Bedichek’s sense of place

 When people ask me about Texas writers, I always mention Roy Bedichek. He somehow caught a sense of the place.

People talk about time all the time, usually to say that they are busy. In the old days someone might mention a new wristwatch. Now someone is more likely to mention a new app that helps to organize all those schedules and routines.

Bedichek, at 80, said the real clocks are waistline, eyesight and mood. He wrote:

My main ambition in life, I told a friend the other day, is to avoid getting lumpy and grumpy.

Maybe such things are said in other parts of the country. But I read those words and hear the drawl of the Texas Hill Country.

If people in other parts of the country talk like that, well, there’s this: The same letter goes on about how a fellow should take a nap in the afternoon and then go for a swim in Barton Springs, which will give you chills even on a 100-degree afternoon.

And if that doesn’t convince you, the letter continues with advice on how to make a lunch of a kershaw, known in other parts of the world as cushaw.

If you’re not from Texas, he’s talking about a kind of long-necked member of the gourd family. Bedichek says it’s best baked in the rind.

• Source: The Roy Bedichek Family Letters, selected by Jane Gracy Bedichek; Denton, Texas: University of North Texas Press, 1998, p. 409.