Living in Marshall
July 12, 2004
Dear CeCe,
Where am I?
I am living in Marshall, TX.
After five months of traveling in South America and with an occasional discussion on “what are we going to do when we return the US of A”, spending a month in Denver and Tucson with people asking, “When are you going to get a job?”, spending another couple of months in Marshall on family business – we decided to buy a house in Marshall!
Marshall is a town; not large enough in my mind to qualify as a city, of less than 24,000 people. Lots of trees, grass, rain, mosquitoes, fire ants – the Marshall Fire Ant Festival is in the fall, and lots and lots of attorneys. Marshall is a legal center for protecting people from all kinds of horrors -- a center for “class action lawsuits”. Class Action Lawsuits are one of Marshall’s major industries. Marshall also has no big city day-to-day stress of living, keeping up with the Jones mentality, rush hour traffic, and overall life is just simpler.
Simpler as in:
Shopping –- Super Wal-Mart, five minutes/two miles from the house.
Shopping Decisions - None, you buy what Wal-Mart stocks.
Health Club -- Less than five minutes and our bodies are considered some of the in
shape bodies. My favorite guy is about 70, wears bib overalls, tennis shoes, a cowboy hat while using a tread mill.
Regional Hospital -- Next to the Health Club.
Groceries -- Kroger, four minutes if you have bad luck and catch a red light. We do buy our thin slice sandwich bread and a few other items in Longview and walked to the farmer’s market for produce this past Saturday.
Liquor Store -- I believe there are three liquor stores in town with the largest next to Kroger. I do find it strange that the first liquor store in Marshall is located next to the high school.
Fast Food -- We have them all. Taco Bell has become our favorite quick meal and on the way a stop at the Block Busters to pick up the evening entertainment.
Donuts -- It is a fried food – the basic food group of East Texas food connoisseurs and therefore we have at least three shops within five to ten minutes of our house.
Hardware Store -- Five blocks from the house.
Movies -- Five maybe six minutes from the house, 6 theaters and $3/movie.
Movie Rental -- Block Busters (next to the Kroger) is critical to us since we haven’t watch TV for the last ten plus years.
Electrical -- Bought my police radar detector at Radio Shack next to Block Busters.
Building Supplies -- Lowe’s, two minutes further down the road than the Hardware store. Lowe’s and a hardware store are important when you own a house that is 129 years old!
UPS & copy store -- Next to the Hardware Store.
Post Office -- Five minutes and usually a two minute wait in line.
Auto Repair -- Three blocks from the house, we have lots of auto stores & shops. Bad news, about two months ago the “car wheel rent to own” store went out of business – wheel not tire!
Feed & Grain -- At least three stores, but I have yet to visit any.
Dollar Stores -- At least six stores, need to visit the one nearest us to discover what you can buy in the U.S. for a dollar.
Check Cashing -- Three or four located within ten minutes of the house. Never know when I might get a full time job and need to cash my work check.
Downtown -- We walk to it and on our way pass the fire station and then the police station.
A great restaurant -- Located on our side of the Downtown square.
A great bar -- Part of the Great Restaurant.
Dancing -- Live music upstairs in the bar on Saturday night (look for our picture on the Marshall Web Page).
Banking -- Downtown.
Haircut -- Just before the Hardware store.
Coffee -- No Starbucks but several local coffee shops with people who talk to you rather than just take a coffee order.
Big Box Stores -- All are located in Longview, about 20 to 25 minutes from our house.
Bike shop -- Longview, just before the Big Box Stores.
Stop Lights -- I don’t remember ever being more than the third car back at a red light & the lights start blinking at 10:00 pm.
Newspaper -- Seven days a week averaging about 20 pages not counting the Sunday big paper of maybe 40 pages (We cheat, we have the Wallstreet Journal delivered along with the Marshall Messenger newspaper.)
Politics -- A cousin of Nancy’s is married to the mayor and I have a 0.0098 percent of an oil well drilled by the mayor’s company – we’re family.
Bad Politics -- We have a lot of the born again Christian, Right-wing, nasty Republicans.
Religion -- “We gots religion”, all directions are given based on the nearest church to the location you are going to.
City Services -- City building is five minutes and you just walk in -- no X-ray machine, find the person’s office you need, walk into their office and say, “hi” and discuss life for five minutes, and then state your problem or request.
Lakes -- We can load the kayak on to the jeep, drive to Caddo Lake, and be in the water in less than 40 minutes – like this past Friday.
Catfish -- Every restaurant, except the “great restaurant”, in town.
Fried Food -- See Catfish above. Also, see Donuts above.
DSL -- Either from the phone company or cable, our window to the world.
Airports -- Shreveport is 40 minutes from the house to the check-in X-ray machine and Dallas is 3 hours.
The Disadvantage -- No bookstore, unless you count the three religious bookstores.
We bought a two story, 4200 square foot house. The first floor and wrap around 12 foot
wide front porch was built in 1875 and the second floor added around 1906. We have 19 spaces:
a seven foot wide by 20 long entry, a card room (TV), a living room, dining room, butlers panty, powder room, kitchen, enclosed porch, storage room, laundry room, office #2/down stairs guest room, office #1, full bathroom, upstairs hall, master bedroom, middle bedroom (soon to be master closet and extension of bathroom), bathroom, guest bedroom, guest bedroom bath, and spare bedroom.
Ceilings on the first floor are 11’ – 11” and 10’ on the second floor. All floors except the bathrooms and the laundry room are (original) wood. All the wood stairs, trim, doors, windows are stained; never been painted.
We bought the house for $41/square foot or for a total price of slightly more than the down payment on our last two houses!
Now, why did we trade the Big City and Fast Track Work life for Marshall:
1) No matter how hard I work we are never going to be rich. Therefore all we were accomplishing by living and working was:
a) servicing an ever larger house payment – keeping up with the Jones,
b) buying things we really didn’t want or need – keeping up with the Jones, and
c) never having time to ourselves – so that we could keep up with the Jones.
d) and we don't even know the Jones!
2) We want and like to travel. With three weeks of vacation a year of which at least one was spent with family, we only had two weeks a year to see the world. And if I took off two weeks, I felt guilty about not being in the office the entire time we were on vacation. And of course, work required me to email and call-in – even from New Zealand. Gots to love that American work ethic.
3) Life is truly simpler in a small town. And simpler can be good.
4) A small town is less expensive than a large town. The saved money allows you to live a good life without the hectic, ever-on-the-go, stressful, no time to be together life/work routine. We can’t afford the good life style in Denver, Austin, Washington D.C. or Boston – two weeks ago took a week off for a wedding in CT and tourist time in Boston.
We have settled into Marshall. Nancy has three cousins living here but more importantly we have met an entire group of people similar in age and outlook who have moved (back) to Marshall.
This group eats dinner together every Thursday night. Last Thursday night was at a downtown Mexican restaurant and everyone brown bagged their wine or beer. Yes, I carried my brown bag bottle of wine past the police station on the way to the get together. The group includes: a consulting educational book publisher with her doctoral degree in English, a naval engineer with his Masters from CA-Berkley whose wife sold CA wines at a Napa Valley vineyard, a singer of county western songs and wife who volunteers at the Humane Society, the owner of a local title company who has a law degree, a small general contractor and his wife – first baby due this Monday, a furniture store owner and his wife, an artist, a woman who consults on conventions across the United States and paints flowers or creates metal sculptures in her spare time, a Dallas newspaper columnist and her husband who was a speech writer for one of the past governors, an ecologist, etc.
Marshall is going through a renaissance. There is a group of long time residents but more importantly a group of people who have either moved back or live nearby who want Marshall to be a place you want to live rather than a place you have to live (for whatever reason). The downtown has undergone a total re-do in the last 2 years. There is a positive energy in Marshall. That is not to say that the old power structure still doesn’t want change but people are now going around them to make the change. I believe I am about to become part of the change group.
Just two or three years ago I would never have considered living in Marshall because it was a dead town. No spirit, no pride, no life. Today Marshall wants to be a livable place that anyone would be proud to call their home town. It doesn’t want to become a city but it wants to be a place you are proud to call home, a place where your children can make a decent living, and a town that aesthetically creates a space you want to be part of. I think it will be fun to be part of the creative force that shapes the new Marshall.
Now having said everything about small town life in Marshall, do not be surprised to hear from us from another Big City. I am starting to contact construction executives I know and let them know I am available for consulting assignments up to five months in duration. I returned a call this past Friday concerning Miami, FL. Nancy and I agree that there are worse places to winter than Miami, FL. Of course, we won’t let this potential assignment interfere with next year’s Jan. trip to Ecuador or July’s trip to Russia. Stay tuned.
Best to the family and you,
Tom
Dear CeCe,
Where am I?
I am living in Marshall, TX.
After five months of traveling in South America and with an occasional discussion on “what are we going to do when we return the US of A”, spending a month in Denver and Tucson with people asking, “When are you going to get a job?”, spending another couple of months in Marshall on family business – we decided to buy a house in Marshall!
Marshall is a town; not large enough in my mind to qualify as a city, of less than 24,000 people. Lots of trees, grass, rain, mosquitoes, fire ants – the Marshall Fire Ant Festival is in the fall, and lots and lots of attorneys. Marshall is a legal center for protecting people from all kinds of horrors -- a center for “class action lawsuits”. Class Action Lawsuits are one of Marshall’s major industries. Marshall also has no big city day-to-day stress of living, keeping up with the Jones mentality, rush hour traffic, and overall life is just simpler.
Simpler as in:
Shopping –- Super Wal-Mart, five minutes/two miles from the house.
Shopping Decisions - None, you buy what Wal-Mart stocks.
Health Club -- Less than five minutes and our bodies are considered some of the in
shape bodies. My favorite guy is about 70, wears bib overalls, tennis shoes, a cowboy hat while using a tread mill.
Regional Hospital -- Next to the Health Club.
Groceries -- Kroger, four minutes if you have bad luck and catch a red light. We do buy our thin slice sandwich bread and a few other items in Longview and walked to the farmer’s market for produce this past Saturday.
Liquor Store -- I believe there are three liquor stores in town with the largest next to Kroger. I do find it strange that the first liquor store in Marshall is located next to the high school.
Fast Food -- We have them all. Taco Bell has become our favorite quick meal and on the way a stop at the Block Busters to pick up the evening entertainment.
Donuts -- It is a fried food – the basic food group of East Texas food connoisseurs and therefore we have at least three shops within five to ten minutes of our house.
Hardware Store -- Five blocks from the house.
Movies -- Five maybe six minutes from the house, 6 theaters and $3/movie.
Movie Rental -- Block Busters (next to the Kroger) is critical to us since we haven’t watch TV for the last ten plus years.
Electrical -- Bought my police radar detector at Radio Shack next to Block Busters.
Building Supplies -- Lowe’s, two minutes further down the road than the Hardware store. Lowe’s and a hardware store are important when you own a house that is 129 years old!
UPS & copy store -- Next to the Hardware Store.
Post Office -- Five minutes and usually a two minute wait in line.
Auto Repair -- Three blocks from the house, we have lots of auto stores & shops. Bad news, about two months ago the “car wheel rent to own” store went out of business – wheel not tire!
Feed & Grain -- At least three stores, but I have yet to visit any.
Dollar Stores -- At least six stores, need to visit the one nearest us to discover what you can buy in the U.S. for a dollar.
Check Cashing -- Three or four located within ten minutes of the house. Never know when I might get a full time job and need to cash my work check.
Downtown -- We walk to it and on our way pass the fire station and then the police station.
A great restaurant -- Located on our side of the Downtown square.
A great bar -- Part of the Great Restaurant.
Dancing -- Live music upstairs in the bar on Saturday night (look for our picture on the Marshall Web Page).
Banking -- Downtown.
Haircut -- Just before the Hardware store.
Coffee -- No Starbucks but several local coffee shops with people who talk to you rather than just take a coffee order.
Big Box Stores -- All are located in Longview, about 20 to 25 minutes from our house.
Bike shop -- Longview, just before the Big Box Stores.
Stop Lights -- I don’t remember ever being more than the third car back at a red light & the lights start blinking at 10:00 pm.
Newspaper -- Seven days a week averaging about 20 pages not counting the Sunday big paper of maybe 40 pages (We cheat, we have the Wallstreet Journal delivered along with the Marshall Messenger newspaper.)
Politics -- A cousin of Nancy’s is married to the mayor and I have a 0.0098 percent of an oil well drilled by the mayor’s company – we’re family.
Bad Politics -- We have a lot of the born again Christian, Right-wing, nasty Republicans.
Religion -- “We gots religion”, all directions are given based on the nearest church to the location you are going to.
City Services -- City building is five minutes and you just walk in -- no X-ray machine, find the person’s office you need, walk into their office and say, “hi” and discuss life for five minutes, and then state your problem or request.
Lakes -- We can load the kayak on to the jeep, drive to Caddo Lake, and be in the water in less than 40 minutes – like this past Friday.
Catfish -- Every restaurant, except the “great restaurant”, in town.
Fried Food -- See Catfish above. Also, see Donuts above.
DSL -- Either from the phone company or cable, our window to the world.
Airports -- Shreveport is 40 minutes from the house to the check-in X-ray machine and Dallas is 3 hours.
The Disadvantage -- No bookstore, unless you count the three religious bookstores.
We bought a two story, 4200 square foot house. The first floor and wrap around 12 foot
wide front porch was built in 1875 and the second floor added around 1906. We have 19 spaces:
a seven foot wide by 20 long entry, a card room (TV), a living room, dining room, butlers panty, powder room, kitchen, enclosed porch, storage room, laundry room, office #2/down stairs guest room, office #1, full bathroom, upstairs hall, master bedroom, middle bedroom (soon to be master closet and extension of bathroom), bathroom, guest bedroom, guest bedroom bath, and spare bedroom.
Ceilings on the first floor are 11’ – 11” and 10’ on the second floor. All floors except the bathrooms and the laundry room are (original) wood. All the wood stairs, trim, doors, windows are stained; never been painted.
We bought the house for $41/square foot or for a total price of slightly more than the down payment on our last two houses!
Now, why did we trade the Big City and Fast Track Work life for Marshall:
1) No matter how hard I work we are never going to be rich. Therefore all we were accomplishing by living and working was:
a) servicing an ever larger house payment – keeping up with the Jones,
b) buying things we really didn’t want or need – keeping up with the Jones, and
c) never having time to ourselves – so that we could keep up with the Jones.
d) and we don't even know the Jones!
2) We want and like to travel. With three weeks of vacation a year of which at least one was spent with family, we only had two weeks a year to see the world. And if I took off two weeks, I felt guilty about not being in the office the entire time we were on vacation. And of course, work required me to email and call-in – even from New Zealand. Gots to love that American work ethic.
3) Life is truly simpler in a small town. And simpler can be good.
4) A small town is less expensive than a large town. The saved money allows you to live a good life without the hectic, ever-on-the-go, stressful, no time to be together life/work routine. We can’t afford the good life style in Denver, Austin, Washington D.C. or Boston – two weeks ago took a week off for a wedding in CT and tourist time in Boston.
We have settled into Marshall. Nancy has three cousins living here but more importantly we have met an entire group of people similar in age and outlook who have moved (back) to Marshall.
This group eats dinner together every Thursday night. Last Thursday night was at a downtown Mexican restaurant and everyone brown bagged their wine or beer. Yes, I carried my brown bag bottle of wine past the police station on the way to the get together. The group includes: a consulting educational book publisher with her doctoral degree in English, a naval engineer with his Masters from CA-Berkley whose wife sold CA wines at a Napa Valley vineyard, a singer of county western songs and wife who volunteers at the Humane Society, the owner of a local title company who has a law degree, a small general contractor and his wife – first baby due this Monday, a furniture store owner and his wife, an artist, a woman who consults on conventions across the United States and paints flowers or creates metal sculptures in her spare time, a Dallas newspaper columnist and her husband who was a speech writer for one of the past governors, an ecologist, etc.
Marshall is going through a renaissance. There is a group of long time residents but more importantly a group of people who have either moved back or live nearby who want Marshall to be a place you want to live rather than a place you have to live (for whatever reason). The downtown has undergone a total re-do in the last 2 years. There is a positive energy in Marshall. That is not to say that the old power structure still doesn’t want change but people are now going around them to make the change. I believe I am about to become part of the change group.
Just two or three years ago I would never have considered living in Marshall because it was a dead town. No spirit, no pride, no life. Today Marshall wants to be a livable place that anyone would be proud to call their home town. It doesn’t want to become a city but it wants to be a place you are proud to call home, a place where your children can make a decent living, and a town that aesthetically creates a space you want to be part of. I think it will be fun to be part of the creative force that shapes the new Marshall.
Now having said everything about small town life in Marshall, do not be surprised to hear from us from another Big City. I am starting to contact construction executives I know and let them know I am available for consulting assignments up to five months in duration. I returned a call this past Friday concerning Miami, FL. Nancy and I agree that there are worse places to winter than Miami, FL. Of course, we won’t let this potential assignment interfere with next year’s Jan. trip to Ecuador or July’s trip to Russia. Stay tuned.
Best to the family and you,
Tom
posted by Rambling Tom at 4:17 PM
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