Dispatches from Austin, Texas
Will the Austin I fell in love with be there once the world becomes safe again?
It has been months since shelter-in-place orders were first announced and while I was fine not thinking about travel during the beginning stages of quarantine, I’m now consumed with wanderlust. Aside from outdoorsy day trips and limited social distance hangs with friends, I’ve been at home. No vacations booked, nowhere to go. Instead, I comb through my travel memories wondering how my favorite places are handling the pandemic.
This is a short story about one of my favorite getaways of “The Before Times” and the lingering feeling of helplessness that comes with being a tourist forced to stay put.
Curiosity mounted as my departure to the land of breakfast tacos, cacti, and honky-tonk bars neared.
In a college job organizing South by Southwest events for music biz folks, I traveled to Austin only vicariously. But I always longed to see why thousands of people flocked there every spring. These days, I’m stuck with a different fear of missing out: I hope my version of Austin will still be there once the world becomes safe again.
“In many ways, Austin punches well above its weight.”
“In many ways, Austin punches well above its weight,” my friend Brian remarked as we caught up on pandemic living in Austin. A web developer by day and DJ by night, Brian and his long-time partner Leila embraced Austin’s quirks immediately upon their cross-country move a few weeks before I arrived. They’re now keeping busy running an indie newsletter cataloging nightlife across the city, host weekly Twitch “home isolation” dance parties, and spin records on internet radio stations.
For my friend Meg, her memories growing up in “Old Austin” remain despite the city’s fast growth and current crisis interruption. She has witnessed a revitalization with “modern farmhouses” alongside long-standing Zilker properties turned trendy mercantile shops, bars, and restaurants. More recently, Austin has grown beyond downtown corridor neighborhoods, allowing transplants and OG Austinites like herself to attain the best of big small city living - even when they can’t leave the house.
In the spring of 2018, I finally took the bait. In a whirlwind of five days tagging along with friends Brian and Meg and their significant others, a field guide to delicious offbeat living in Austin emerged:
Walking down the street, mural artists reminded me to “Keep Austin Weird” with vibrant, large-scale creations surrounded by oddly-shaped plantlife. My first Sunday Funday kicked off on East Seventh Street with a punch thanks to Hillside Farmacy’s grapefruit sweet-and-tart house cocktail, later ending with boozy black charcoal ice cream around the corner at Prohibition Creamery. At Tex-Mex family-run Joe’s Bakery, I gasped aloud at the first sight of my breakfast tacos arriving plate-sized, spilling over with soft folded eggs, cheddar shavings and grilled to crisp bacon. My evenings bled into late-night hangs with back patio beers and live music stops downtown at Easy Tiger, The Liberty, and The White Horse. I savored recess at watering holes across town at Zilker Park’s Barton Springs Pool and silent nature walks along Lady Bird Lake. I admired taxidermy and decaying flowers while sipping on ‘queen bee’ cocktails inside a rehabbed bar(n) known as Whisler’s. My day of head-to-head old school versus New School Barbecue taste battles revealed a sleeper hit: LeRoy & Lewis’ fire-roasted sweet potatoes filled with herb butter. My food cravings were never not refilled - whether by biting into my first Detroit-style pan pizza at Via 313, following #tacotrucksoneverycorner like El Chilito, or binging chile con queso at South Austin’s Guero’s Taco Bar.
Encountering antique shops filled with traditional mementos across the Hispanic and Latinx diaspora, passing by plots of cacti on the sidewalks, hearing my native tongue spoken openly, Austin felt somehow familiar and new. A place I could see myself calling home. I entertained turning in my SEPTA cred and cheap South Philly row home for an East Austin bungalow and Volkswagen Camper Van.
Looking ahead, Austin can survive the pandemic thanks to its moxy and resilience: From custom merch collaborations with MerchAid, petitions to save indie live music venues, members-only barbecue classes at Leroy & Lewis, Guero’s honorary Congress Bridge hanging bat sculptures and Mexican [women's] Revolution pride shirts, to Parts + Labour's locally handmade art and Do512 raffle gift cards, it’s easier than ever to support Austin from afar. In the meantime, Austinites are fighting for the city to safely reopen, eventually welcoming people like me back, whenever that may be.
“How can we support the people, cafes, bars and restaurants that make up the places we love from far away? Will that support be enough? Where do we go from here?”
