How Long...?

How long has it been since you awoke before sun-up on a cold fall morning and headed to a country pasture? How long has it been since you walked - with your hands shoved deep into your pockets - through a dew-wet meadow, watching your own breath billow and hang in puffs about you?

Has it been awhile since you sat on an old fallen log and watched your morning coffee brew on a campfire?


How long you reckon it's been since a real cowboy - the quiet type, with spurs and everything - poured you a cup of hot coffee? Real coffee. Black coffee. None of the half-fat, venti, whipped, mocha business. Just an honest cup of coffee. No menu board. No lines. Just you, a cowboy, a styrofoam cup and a coffee pot. How long's that been?


Think back. When's the last time you sat on a bench made of a tree stump and listened to someone play the guitar as the sun came up and warmed your backs?

And if you had to, when's the last time you'd say you had a steaming bowl of real Texas Beef Stew? Not something from a can. Not something from a restaurant. I'm talking about cast iron seared beef stew that's simmered for hours over an open flame. I'm talking stew manned by a boot-wearing fella who quarters onions and dices carrots with the same knife his Daddy probably used 50 years ago...

I knew it. That's too long.

You should come on down to Texas. I think you could probably use the open air and some real coffee and guitar-strumming at sunrise and a bowl of chuckwagon beef stew. I can't imagine who wouldn't. (Unless you're one of those city slicker types with ragweed allergies, caffeine issues, an iPod and an "I'm a Vegan... Are You?" shirts. If that's you, please consider staying home. You'd hate it here. And, as impossibly friendly as we genuine Texans are, we do tend to be suspicious of folks who can't handle their red meat.)

No offense to anyone. Just sayin'.

The day was such a success. It had been too long since I'd done all that. And the henrybella's table (seen above about half-way through the morning), sold out as it does every year. I actually forgot my camera today, but remembered to snap a few pictures with my Blackberry. How long has it been since I neglected to take my camera with me to an event like this one? Forever.

It's also been forever since I settled into the couch with a little company and had a movie night. Excuse me while I go wash a few dishes and prepare to settle in for a quiet Texas night at home.

Happy weekend. -Brin

(PS. The cooking today was done by a guy named Garland Hays. He owns Big G's Chuckwagon & Dutch Oven Catering Company (903-335-3028), and he's the one pouring the coffee and stirring the stew (but not playing the guitar) in the above pictures. I highly recommend him and his beef stew.)