Before we found a small house, newly constructed according to the modern pattern, we found what looked like an old, tumbled-down, Bates Motel.
The stories these walls could tell! We really had no idea what it used to be. An apartment complex?
Whatever it was, once, it is uninhabitable now.
It seemed to have been constructed with no regard whatsoever for anything like habitability, in fact. Basic structural engineering principles seem to have been the farthest thing from the builder's mind. You find this a lot in small towns in Texas, where everybody does as they please with no regard for the common good or even simple physics. Don't you ever try to tyrannize a Texan with talk of a "common good", or about the existence of basic, objective, physical laws-- you are likely to get shot.
Next time, I'll tell you about the one small house we found, and why I did not include a photo, why we passed it over and went on to photograph yet another private junkyard. I will tell you what we think of the small house revolution in Spur.
Small houses were the reason we were IN Spur that day; the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal (stop laughing) did a story on small houses in Spur. My wife read the article and we were interested. We wanted to see these things. The AJ described one as having "98 square feet" of living space. That seemed a bit tiny to me, and I thought it had to be a misprint. 980 square feet seemed more reasonable. A factor of ten error is perfectly reasonable for the local paper-- better than average reporting, in fact. So we were looking for something about that size.
We were finding plenty of ruins and relics, but no new construction.
But we did, finally, find one of those small houses, one of those revolutionary small houses...
So far, we've been searching for signs of small houses, and we have not found any. We were wondering where they might be. Of course, they are SMALL... just how small are these things, anyway? Should we be revising our search methods? Have I, in my ignorance, already STEPPED ON a small house, and caused untold damage and hardship?
Oh, clumsy me! Cloddish and clumsy creature of the Earth! I've been stomping around with my camera, crushing entire neighborhoods, entire cities, into the dirt, and have not even noticed! No, surely not.
We've driven here, and driven there, we dined in a local restaurant, and I even went to the restroom in a big convenience store on a hill, in desperate need to expel that which I ate, and still no sign of the big small house revolution. We were determined not to return to Lubbock until we had gotten to the bottom of this social upheaval.
We continue our exagimination of this town. No revolutionary small houses yet. We are in the business district. Or, it might have been that, once.
Every time we visit this place, we wonder, what HAPPENED to Spur? Or, what FAILED to happen to Spur?
We were hoping that the big small house revolution might transform the town.
We are still looking for new little houses, as opposed to old little houses that are falling apart, and documenting various buildings in the main business district.
This old house seems to be past its prime.
Spur appears a little more dilapidated every time we visit...
We always wonder what it would take to put some more life into Spur. A small house revolution?
The stories these walls could tell! We really had no idea what it used to be. An apartment complex?
Whatever it was, once, it is uninhabitable now.
It seemed to have been constructed with no regard whatsoever for anything like habitability, in fact. Basic structural engineering principles seem to have been the farthest thing from the builder's mind. You find this a lot in small towns in Texas, where everybody does as they please with no regard for the common good or even simple physics. Don't you ever try to tyrannize a Texan with talk of a "common good", or about the existence of basic, objective, physical laws-- you are likely to get shot.
Next time, I'll tell you about the one small house we found, and why I did not include a photo, why we passed it over and went on to photograph yet another private junkyard. I will tell you what we think of the small house revolution in Spur.
