Last week was been extremely busy. With
the Adrian Peterson parade that weekend and working on everything
else to try and wrap up as much as I can before I leave and Wendy's
new ascension to interim city manager, I've been lazing almost as
soon as I've gotten home. Today, I managed to find a little breathing
room.
The Saturday before last was the Adrian
Peterson parade. It was a surprisingly good turn out and, despite the
fact that I know nothing about football, I enjoyed myself. I was
slightly late to the event and the parade took off without me. I was
parked at the origin of the parade route at the courthouse, and I
jogged about two blocks to get ahead of the procession. The video of
the actual parade is kind of wobbly because I was acknowledging
people as they went by and, since I don't have a tripod, the camera
isn't going to be great for a time lapse any ways.
Speaking of time lapses, I have only a few days left. While I have very much enjoyed my stay and the hospitality
of my hosts, it'll be nice to settle back into a more permanent
residence. I was actually given an offer to stay through the summer,
but my class looks like it will be fairly intensive and will require
a a reliable internet connection (which, my current residence does
not have). There's also a few things I'm looking forward to about
being home. I'd like to see my mom and grandmother before I move away
for good after school. I will admit I didn't have much of a civic
pride for Bryan, though that may be just inactivity on my part.
Either way, I feel emotionally and personally invested in Palestine,
despite only being here a month. Continuing to be involved on an
irregular basis with the city throughout my graduate degree program
is certainly something I'm open to.
Much of last week is a whirl wind. I
cut and produced two videos. I processed a lot of invoices and feel
as if I could maintain the position of administrative assistant if
circumstances were slightly different. Thursday I went to capture
footage of the Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility to use for video
production. This way, there will be a nice backlog of videos for
Wendy and the crew to release. I'd like to discuss continuing to
generate content for them, though the details and specifics of that
are up in the air, and my skills may not be worth the trouble. I know
I wouldn't pay me.
We took a field trip to Waco on Friday.
By this point in the week, my normally ironclad memory was starting
to slip up and I forgot about a small meeting Wendy had for Thursday
morning. Fortunately, the preparation was not too demanding. Just
some coffee and a clean table. Friday was a strange day. I went with
the city staff to the Sanderson Farms hatchery in Waco to see what
Sanderson planned to build in the business park here in Palestine. I
have very mixed views. I am an avid meat-eater and fundamentally
opposed to the hypocritical psychopaths who run PETA. However, the
chicks just being thrown around through machines as if they weren't
living was a upsetting. It's definitely something for me to think
about.
That night, my friend from Houston
visited for the weekend. We ate at Switch, which is a coal-brick oven
pizza place on S. Royall street, that only looks like it's in the
middle of the woods. We splitted a Blanco pizza. While it had a great
taste, the pizza was pretty light and my friend hadn't eaten that
day. We wended up eating out again around 2 or 3 in the morning. The
next day, I brought him to do a little shopping and walking around
Mainstreet, then we went to Old Town for lunch. We had chicken strips
at the Ranch House, because I could no longer smell baby chickens on
my clothes. Afterward, we got some pie at the Oxbow Bakery. I got the
buttermilk, which was amazing. Later that night, we had dinner at
Denby's, where my friendly bartender greeted me with a side-hug.
After an early dinner, we went and saw Man of Steel. By then it was
dark, and we decided to drive by the old Palestine Memorial Hospital.
It's supposedly haunted, and we would've stopped and gotten a closer
look had it not been deep in the night by then and I hadn't left my
1911 at home.
Finally, yesterday we went to Canton
Trade Days. We didn't buy anything, however we did get some classic
festival food. I hadn't had a funnel cake or a corn dog in years. We
washed it down with some cherry lemonade on the drive home. Once in
Palestine, we browsed a few more shops and went back to the Palestine
Memorial Hospital in the daytime and cased it one foot. No
trespassing for us. One of the fence gate was open, so we walked into
the yard for a closer look, but it bore no fruit. We snapped a few
photos of the windows and left. Neither of us really believe in
ghosts, but little adventures like this make life fun. That night, we
had dinner at Red Fire Grille on the first floor of the Redlands.
That brings us to Monday. Today is
something of a recovery and wrap up day. My time at work was mostly
spent gathering together a few things to cut a final video or two
tomorrow or Wednesday. Preferably Tomorrow. Wednesday I plan to catch
some raw footage to leave behind for them. I also have to meet with
Laura to be debriefed. I'll do some packing up over the next couple
of days and be on my way Wednesday evening.
I've really enjoyed my stay here in
Palestine. There's a nice charm to it and I feel connected to the
city even though it's only been a month. I do pause to wonder if that
is only because my internship put me into contact with a lot of these
people. Had it been just me, as it normally is, would I have felt any
kind of connection? Would people have been so friendly and open
toward me? I'm not certain. Regardless of whether my circumstances
affected my perception or not, it's been a good time and I'd
certainly be open to visiting Palestine again in the future.
So, in conclusion to what will likely be my final update to this blog, I would like to thank the people of Palestine for making me feel welcome in your city. Particularly those of you I interacted with on a regular basis.
