There was an American flag on almost every street corner. Trucks rattled by towards the fields that seem to engulf this sparse town of less than 2,000 and the smell of diesel and cheap beer floated on the warm breeze while the hot sun beat down down down onto cracked sidewalks and empty streets. The taste of USA felt so strong here, from the way the dogs barked from behind chain link backyard fences to the parked police car next to the pizza place, the lone passenger in the drivers seat reclined for a nap in the afternoon heat.

Save Us All , the graffitti proclaimed up above the furniture store and I wondered who had ventured up to the structure to spray those words for all to see. Save you from what, I idly wondered, god being around the corner on every street here in these small towns. . Graffiti is possibly endemic here, with so many wide open walls just waiting to be sprayed with messages for gods both here or not, and underneath their fresh layers of white, I could see remnants of previous messages just waiting to be recovered on many walls.

Residing in Hunt county, with an estimated 459 housholds as of the 2000 census, you can’t help but wonder at the life here. There is beauty, the colors red-white-blue popping out from everywhere, and the little houses that sprawl out from the town center are filled with thriving gardens that clearly showcase a special kind of quiet resilience that isn’t easily found in modern suburbia. Between Greenville and Royce City, it’s bypassed by the highway that connects both and as such, it’s easily missed unless you aim for it by placing your life in the hands of any of the small farm roads that connect it to main civilization. Or, I guess if you wanted to, you could fly in, as they somehow have their own municipal airport. Don’t say these places can’t surprise you.

~m