The Hobbs Holler

Monday, October 13, 2025

Leaps

- The Box Tops -

I thought I better do some work today, so I took some photos of a 1970 South Plains College yearbook to sell on ebay.

There was a band, The Box Tops, mentioned in it. That school year, they had played in "The Dome", a sports facility in Levelland, Texas.

I wondered who they were, thinking they were some local band of the time.

Information online said that they sang the song "The Letter". Not that song, I thought. Not the one that the words start playing in my mind without me having to recall them: Gimme a ticket for an aeroplane...

It is that song. I thought The Animals or someone like that had sang it. My mind was blown.

Then I wondered who wrote that song. A guy named Wayne Carson, who went on to write so many songs that you can't not know one. Always On My Mind, Satin Sheets, and on and on, performed by famous singers like Willie Nelson, Johnny Paycheck and Waylon Jennings. He also wrote a few more of The Box Tops top hits. Mind blown, again.

Next I wanted to know who sang the song that started all this unraveling. It was Alex Chilton, a sixteen-year-old boy from Tennessee.Wait, what?! He also wrote In the Street, covered by Cheap Trick, which was used as the theme for That 70's Show? Good grief, the leaping around my mind was having to do was staggering. Wait, though, there was one more great jump to make.

Alex Chilton was the singer for Big Star. He wrote Thirteen, one of the sweetest songs I've ever heard. I was having cataclysms in my mind. I thought these were contemporary songs, but they're from the '70's! I mean, Thirteen was on the Gilmore Girls soundtrack! It played in the background while Rory and Dean were courting.

The older I get, the more I'm amazed at what I don't know. It's very exciting, discovering new old things. Just dazzling.

So, wow, The Box Tops, Wayne Carson, Alex Chilton, That 70's Show, Gilmore Girls, all connected. Now, I wonder where Kevin Bacon fits into all of this?

Thursday, October 9, 2025

More county properties to be auctioned

The sale of the Longworth Community Center and the Sylvester Community Center is on the Fisher County Commissioners meeting agenda for October.

The agenda states that the Longworth property consists of 1.36 acres and the Sylvester property consists of 8 lots.

The minimum bid for the properties will be discussed during the meeting.

The meeting will be held at the courthouse October 14, 9 a.m.

Friday, October 3, 2025

The passing of a Hobbs Community icon

- Howard Gordon, 2012 -

Howard Gordon died September 21, 2025. He will be sorely missed.

Obituary in the Double Mountain Chronicle.

Hobbs reunion

The Hobbs School Reunion will be held October 18 at the school annex.

Registration is at 10 p.m. with lunch following at noon.

Rough Creek Catering will provide the meal. There will be a dessert.

County auction set

The sale of the Fisher County owned community center at the corner of FM 611 and FM 419 will be held October 14, 10 a.m. at the courthouse.

The minimum bid is $25,000.

The property consists of 1.676 acres with a building on it.

More information can be found in the public notices section of the Double Mountain Chronicle.

Tuesday, September 9, 2025

County property to be sold at auction

In the monthly meeting held yesterday, Fisher County Commissioners approved the sale of the community center that sits at the corner of FM 611 and FM 419. The corner is known as Capitola, or Claytonville, by locals.

Micah Evans is commissioner of precinct 4, where the building and land is located.

Judge Ken Holt stated in court that the property consists of 1.67 acres.

The county barn sits to the west of the community center. Both were located in parcel 33182, that held 4.906 acres, but Evans said that the portion to be sold has been separated out.

He suggested $25,000 as the minimum bid on the property, and that amount was approved.

A public auction for the property is anticipated to take place after the October commissioner's court meeting. It will be sold at a sheriff's sale at the court house.

Monday, September 1, 2025

Riding around

- Looking east -

I went to Rotan this morning, then decided to take a little ride out to the river bridge. It was about 8 a.m. and there was some fog around the bottom of the Double Mountains and in low ravines. The sun was lighting up the red canyon walls. It was spectacular, so I thought I would go on down the road a bit, looking for more beauty.

I kept on towards Jayton, being amazed by the flat vistas and craggy breaks. I thought about what it must have been like to be on horseback or in a wagon and come across those ravines, or to be pursued and know the tricky trail down into the creek bottoms, leaving a foe confounded.

I came across a sign for Riverdale Cemetery. I had seen the name several times on maps and had wondered where it was. This was my lucky day, with time to explore.

The cemetery is almost directly due north of my house, as the crow flies, but it takes quite a bit more time to drive there. It took me about two hours and fifteen minutes to make the round trip, minus whatever time it took me to go in the store, drive through the Belvieu Cemetery east of Rotan, and walk around Riverdale Cemetery.

There were quail, dove, deer, roadrunners, mocking birds, scissortails, a rabbit, a snake, a ground squirrel and other various birds on the eight miles of dirt road leading to the cemetery. It's been a few years since I've seen such large coveys. Maybe this is where they go to hide. I stopped four or five times to let wildlife safely pass.

When I got to the graveyard, it was very quiet, except for the crack of a gun. That was to be expected, since it is opening day of dove season. I walked around a little, noting headstones and unmarked graves. There are a lot of Shipps and Ratliffs buried there.

I had noticed smoke to the south, about where my house is, while I was driving to the cemetery. I was a little worried, because I had left the washer going, but when I got home, all was well.

It was a nice little day trip. It's not an easy road and I was grateful that I was in a four-wheel drive truck.

Monday, August 18, 2025

Nolan County Sheriff's sale September 2025

The sale is scheduled for 2:00 p.m. September 2. One property is east of Sweetwater, the rest are in town.

Parcel 19974: 45.90 acres east of Sweetwater, south of county road 109
Parcel 26452: 401 Fisher
Parcel 26921: 1010 Bowie
Parcel 26617: 1009 East 13th
Parcel 30973: 1002 Fisher
Parcel 31224: 2106 Hubbard
Parcel 31225: 1900 Hubbard
Parcel 24766: 202 East Alabama
Parcel 29931: 910 Locust
Parcel 19795: 319 Canfil

More information is posted on the Perdue Brandon website.

Sunday, August 10, 2025

Carrying on

I'm reading a book where, after his mother's death, the author relates dreams about carrying her through unfamiliar streets, not being able find guiding signs or landmarks that might lend a clue to where they're going, and it reminded me of the dreams I used to have after my mother died. It's coming up on fifteen years since she's been gone.

I would dream that I would be caring for her and she would slip down in a split between two mattresses and disappear, or that I would forget about her for weeks, or even years, and go into a panic, fearing she had starved in my absence.

Thankfully, those dreams don't come to me now. I guess time and life have knocked the edges off my feelings of guilt, and slowed down my mental rearranging of events in the the last year of her life, trying to think of things I could have done to make her more comfortable, to help her rest easy.

There was one powerful dream I had about her that was fitting and satisfying. In it, I had driven up to the house that I live in now, which belonged to my parents back in the 1960's. There was a crowd in the yard, a party going on. People were holding drinks, talking to each other and laughing. There were a couple of shade tents set up, with coolers and food sitting on tables beneath them.

I saw my mom come edging through the people, holding a glass high above her head, and laughing as she tried to part the crowd to hand someone a drink. I called out "Mom! Mom!" to get her attention, but she couldn't hear me over the sounds of merriment. I could see she was having a good time, and it made me feel happy for her.

She still shows up in my dreams, but now it's just to say some everyday thing like "We need more corn" or "I'm going to town". She's not lost or forgotten, and I'm not riven with guilt. Of course, she's always with me. I stood in Goodwill just the other day with tears rolling down my face because a song was playing that reminded me of her. "Now that she's back in the atmosphere, with drops of Jupiter in her hair, oh-oh-oh, oh-oh-oh..."

When she first died I could only think how ridiculous it was, how stupid, how unbelievable. The strongest person I know, the one who knew me so well, had just vanished.

Now memories of her are woven into the context of my everyday life, as constant and un-intrusive as a clock on the wall or a hand towel next to the sink. Well, I'm kind of lying, because she could never be that ordinary. To tell the truth, I'm still learning to live without her.