The Wef Takes a Road Trip

Day started before dawn driving due east into the coastal plains. Flat as a pancake, more than half the two-hour-plus drive on a two-lane highway. I had talked to the organizer yesterday and he advised against the internet maps, suggesting there was a lot of fracking traffic on that road. I felt like he saved my life with all the heinous car crash stories I've heard about sleep deprived drivers.

I did have to drive through Gonzalez, a town with quite a battle history during Texas revolution. It is home of the "Come and Take It" flag with the old cannon. That symbol always scares the crap out of me. A sticker of that image is as good as the stars & bars on a pickup. Besides that wide spot in the road, the way he brought me to his town was a pretty drive—horizon big as Texas, dawn beautiful yellows and pinks. Lots of downed trees, buildings with no roofs or mid-repair. I missed the cutoff and drove down Main Street to the town square, complete with courthouse, gazebo, statue. Driving through town I saw plenty of windows boarded over, roof repairs in progress, and more downed trees, some just a pile of logs. Harvey.

I called and got rerouted by a human. (No, I don't use GPS for driving. I need a picture in my mind of the route, turns, distances. If I figure it out, I can get there again without much effort.)

The class was in a mobile house that serves as the Victoria Youth Soccer Organization's office and classroom. We did the class with no internet, like the old days. Students from 10 years old to adult: a father/son pair, a mother/son pair, a kid who zoned out after lunch, and a classroom teacher who was AMAZING at taking any role-play scenario into an extraordinary learning zone with his enthusiasm, embellishments, and challenges to the kids that I have never accomplished.

It was a tiny class so we moved through a lot more material than a bigger class would have. I'm so glad I got to see how my program works when it has to adjust this much.

We were packing up everything at the end of day when the most exciting thing happened. Stephen picked up the projector that had been on most of the day and that was quite warm, and a scorpion wiggled around confused that his house had disappeared. It ran in a circle on the table and then headed straight towards one of the kids. Stephen scooped it up with a sheath of papers and tossed it outside in a few smooth moves. The kids shouted all sorts of torturous ways to kill it. "Why would you do that? It's good he just let it go," said the obviously-not-country girl who has never been stung by one. The conversation spiraled into scorpion-sting stories before we got back on track.

Long day, but Victoria, Halletsville, and Port Lavaca all have new refs. Small towns are lovely to visit. Glad to be home.