If there was ever a worse state to drive through, I would love to be enlightened. 

Alas, after 20 years in this state — a whole four and a half years of which with a license — I’ve determined that Texas has to be the dullest place to let your mind wander off in while driving through. Until, that is, a pickup truck flies by while you’re already 15 mph over the speed limit yourself, causing you to snap out of your highway hypnosis. 

Beyond the stretch of asphalt cutting into people’s lands and the assortment of billboards virtually stacked on top of each other in the towns you pass through, there’s a quiet splattering of flies upon your windshield as the blazing sun scorches their dead corpses on the glass. 

I am used to hearing such complaints about the Texas scenery, or rather the lack thereof.

If there were a single word to describe the lackluster thrill I find in a prairie, it would be nostalgic: Seeping through the cracked dirt of a land that has endured never-ending droughts — which once meant a school field days without any water activities — is a familiarity that takes control when I look out my windshield at the expanse of identical landscape.

In a world as interconnected as ours is today, it’s no wonder we want to find a way for our great state to stand out. How are we different? How are we better? How can we be both of these things in a place as vast — and flat — as Texas?

To that, I look back at my childhood road trips. 

Just over two hours from my home, my family would drive to my grandparents’ farm every few weeks, a journey that consisted of highways leading us out of Austin, through a bunch of grass and then past some small towns that all kind of looked the same, until we finally ended up in Mission Valley on the outskirts of grand ol’ Victoria.

On the occasion that my parents determined my sisters and I were not to watch a movie during the trip, I sat wishing I wasn’t banished to the third row, where the windows didn’t roll down. With time to kill and no outlet for my newfound sense of boredom — beside tormenting my younger sisters and thus parents, of course — all there was to do was stare out the locked-up window and watch the passing Buc-ee’s signs exclaim that there is a “thirst trap ahead,” knowing  my family would inevitably pass said signs because we “didn’t want to waste our time on that.”

So close to heaven, indeed — yet still so far.  

For the remainder of these trips, all I saw were winding turns through fields of trees that would catch fire every few years. Bored out of my mind by the lack of sights, considering it was a harsh repetition of trees and grass, I dreamed of far-off places like Schlitterbahn and the American Girl Doll store — two of our state’s most beautiful redeeming factors in the eyes of a young Texan girl.

Once we arrived, I found solace in the countryside, an escape from the never-ending drive down farm-to-market roads. Fireflies would light up my grandparents’ porch every summer, and the endless supply of chocolate popsicles made each night that much sweeter. If we were lucky enough for a season of rain, dewberries ripened on the cacti by the mailbox.

Somewhere between the burned grass that covered the horizon in a rotting tan and the overgrown thorny brush that was no longer cared for, however, there grew a tree. 

Despite the fact that it looked like any other tree found along the journey to visit my grandparents, this tree was special. We rarely traveled down the beaten path to reach it, but when we did we were greeted by the fairies that lived in its canopy — I swear to this day of their existence. The magical little abode we had stumbled upon was enough to make me look a little closer at any tree thereafter.

When I circle back to the same roads that brought me there, I see a little more beauty than I used to in the trees of the same species that line the paths, thinking of the smile brought to my face by that special tree. This flatness is no longer a bad omen that the edge of the Earth is near, but instead a clear view into the vast sky as stars and fireflies become one and the same, reminding me of those beautiful summer nights. 

Is it fair of me to say that these childhood memories fuel my newfound love of Texas roads? I know, it’s such a cop-out to convince people that the stretch of concrete through the prairie is a beautiful place to be when I base it on my perfect, cherry-picked moments of youth. 

Nevertheless, we are only ever made up of our relationships, and our designation of beauty is only ever based on our understanding of these relationships, whether they be the hierarchical status of people determining certain features as most aesthetically pleasing or the connections between our emotions and the places in which we experience them. 

Land is not inherently beautiful. As much as I find Mykonos, Greece to be a gorgeous island surrounded by crystal clear water, if I received terrible news that crushed me while vacationing there, I could no longer appreciate my surroundings and would thus associate a classically adored location with memories of loss and disappointment. Even if I were able to acknowledge its beauty, it would never be the perfect place in my mind due to my lack of a positive emotional connection.

The same can be said for why we love the most random places, like a local 7-Eleven where we laughed with our friends while buying junk food together. Not an establishment typically known for its beauty, we may now pass that specific gas station and focus on the memories we associate with it, making the whole place seem a little bit brighter and more welcoming.

I applaud your big dreams to run away from the land that supported you; candidly, I hold the same ones. The pure nature of the Rocky Mountains or tropical vibe of Hawaiian beaches may be the most natural of destinations — certainly not the Texan peaks, nor the Gulf of Mexico’s sandy shores. Or, maybe you long for cities that are hundreds of years old, saturated with history and old ruins. 

Though it is not hard to love something so obviously a miracle for our world, whether it be crafted from the earth itself or by the hands of people, Texas is more than this simple awe of creation. 

The Lone Star State is cultivated by a blurring of its rich history, personal sentiment and natural features, and we are what gives Texas its warmth. Families have kept their farms and businesses afloat for generations because of their love and understanding of the natural surroundings. Sure, it helps that our sunsets seem to go on for miles, with deep reds and purples no matter the time of year — then again, this perspective may still be a result of the association between the Texas sky and my happiest moments experienced during this natural phenomenon.

To miss out on the beauty of Texas, we miss out on ourselves. You must be a terribly miserable sort of folk to scorn this state, because I’d like to think the people of Texas share not only a deep sense of connection with each other, but also a relationship with our land that only seems to deepen the longer we inhabit it. 

We do not need the crutch of a world wonder. We do not need a 13,000 foot mountain or a colosseum.

The roads we travel down hold a breath of fresh air for the soul. If only we were to open our hearts to the connections we hold with each other and the memories we form around our Texas landscape, we could discover the key to unlocking an appreciation for the beauty that stretches along our state roads with moments of reflection on our individual experiences. 

Thea Findlay is a communication junior and opinion writer for The Battalion.