LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
We are leaving town after almost thirty of the best and most interesting years that we have spent in more than eighty years of living. We came to Wimberley at the tail end of 1991, just in time for the first hundred year flood of the five or so we have experienced since then. I am not sure that the traffic light at River Road and RR 12 was up at that time, but it was the only one.
We arrived here after living on out sailboat, for almost three years, in Mexico and various ports in Central America. Coming to Wimberley was like walking into a warm embrace from perfect strangers. It was a place that people seemed to come to in order to reinvent themselves. I once commented that the typical resident at the time was a guitar playing recovering alcoholic massage therapist, with a real estate license. Somebody told me I was not far from wrong. I spotted a bumper sticker at Cliett Lumber that read, “Why is it called tourist season if you can’t shoot ‘em.” If you wanted to get gas there was a Texaco station, which is now a jewelry store, or the two Exxon pumps on Ace Hardware’s parking lot. Ace also had bread, milk and assorted other grocery items. For major shopping there was Country Boys. Mavis Woolsey had a self designated tow away zone parking space outside her ice cream parlor and real estate office. Everybody knew it was unofficial, but nobody parked there anyway. Civic matters were taken up by the breakfast crowd at the Burger Barn. I think Jim Henderson was recognized as the mayor UN-officio. Bill and M.F. Johnson sort of lovingly herder the more civic minded into quality projects that would be more beneficial to the community.
A few of the things I have experienced that will stick with me as long as reliable memory lasts are collaborating in music and lyrics for the musical melodrama, “The Blanco Was Blameless, or It was Balcones Fault” with Jules Alexander – a founding member of the group, The Association. The show itself was held over two weeks to sold out houses. My wife, Shirley, directed most of the shows (at the time), and distinguished herself by performing in a two person piece in which the “F” word was uttered for the first time on a Wimberley stage. Musical acts at “Susanna’s Kitchen” at the Methodist Church are another great memory. Two of my favorites were Kevin Welch singing, “Too Old To Die Young” – one of my all time favorites – and then, on another occasion, roaring along with Ray Wiley Hubbard on “Up Against The Wall, Red Neck Mother”. There were the Mike Bond led jams out behind what is now Kate’s Place. One sometimes participant was Wimberley’s Grammy Award winning Sarah Jarosz. Playing a mandolin as big as she was, her three feet high body and six foot voice would belt out Bill Monroe’s “Blue Moon of Kentucky” to the delight of all who were in attendance. We also were at the beginning of Wimberley Valley Habitat for Humanity, the seed for which was planted by a wheel chair bound bundle of energy named Carol Spangenberg.
One event that stands out in my memory is the fund raising campaign for the new sanctuary of the Methodist Church. We were advised that the most we could expect to raise would be in the neighborhood of four hundred thousand dollars, we raised nearly a million. The advising consultant was flabbergasted. We weren’t. After all this is Wimberley where dreams come true- but only if you let ‘em.
Russ Marlett