We All Fine

Greatest local tragedy — for me? Went to Santa Fe Trail for hurricane breakfast tacos, and the place was closed!

A few weeks back, passing through Austin, I ventured off the beaten path for a quick tour through an old neighborhood of mine. Old, East Austin – south of the river, Old East Austin. The cops shot a guy in the alley of the place I lived, and the word I got from a beat cop, the assailant pulled out a firearm. The neighborhood is now paved over with mid-rise, multi-use developments, decades of old apartments gone and buried, nothing more than memories. Remember, a time, dashing to the corner laundromat wearing only a robe?

The second, or third, hand story I got, it was a neighboring apartment building, at the time, and either a lightening strike or small tornado had peeled back one brick and stone wall, facing the river. Just exposed two or three second and third floor apartments, like skinning a catfish. Nature’s filet knife, peeling back a single layer of the building’s epidermis. That was 20 or 30 years distant. Not sure I mentioned it at the time, but the building itself bordered what was then Town Lake, part of the Colorado River.

We All Fine

The first of the images from Harvey flooded in, bringing back that salient memory, the frailty of our world, and then, the hope that I get to fish. Rockport, TX, a long favorite destination, its unofficial tag line, “A drinking town with a fishing problem.” Place look pretty crushed from the first images. Port A, Aransas Pass, Rockport, and Fulton bore the burden the strike.

Here? So far? Not much. But thanks for asking.

Your mileage may vary…

I tend to think of the Gulf Coast and hurricanes, not as of question of if, just a question of when.

Rockport Mayor Pro Tem, Patrick Rios, “If they’re going to stay, they should mark their arm with a sharpie pen, name, social security number…” presumably, makes a body easier to identify.

Cold, dude, really cold. But it was, as he pointed out, a voluntary evacuation order.