Fiction, Essays, and Other Things

  Environment often dictates behavior and for that reason, most anywhere else I would have passed by a Buc-ee’s with little more consideration than I would have passed by any random rest area. But since its opening in Clute in 1982 and its expansion throughout and outside of Texas, Buc-ee’s has brewed such local fervor that I had to stop at its Amarillo location before departing the city. It is, to be sure, unlike any rest stop I’ve seen before. Tacky, perhaps, but not without value. Roughly the size of a smaller K-Mart, Buc-ee’s offers its own merch (hats, shirts, plush toys of its mascot, the titular beaver etc.) as well as a wide array of snacks, baked goods and take-out options. I stocked up for the road, mostly with bottled drinks and cleaning supplies, and can win the approval of any Texan I tell I’ve been to a Buc-ee’s.                                             ...

  I was particularly intrigued by Shamrock for one peculiar reason. I knew so little about Irish diaspora west of the Mississippi. I grew up in the historic stronghold of Irish immigration and since childhood was immersed in its heritage, a legacy that can be felt from Maine to Maryland. So intricately tied to the northeast have I come to see the influence of the Irish in the United States that I never conceptualized it further west. “Boston Irish” is a term that carries socio-historic implications as well as a prototype in the cultural zeitgeist. But what does it mean to be Irish in another state, far away? Shamrock was the place to find out, a city that greets visitors with a stone plaque that could have been interchangeable with any in Southie depicting a leprechaun stating “Top O’ the Mornin’ to Ya!”. Even more incongruous with a city in the Southwest is the piece of the Blarney Stone that was shipped from the Emerald Isle in 1959 and has sat in the center of town since besid...