You Can’t Go Home Again

The saying “You can’t go home again” seems very true now that I have moved back to the place where I grew up. After a 20-year absence, Lubbock is just not the place I left. Even though I came back often, I never really had time to drive around and see all the changes that have taken place. Lubbock seems like four towns now rather than the one I was used to growing up. In Lubbock, progress has been very good. It is much cleaner than it was when I left. Of course, the older areas have been replaced with new companies and new homes. Texas Tech is like a new university and is still changing. The campus has always been the second largest in land area — the Air Force Academy is the largest — and now it is almost built out. There are also several university buildings not on campus. The area where I grew up (Tech Ghetto) is now a complex of housing for Tech students with very upscale hotels and businesses. My mother was the last homeowner to sell her home there. Most of the area had been destroyed by the May 11, 1970, tornado. The tornado came down her street and destroyed much of the northern side. Mother and Dad only lost three shingles on their roof. A church in the next block was totally destroyed except for the cross in the sanctuary. East Lubbock, always the least developed area, is now a thriving industrial area. Cotton fields in all directions have been replaced by developing housing areas. One thing from East Lubbock I don’t miss is the smell from the stockyards — especially during the summer after a rain. Also, I don’t miss the congestion caused by the gins during cotton ginning season. Lubbock had five major stockyards with butchering facilities at one time. Many of the gins and compresses have disappeared, but farming is still a major industry. Thank goodness modern farming methods have kept the sand from blowing as it did when we moved here in 1952. Lubbock has changed from an agricultural center to an education and health care center for West Texas, the Panhandle, eastern New Mexico, and Southwest Oklahoma. Many of the small businesses have given way to the big box stores. That trend has reversed now. I do miss Reese Air Force Base, even though it has been closed for many years. The families were very diverse and added much to Lubbock. The city has adapted to the loss of the base. It has been repurposed. The small school (Lubbock Cooper ISD) where I taught for 13 years was one campus. Now the district has expanded. The high school sits on a large complex complete with a state-of-the-art stadium, six elementary schools (two new) are nearby, and a second high school will be completed in two years. Incidentally, this is where my younger brother spent 42 years teaching. We built a house six miles south of the loop that encircled Lubbock in 1976. Now that house is in the middle of a development extending from Lubbock. Progress is great, but I do miss the “good old times.” Thanks for staying with me.