded me of my fear of heights.
Our rock had a lot more boulders on it. This is looking toward the Enchanted Rock.
Here's Philip on the top of our rock with the back of Enchanted Rock in the background and a view of the Hill Country.
Some of the boulders congregated on the back of Enchanted Rock.This shows how the skin of the rock is being sloughed.
A bit of Texas fall color.
A dragonfly we saw near a stream at the base of the domes.
This is the stream where we saw the dragonfly.
The sun sparkling on the water of the pond. It looks late but I think it was about 2:00 pm.
The forest around the base of the granite domes.
Philip admiring the view from a scenic overlook on the loop trail.
It was around this area that my brother Stephen and I caught three water snakes one day. Stephen made me catch them because water snakes always bite.