Texans | The Professor's Convatorium

Steve Dunwell – Getty images

In Texas we are known to do things big. We tend to favor and flavor life robustly and then give our opinions about it, solicited or not, whether one likes it or not. It is a state of mind and a State of mine. And yes, whether I like its earned reputation and personality or not, doesn’t matter to Texans too much either. That’s also the meaning behind the Lone Star.

As such, I pay my humble tribute to my great, robust, opinionated Lone Star State because I can. I am an eighth-generation Texan — which means we were here well before the state was stolen away from Mexico — and have much to share about it. I will list a few definitions, and explanations of how we speak and what it means, or could mean. I feel this is an accurate self-portrayal, albeit parody, of my beloved rural Texas minus the guns, the horns, the beseeching “Lord in Heaven” for sure, and the Good ol’ boy yee-hawing.

The Meanings of Inept, Useless
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Common: having or showing no skill; clumsy.

In Texas: 1 – He/She could screw up a two-car funeral. 2 – He is such a numbskull, he bought a suit with two pairs of pants, then burned a hole in the jacket. 3 – If she’d been cooking for the North, the South would have won the war!

The Meanings of Slow

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Common: moving or operating at a slow speed; not quick or fast.

In Texas: 1 – He’s so slow he could gain weight walking. 2 – He was behind the door when brains were passed out to the room. 3 – If it gets any greener (stopped at a traffic light) it’s goin’ to grow!

The Meanings of Dead, Deceased

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Common: no longer alive; not moving.

In Texas: 1 – He/She gave up their fiddle for a harp. 2 – The devil’s comin’ round with the bill. 3 – He/She swallowed the wrong pill. 4 – His/Her moving picture went dark.

The Meanings of Poor

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Common: lacking sufficient money to live at a standard considered comfortable or normal in a society; of a low or inferior standard or quality.

In Texas: 1 – Broker than the Ten Commandments. 2 – He lives on the other side of across the tracks. 3 – We’re so poor we can’t go window shopping or ‘draw’ breath in the bank.

The Meanings of Unacceptable

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Common: not satisfactory or allowable; intolerable.

In Texas: 1 – Like hugging a rose bush. 2 – I’d rather play leap frog with a unicorn. 3 – I’d rather pick cockleburs out of a skunk’s ass. 4 – I’d rather use sandpaper than toiletpaper. 5 – He got caught in his own loop South.

The Meanings of Fast, Brilliant

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Common: moving or capable of moving at high speed; exceptionally clever, quick-witted, or talented.

In Texas: 1 – He/She gets there in one-half less than no time! 2 – Movin’ like he was goin’ for the luncheon after Sunday service. 3 – She’s a walking encyclopedia inside a labotomy lab.

The Meanings of Advice, Tips

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Common: guidance or recommendations concerning prudent future action, typically given by someone regarded as knowledgeable or authoritative.

In Texas: 1 – Never call a man a liar just because he knows more than you do. 2 – Never sign anything by neon! 3 – There’s never a good time to have your gun jam. 4 – Just give me the bacon without the sizzle. 5 – Don’t jump off your horse and saddle to kill the rattle snake without your rifle outta the sleeve on the saddle.

The Meanings of Immoral, Wild

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Common: not conforming to accepted standards of morality.

In Texas: 1 – They’ll wrap around you like a sweet-potato vine. 2 – He was born on the wrong side of the blankets. 3 – They’re hitched but not churched. 4 – His lips ain’t no prayerbook. 5 – They ate supper before they said grace.

The Meanings of Yonder

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Common: at some distance in the direction indicated; over there.

In Texas: 1 – If ya leave by daybreak, you and your horse will arrive as the biscuits rise or the dinner-bell sounds. 2 – He’s bored and yonderin’ (as in daydreaming; drifting away and yawning).

The Meanings of Celebration

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Common: the action of marking one’s pleasure at an important event or occasion by engaging in enjoyable, typically social, activity.

In Texas: 1 – Let’s shoot out the lights. 2 – We’ll go to town… or at least the far pasture. 3 – Let’s hallelujah the county! 4 – Throw your hat over the windmill. 5 – Let’s wear our Sunday-go-to-meetin’ clothes! 6 – We’re gettin’ happier than gophers in soft dirt.

I have all of my 35 or more cousins in Texas, but these three cousins grew up in a rural town outside of Austin. We spent a lot of time together growing up. They loved to hunt many sorts of wild game on huge thousand-acre ranches. On this particular all-day hunting trip, having walked around for miles, tired and hungry and having not shot anything but the wind with each other, they wanted to get back to the truck immediately for my Aunt’s excellent home-cooking. There was one problem. They’d moved so many times they weren’t sure if the truck was one way or another.

They argued, not rude or abhorrently, but each not trusting the other’s sense of direction. It also did not help they laugh and talk with each other making none of them a stealthy hunter in the least. Greg, the heavier slower walking brother was certain their escape was that way about a mile or two because of where the Sun moved all day and was now nearer the westerly horizon. Clay wasn’t so sure and wanted to one-up Greg as brothers do. “Due to the fall season,” Clay explained, “shorter days, and Earth’s rotation,” he claimed with an irrefutable tone “if we walked faster (glaring at Greg) this direction we’d find the truck a lot sooner.” Billy, the more tired and hungry brother, and argueably the one with more common sense, was not going to be outdone by either of them and said “Well, if the Sun is over there Greg, and the Earth is rotating faster than you walk, and Clay you say the truck’s in front of us, then why not we just sit here arguing until the truck comes to us?“

Ah yes. My beloved state of Texas. Nothing like it or us cowboys inside it, anywhere in the world. We are indeed in some state of mind.