THE PROJECT

"They have demanded surrender...we've answered with a cannon shot."

The courtyard (reconstructed). The Alamo, San Antonio, Texas

How then are we to contend with an unpleasent bite at the unripened apple? What? I’m sorry, I spent some time this morning getting our gardens and apple trees ready for winter. Must’ve been overtaken by some prophetic nonsense. If you’ve ever pulled an apple from the limb before its time, I bet you remember that taste though. Chalky, sour, and lingering. Distance, time, and water will cure what ails ya. They’ll get that taste out of your mouth anyway. If only all the anwers were that easy.

I’m a son of Texas. “That’s right”, as Mr. Lyle would say (or sing). Born between the Congress Avenue Bridge and the governor’s casa. When Austin was still Austin. We Texans stand on, and for, a lot. History. Ceremony. Tradition. Culture. We’re not afraid to tell you that you’re making your chili wrong. We have rules governing the acceptable steering wheel gestures required to complete a proper greeting when met by an oncoming vehicle on a farm to market road. We call those the “FM” roads. If you know, you know. Pointer finger extended, lift hand up off the wheel casually, slight head nod, eyes back to the horizon. There are regional variations that are debatable, but the fundamentals are indisputable. If you’re having trouble getting it right, I’d suggest a Bob Wills playlist and repeated practice runs through Llano County. What the hell do apples and Bob Wills have to do with each other? Nothing. I’m just introducing you to the uncharted voyage of my thoughts. To be fair, Bob Wills taught us that “Roly Poly, daddy’s little fatty,” did, in fact, eat an entire apple pie.

Good Lord, Gertrude, I think that Choate boy up there in Colorado is a half a bubble off plumb. Yes sir. Maybe so. Give Ms. Gert my best.

Texas is more than a place. More than a thing. It is more than events and people. Texas is the smell that snakes into your soul while you stand in line with your red plastic tray in hand - at a real, by God, pit BBQ joint. A joint is different than a restaurant for those of you keeping score at home. Try the cobbler, trust me. If the blackberries are ripe in the tree rows out back, order two. Texas is the first day of dove season. It is the feeling in your neck and shoulders when they relax, as only they will when you clear the grassy dunes and trot down to the surf in Port Aransas. Bring a cup, somebody down there has a keg of cheap, cold beer. Texas is midnight at the ‘Spoke. It is gameday at the Chicken. Tailgates next to Shulz Garten. The Chili Parlor. Fried Chicken on Sunday in Buffalo Gap. The hanging of the Christmas wreaths at The Espiscopal Church of the Heavenly Rest. On Meander, not the one in New York City.

There are as many ways to stereotype Texas as there are Texans to stereotype. Cowboys. Both kinds. Music. All kinds. Food. The best kind. Weather. Ok, lets just skip that one. I’m an expatriate. I left home when I was 18. I’m now a citizen of Nebraska, plopped in the southwest corner of Colorado. I’ve learned to take a good natured ribbing about all the things my native land is known for. Good and bad. A few things that are truly “Texas”, however, are respected universally. None more than the old Spanish mission in San Antonio. We are reverent when of it we speak. And we hold fast to the knowledge that what happened there isn’t just a Texas story. It is a solemn and necessary yarn in the fabric of the United States of America.

I’m not a big fan of what they’ve done to the Alamo. More specifically, what they’ve done to the neighborhood around the Alamo. But nobody asked me, so that’s that. Regardless of who is peddling what at the gates, however, the story of the Alamo is much like Texas. It is bigger than Davey Crockett. Truer than Georgie Russell. More complete than what later happened at San Jacinto. It is not Santa Anna or Stephen Austin. It is all of them, and none of them. It is the personification of bravery, sacrifice, and human spirit, that did not die when the besieged therein were killed. It is a lesson in what men and women are capable of doing when they taste the chalky, sour apple, and cannot get it out of their mouths. On those walls, they chewed, and swallowed, and took another bite.

In response to my being declared a winner in the Parkinson’s disease lottery, I’ve looked for all manner of escape. Literal and not. I can only imagine the many times worse sense of hopelessness that visited the people within that little mission. At the end of the day, they realized no way out. So they stood. And fought. They had no choice, so they made the most heroic of choices. Some of those volunteer soldiers were, in fact, heroes. Some were good people. Others were dispicable. I’ll leave that for someone else to debate. Some scholars and behaviorists have concluded that the inhabitants of the Alamo were nothing more than animals backed into a corner. They’d say that character had nothing to do with their actions, they just reacted in desperation. I don’t know, and the smart people don’t either. I do know that they didn’t surrender and they didn’t curl up in a ball in the corner and wait for their respective ends. They fought. And in that, I find inspiration. I’ve looked for the exit, and there isn’t one. I’m not much one for curling up in a ball. Maybe I’m an animal backed into a corner, but I’m not going to just wait around for my end.

When Santa Anna’s troops cleared the walls and overran the battlements of the Alamo, it was a massacre. In short time, the waves of soldiers grew and the killings became more efficient. They soon made their way into the bowels of the mission. It is there that they found the infirmary. One of the men previously committed to that ward was something of a legend already. He was, according to history, more scoundrel than hero. That same history will never forgive some of what he did earlier in his life. He was in that infirmary against his will. Deemed too sick to fight, guards had to stand watch to prevent him from returning to the rooftop.

Legend tells us that toward the end of the battle at the Alamo, its defenders were reduced to hand to hand combat with all manner of makeshift weapons. I believe, based on a lifetime of reading, hoping, and dreaming, that one of the most fierce of those hand to hand battles took place in that infirmary. Jim Bowie didn’t curl up in a ball. He didn’t get on his knees and beg. He didn’t feel himself unworthy of the noble death awaiting him. Perhaps he was cornered like an injured bobcat and just had no other choice. He knew the taste of that apple. He knew there was no water, no time, and no distance. He was within those walls of his own accord. When they killed the men outside that door that day, he fought what was to be one of the last fights inside the mission. He died for Texas. He died for the United States. He died a hero, a sinner, a saint, and scoundrel. Fighting to the end, with his boots on.

I’ve not been in combat. I have pulled a trigger in defense of myself and others. I’ve been in a few fist fights. There are no winners in the end. Only the bloodied, and the more bloodied. The living, and the dead. God bless them both. Believe me. I don’t look upon Jim Bowie as one of my heroes. Didn’t know the man. I can’t, with clear mind, compare my fight (or any I’ve been a part of) to the bloody horror of the Mission San Antonio de Valero. But I know it is wise to seek lessons of a stage greater than the one on which you are comfortable when the fight for your life is at hand. I’m not a hero. I’m not a saint. I’ve aspired to both, and fallen short. But I know the step of men and women who didn’t. It is in their footprints that I hope to follow. There were good men and women on both sides of the walls of the Alamo. Some of them died at the direction of men they’d never met. Some of them were kids, others were elderly. Families in Mexico and Texas mourned their loss. They reshaped borders, cultures, peoples, and character. Few asked to be there, and those that did, like Jim Bowie, only asked because their own “no way out” started long before that battle.

This is THE CHOATE AND BOWIE PROJECT. It isn’t a Texas history lesson. It isn’t a primer for the use of lethal force. This is one man’s will, pitted against the unrelenting march of a progressive, degenerative disease. This is my fight, and maybe yours, against an enemy I (we) cannot escape. We cannot fight it with weapons, fists, or feet. In fact, at times, there is little else to do but rise, and walk around in circles. Parkinson’s disease will, over time, get worse. It has already curled my toes and curved my left foot inward toward my right. It has felled me, slurred my words, and pulled at my dignity. One day, it will take my voice, my hands, and my mind. Please don’t recoil from that. I’m not going to give anything up easily. I won’t tolerate pity or allow you to feel sorry for me (or anyone else with PD). But I have to know what is coming to appreciate what I still have. I am scared. I’m pissed. I’m everything you’d be given the circumstances. So, in response, I created THE PROJECT.

THE CHOATE AND BOWIE PROJECT is based upon my desire to relieve my mind of the burden of unspoken (unwritten) words. It involves daily journal entries, blogging, and articles written for profit. I’ve written a book. But the stubborn part of me is having a hard time getting along with publishers and literary agents. I’ll be damned, who saw that coming? So, if you know a guy or gal in the book biz, I’m an unsigned free agent. This project is nothing more than my intentional efforts to remain busy, productive, and engaged now that I’ve (been) retired. I’m a proactive personality and a real pain in the ass. Relatively harmless and a damn good cook. I find myself in a place that requires me to work hard to simply salvage who I want be. There isn’t a tomorrow in the sense that there once was. I peel myself out of the sheets every morning. I make our bed (not exactly hospital corners but Jill is patient with my efforts). Thanks to Admiral McCraven, I put that accomplishment in my pocket…and begin the day.

THE PROJECT keeps me busier than I typically was when I was working. I don’t yet feel productive, and I struggle to remain engaged. I have a couple of side hustles that pay better than they should. I box and workout with my trainer, Don Roberts. The best in the business, unapolgetic plug for FIT 24/7 on Camino Del Rio, in Durango. I eat pills like they were popping out of a Pez dispenser. I build things in the shop and fight the squirrels and bugs and bears for the apples out back. I’m not fighting an invading army. I’m fighting to be a friend, a father, a husband, and a writer. I fight to build knives and shelves - and a good pot of chili. To declare victory, Parkinson’s disease needs nothing more than my willingness to curl up in a ball and surrender. My people don’t do that. If the fight someday reaches the infirmary, I’ll be waiting. With my boots on.