EXPLORE Magazine October 2016 by Schooley Media Ventures, LLC

OCTOBER 2016

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CONTENTS

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Marjorie Hagy History Marjorie is a bibliophile, a history nut and an insomniac, among several other conditions, both diagnosed and otherwise. When she's not working tirelessly to avoid getting a real job, she nurses an obsession with her grandson and is involved in passing legislation restricting the wearing of socks with sandals. She is an aspiring pet hoarder who enjoys vicious games of Scrabble, reading Agatha Christie, and sitting around doing nothing while claiming to be thinking deeply. Marjorie has five grown children, a poodle to whom she is inordinately devoted in spite of his breath, and holds an Explore record for never having submitted an article on time. She's been writing for us for five years now.

Kendall D. Aaron Spiritual I’m just a normal guy. I’m not a theology student, I don’t preach in church, and I’ve never written a book. I’m just a normal guy that thinks, and feels, and is on a never-ending journey attempting to be the best person I can be. I fail frequently at this quest, yet each day, the quest continues. I’ve lived in Boerne since the late ‘80s, I’ve got a most beautiful wife, three wonderful children, and just really, really love God. Thanks for going on my spiritual journey with me.

Rene Villanueva Music Rene Villanueva is the lead singer/ bass player for the band Hacienda. Having toured worldwide, hacienda has also been featured on several late night shows, including Late Show with David Letterman. Rene and his wife Rachel live in Boerne, TX and just welcomed thier first child. Jack Ingram -Gruene Hall - September 2016

10 From The Publisher

32 History

14 Calendar

38 Spiritual

20 Troubadour

44 Art Of

26 Parade of Artists

50 Old Timer

Publisher Benjamin D. Schooley ben@hillcountryexplore.com

8 | EXPLORE

Old Timer Just Old Timer The Old Timer tells us he's been a resident of Boerne since about 1965. He enjoys telling people what he doesn't like. When not bust'n punks he can be found feeding the ducks just off Main St. or wandering aimlessly in the newly expanded HEB. Despite his rough and sometimes brash persona, Old Timer is really a wise and thoughtful individual. If you can sort through the BS.

Operations Manager Peggy Schooley peggy@smvtexas.vom

Assistant Creative Director Kayla Davisson kayla@smvtexas.com

Creative Director Benjamin N. Weber ben.weber@smvtexas.com

ADVERTISING SALES 210-507-5250 sales@hillcountryexplore.com

EXPLORE magazine is published by Schooley Media Ventures in Boerne, TX. EXPLORE Magazine and Schooley Media Ventures are not responsible for any inaccuracies, erroneous information, or typographical errors contained in this publication submitted by advertisers. Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the opinions of EXPLORE and/or Schooley Media Ventures. Copyright 2016 Schooley Media Ventures, 930 E. Blanco, Ste. 200, Boerne, TX 78006

information we seek. I know that sports is entertainment and is a big business, but who really needs to spend the time to understand it at a depth that we are shown on TV? I know that Texas Tech sucks nowadays, and that our defense is pathetic. I can predict that we might win 5 games this year, and I can also predict that a whole bunch of you Aggies and Longhorns out there just donned an evil smile at my perspective of TT football. This is the extent of my knowledge of Texas Tech, which is also my alma mater, and frankly, I don’t want to know much else. Why would you want to know MORE than this? Why would you want to devote valuable time of your life to knowing every detail of Texas Tech football or UT football or A&M football….or ANY football? A magazine about MONEY troubles me even more. We ALL think about money, and it’s a universal knowledge that we all dwell on it more than we should. Heck, Bible verses are written about money. LOTS of ‘em and they all tell us not to dwell on it. But we do, and I can relate to why we do it. But to devote one’s career to the dissemination of information, predictions, and worship of money? Oh, and it is “worship”. Make no mistake. Think of religion and then think of a magazine devoted to money. It is the study, devotion, understanding, and application of money principles. That is WORSHIP. What the hell is wrong with us? I know a lot about magazines, but I certainly don’t worship magazines. They are a vehicle that I use to survive monetarily. They are a “thing” that exists. They’re a TOOL that provides me the comforts to survive income-wise. I suppose I’ll brag that I don’t know everything about magazines, and I hope I never do. Hell, EXPLORE is kind of an anti-magazine in that it has no particular subject niche that defines it. It is comprised of stories. I like to think that it is comprised of emotions and stories and little else. That’s a bragging point, not a condemnation. I’m rambling, but my point is: what do we “worship”? What topic do you know WAY too much about that is controlling your life? College football? (Sheesh, I hope not). Money? Careers? Home values? Interest rates? The topic list is endless, but the ones that are important are heart-breakingly small.

DEAREST EXPLORE READER, I like to watch college football. As a Texas Tech grad, I love to follow the Texas colleges and read of the latest UT debacle, controversy, or bribe. I’m kidding as I have lots of friends that are UT alums, but I’m not unique in that I like to watch the games and then talk trash to all of my friends. It’s a fun topic and a good distraction. It’s one of those topics that is pretty universal in Texas and gives us all something to talk about. While watching the pregame show the other weekend, I listened to the talking heads preview the day’s games. They discussed year over year performance stats for virtually every player, they knew the position players for EVERY school in the nation, and could drill down into stats that painted a clear view of the game for the viewer. Basically, they knew stuff about college football that made my head swim. They had a knowledge of the topic that bordered on earning them a doctorate in it, and could rattle off information that no mere mortal could know. That is, unless they had devoted a serious percentage of their life to studying college football.

winners for football games that I could care less about. They have careers centered around a game, and are paid very well to understand every aspect to this game. We also have people that study money, and have careers that are centered around the study of money, the prediction of money trends, the statistical knowledge of stock market data, and the list goes on and one. They have devoted their careers to the study of money, and are paid very well to dispense that information to people that are likeminded and want to know everything there is to know about money. This depressed me.

I threw it in the trash, walked outside with a lemonade, and got to thinking.

I started thinking about the “subjects” that so many of us devote our lives. Subjects that some of us care about, and some of us could care less about. I know about magazines. I know about paper costs, delivery charges, and advertising trends. I know when some industries like to spend money on marketing, and when they don’t. I know who is going out of business, and who is coming into business. Some of you will care about this subject, and some could give a flip, but nevertheless, I have devoted a significant portion of my life to knowing as much as I can about magazines. Some of you are bankers. You know about interest rates, lending trends, and deposit information. Some of us care, some of us don’t. Somebody out there owns a restaurant. You know all about food costs, labor trends, and drink industry information. I don’t care about that, but somebody does. There’s a guy on TV right now talking about politics. He knows EVERYTHING about politics, and the trends, and the strategies, and the probable outcomes. Somebody is paying him to be a talking head on TV and to drill down into Donald Trump’s haircut, and why it matters. Hillay’s health. ISIS and their relation to some future event that may or may not occur. He knows the information and the correlation, and dammit, he’s going to tell you all about it because he’s devoted his life to knowing these “facts”. JUST. STOP.

We have people that study football and can tell me everything that there is to know about football. They can unpack trends, statistical anomalies, and predict the

As I sit on my porch sipping that lemonade, I’ve decided that there is something very wrong with the information that we seek and for how we reward those that have the

After watching the show, I checked the mail. I received a magazine that I did not order. I suppose it’s one of those “Here’s a freebie, now please order a subscription” type deals. The magazine was called MONEY. Pretty transparent as to what the content was about, but sure enough, I flipped through it while having lunch last Saturday. Articles about money. Ridiculously in-depth analysis of money, what is going on with money worldwide, stock markets, and why I should love my money. Columnists that knew absolutely everything currently going on with MONEY, why I should be terrified, and where I should plant my money for a better return. Lots and lots and lots about money, and written by people that apparently knew everything that there was to know about money.

10 | EXPLORE

What if we had magazines about loving our family members? What if we had television shows that broke down the statistical data about our philosophies? As in, what if we had talking heads that had high-level discussion about philosophy, books, culture, and religion. What if we stopped building Man-Caves and started building libraries in our homes? What if we stopped glorifying beer drinking and tailgate parties and started highlighting smart people doing some critical thinking? What if we stopped talking about MONEY and what it can do for us and started talking about MONEY and why it’s not important at all? I have kids and a job and a back yard that needs to be mowed. I have a dirty truck, a mother that likes to eat lunch with me on Tuesdays, and a pair of parakeets that annoy me when they chirp in the morning. I have a life that consists of real life, and that life is so temporary and beautiful and ugly and normal. It’s the topic of LIFE and making the most of it, and it just seems to me that we sure do spend a lot of time talking about the unimportant parts of life and never really confronting the parts of life that matter. No, my yard that needs mowing is not important, but at least it’s something REAL and indicative of a man that is trying to handle responsibilities. It’s not about a damn football game nor my mutual funds. It’s green grass, kids playing, and hummingbirds. It’s smells, and sounds, and tangible things that matter, even when it’s just my yard. It’s LIFE. Your money may never run to empty. Your football knowledge may grow daily. But your LIFE is temporary, and will assuredly end. Why not devote our lives to LIFE? The beauty that it can bring far eclipses football wins or money gains. In fact, it’s ALL that matters. Welcome to October. You have a life. I have a life. Let’s talk about that for a little bit. EXPLORE your heart, share it with me, and let’s create a memory and a story. When we get done, let’s make a magazine about it. Smiling,

ben@hillcountryexplore.com

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AREA EVENTS

Get out and enjoy the great Texas Hill Country!

The most comprehensive events calendar. Send submissions to info@hillcountryexplore.com

OCTOBER 22 FREDERICKSBURG FOOD & WINE FEST A grand celebration of Texas food and wine with musical entertainment and fun plus several special events. Marktplatz, 100 block of W. Main. GRUENE OCTOBER 6-9 GRUENE MUSIC AND WINE FESTIVAL Offers a great opportunity to taste various wines and listen to talented entertainers all at one time. Historic Gruene. OCTOBER 15-16 OLD GRUENE MARKET DAYS Nearly 100 vendors offer uniquely crafted items and packaged Texas foods. Gruene Historic District. OCTOBER 20 COME AND TASTE IT A featured winemaker showcases three of their newly released, top-selling or hard-to-find wines, alongside a craft brew handpicked by The Grapevine staff. Also enjoy live music and giveaways. The Grapevine. HONDO SEPTEMBER 17-NOVEMBER 20 SOUTH TEXAS MAIZE People of all ages can find their way in and out of the 7-acre maze and enjoy other family-friendly activities during the fall season. South Texas Maize, 911 U.S. 90 E. JOHNSON CITY OCTOBER 22-23 MARKET DAYS City Park, Corner of U.S. 290 and Avenue G. BANDERA OCTOBER 8 OKTOBERFEST Features food, beverages and vendor booths. Wear your best Oktoberfest outfit and enter it to be judged. Grace Lutheran Church, 451 Texas 173 N. www.banderacowboycapital.com OCTOBER 15 RANCH HERITAGE DAY Family event featuring ranch skills, music and stories. Attractions include antique tractors, chuck-wagon cooking, horse training clinic, trick roping, working dogs with sheep and goats, covered wagon rides and a giant rocking horse. Hill Country State Natural Area, 10600 Bandera Creek Road. OCTOBER 29 ANNUAL HUNTER’S GAME DINNER & DANCE Events include a washers tournament, dinner, dance and concert following dinner. The Farm Country Club, 475 Pue Road. BOERNE OCTOBER 7-9 THE KEY TO THE HILLS ROD RUN There are almost 500 coupes, sedans and roadsters that come from all over the country. Main Street Boerne is closed from Rosewood to Blanco. Saturday is the day when all the cars are on display throughout downtown. Main Street. OCTOBER 8-9 BOERNE MARKET DAYS Main Plaza is home to a magical outdoor market that blends the traditions of the Texas Hill Country with the creations of today’s culture. Includes delicious food. Kendall County Court House, 204 E. San Antonio. OCTOBER 8 SECOND SATURDAY ART AND WINE Participating galleries go all out each month with complimentary beverages and a variety of hors d’oeuvres along with fantastic art. Travel to each gallery in the downtown area on foot or on the Shabby Bus. Galleries in Boerne. OCTOBER 9 BOERNE CONCERT BAND FALL CONCERT The Boerne Concert Band performs live musical concerts to entertain audiences of all ages. Boerne High School Auditorium. OCTOBER 14-16 THE TEXAS HILL COUNTRY INVITATIONAL ART SHOW A premier event with a diversity of art and media from artists around the country. Other activities include a paint-out with silent auction, a quick-draw and live auction, artist demonstrations and a breakfast with the artists. Cana Ballroom, 202 W. Kronkosky. OCTOBER 15-16 BOERNE OKTOBERFEST Enjoy good food; activities for the kids; a variety of beers: German, Texas craft and domestic; special events; and the finest in live music. 265 S Main.

14 | EXPLORE

OCTOBER 15, 29 HOT ROD NIGHT Relive old-fashioned Americana street parties with classic cars and hot rods. Soda Pops.

OCTOBER 29 ART WALK Art galleries and venues are open for shopping and browsing. Downtown Johnson City.

OCTOBER 22 THE ALL-BRITISH CAR DAY Open to all British-built automobiles. Participants will vote for their favorite cars and awards will be presented to the most popular vehicle in each class. Main Plaza, 100 N. Main.

KERRVILLE OCTOBER 7 FIRST FRIDAY WINE Share A fun way to discover new or different wines, and encounter people and places Bring your own wine glass.

OCTOBER 29 BOERNE BOO CELEBRATION Come celebrate Halloween. Patrick Heath Public Library, 451 N. Main. OCTOBER 29 BOERNE HANDMADE MARKET Event features new and creative vendors selling handmade items. Included are food trucks for snacks and meals. There is a children’s playground, as well as free live music. Kendall County Fair Grounds, 1307 River Road.

OCTOBER 8-9 KERR COUNTY CELTIC FESTIVAL AND 4TH ANNUAL HILL COUNTRY HIGHLAND GAMES Celebrate Celtic heritage with song and dance, Scottish athletics, and the first Highland Dance Competition. There will be artisans demonstrating their wares and skills. Includes archery, music, dancing, food, pipes and drums. Hill Country Arts Foundation, Stonehenge II, 120 Point Theatre Road.

BULVERDE OCTOBER 1, 8, 15, 22, 29 TEJAS RODEO Features weekly rodeos, live music, events and steak dinners. Tejas Rodeo Co.

OCTOBER 22-23 KERRVILLE TRADERS FEST Find more than 150 vendors, food trucks, live entertainment and kids activities. River Star Arts and Event Park, 4000 Riverside Drive.

DRIPPING SPRINGS OCTOBER 8-9 HILL COUNTRY RANCH: ART AND CRAFT FAIRE This event features gifts, clothing, jewelry, gourmet food, Texas handmade, yard art, accessories, home decor and more. Dripping Springs Ranch Park and Event Center, 1042 Event Center Drive. OCTOBER 14-16 DRIPPING SPRINGS SONGWRITERS FESTIVAL Enjoy a performance of singer-songwriters. Dripping Springs Ranch Park, 1042 Event Center Drive. FREDERICKSBURG OCTOBER 1-3 36TH ANNUAL OKTOBERFEST Celebrate the fun and flavor of Fredericksburg’s German heritage with three days of music, food, drink, dancing, arts and crafts, children’s entertainment and more. Marktplatz, 100 block of W. Main. OCTOBER 1-31 TEXAS WINE MONTH TRAIL Take a selfguided tour of the Texas Hill Country wineries with special tastings. Tickets are limited and available online only. Participating Hill Country wineries. OCTOBER 7 FIRST FRIDAY ART WALK Participating fine art galleries. OCTOBER 14-16 FREDERICKSBURG TRADE DAYS Shop more than 400 vendors in seven barns, acres of antiques, biergarten, live music and more. Seven miles east on U.S. 290 across from Wildseed Farms.

OCTOBER 27-30 KERR COUNTY FAIR Carnival Includes rides, games, cook-off, parade, creative arts, vendors, carnival and midway, bull-riding and dance. Hours are 5–10 p.m. Thursday-Friday, 1–11 p.m. Saturday and 11:30 a.m.–8 p.m. Sunday. Kerr County Hill Country Youth Event Center, 3785 Texas 27 E. OCTOBER 29 HARVEST FESTIVAL Follows the Pumpkin Run 5K/10K. Come in costume to enjoy a family day of bounce houses, food, games, face painting and candy. The Salvation Army Kroc Center, 201 Holdsworth Drive. MARBLE FALLS OCTOBER 14-15 SCULPTURE ON MAIN Festival unveiling of the new sculptures displayed around town. 218 Main Street. MEDINA OCTOBER 1-31 GREAT HILL COUNTRY PUMPKIN PATCH Children’s event features hayrides, petting zoo, apple orchard tour, pony rides, barrel train ride and face painting, Love Creek Orchards, 13558 Texas 16 N.

ALL COUNTY HOME CARE and HOSPICE Mary Lou Shults, RN (All County Home Care and Hospice) has been a nurse for over 35 years. She graduated from RN school at the ripe old age of twenty-one. Mary Lou started her career as a nurse in the hospital setting, having worked on several types of floors. She worked on a urology floor for 14 years at the old Humana hospital in San Antonio. While raising a family she need a part time job on top of her hospital job. The hours and flexibility brought her to home health in 1992. She has practiced home health in the beautiful Texas Hill Country ever since.

The Hill Country’s Most Caring Professionals

In 2007 Mary Lou and Her daughter Allison set out on a journey to open their own home health care. With Mary Lou’s knowledge and Allison’s drive and determination their dream became reality. The mission of the business is to give the best care for the patients and be a great place to work. As working mothers, they have a passion for working families. In 2012 they added hospice to the company. Hospice is very hard for Mary Lou. There is an agreement in the office that Mary Lou is not allowed to do hospice because she cries. Even still she will do visits from time to time. She has been touched so deeply by witnessing the death of her own brother on hospice. This speaks to her heart for people and her character.

Mary Lou is always so giving of herself. She goes above and beyond the call of duty to make sure her patients are taken care of. For example, organizing blanket and house shoes drives or food drives for the local community and churches. She is also a recent graduate of Leadership Boerne, which is a leadership program through the Boerne Chamber of Commerce. She is proud to be an active member in our community on various levels and organizations. She prides herself in the upbringing of caring and loving nurses. She trains and educates new nurses with all of the knowledge she possesses while guiding them to be the best that they can be. She is a wealth of knowledge and wisdom for all of those who work with her and in her community. Bonnie Stewart LVN says this about Mary Lou “she is always so caring and loving. It’s her nature. She lives and breathes nursing. Her compassion left a lasting impression on me. Bonnie and Mary Lou have worked together for over 20 years. Mary Lou is most proud of her family. She always worked two and sometimes three jobs to provide a great up bringing to her three children. Her two daughters are both bachelor degreed registered nurses. “I am so proud that my daughters are in the same profession as I am. I am also proud that they furthered their education and have higher degrees than I do.” Her daughter Rabecca is in nurse practitioner school. Her daughter Allison sits on the Texas Association of Home Care and Hospice board. John Jr. her son in an engineer at Bell helicopter. Mary Lou has been married to her husband John for over 35 years.

Proudly serving those in need in and around the Hill Country

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Cinco Peso Security & Investigations is the Texas Hill Country’s premier professional investigations and private security firm offering a full suite of investigative, protection, and legal services. We are veteran owned and staffed by licensed professionals and experts such as former law enforcement, CPA’s, attorney’s, oil and gas experts, financial compliance officers, bank examiners, and fraud examiners. Our team has decades of combined experience, domestically and internationally and is dedicated to providing our clients with the most prompt, cost effective, and discrete services. Whether you are looking for a long lost friend, wanting to verify your well production, needing to “know your customer”, detect and prevent corporate espionage, locate assets, vett potential candidates or future business associates, or need armed personal protection, Cinco Peso Security and Investigations is your only option.

The Hill Country’s Premier Professional Investigations Firm 16 | EXPLORE

MY TOWN 2 GO Not enough time to cook lunch or dinner? School has started and if you are like us, feeding the family is just another item on a never ending to-do list. We can help! My Town 2 Go offers meal delivery straight to your door from your favorite restaurant. It is quick and simple. How does it work? Order online at mytown2go.com or download the app (mytown2go) and order from your phone. Just enter your address and the restaurants available in your area will appear.

HOME OFFICE HOTEL CATERING AVAILABLE Contact Us At: www.mytown2go.com michelle@mytowntx.com

What is the delivery cost? When you put in your address, an estimated delivery fee will appear. The standard delivery fee is $4.99. How quickly will my food arrive? We are quick! You should have your meal delivered in no more than 45 minutes. Depending on your location, you could have your delivery in about 30 minutes. We are continually adding more restaurants so if you don’t see your favorite on our list, check back. As residents right here in Boerne, the Hill Country community is near and dear to our hearts. A portion of our proceeds go to Hill Country Daily Bread to help those less fortunate in our local area.

Check back - we’re adding more restaurants every day!

TRIO Rehabilitation & Wellness Solutions Trio Rehabilitation & Wellness Solutions focuses on you! We provided Physical, Occupational, and Speech Therapy in one convenient location. All treatment sessions are private and tai-

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lored to your needs! We offer specialized services to help people with: • Risk For Falling • Vertigo/Dizziness • Difficulty Walking • Parkinson’s Disease

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At Trio, we recognize life can be hard. You are not alone on y(our) journey!

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Investing in people. Changing perspectives. WWW.HILLCOUNTRYEXPLORE.COM | OCTOBER 2016

| 17

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18 | EXPLORE

When I started playing music, or thinking about music seriously, it was up to New York. And all the time back again. And again. So many things in my life have happened to me in NYC. Letterman, Carnegie, and late night jams. And celebrities. And parties. And sleeping on floors. Food, food, food. And walking through the streets at night in the rain reading poetry in the geometry of buildings. Each a life created of one mind. Intricately working away at the life of itself. The city. Seen like a Texan. A strange place with its own center of gravity. A dark tangle of thoughts. A massive question on eight million foreign tongues, I don’t understand, and back I go into the think of it on the 14th. - Do you want to know what it is like to be a cell in a body? Or maybe just part of a cell? The cilium perhaps? Or the atoms inside the cilium? Nyc makes me feel that small. - and that’s a great thing... To know I am small in this world. Small movements. And small works. That is everything in life.

THE PAST By Rene Villanueva

Despite what it looks like with these stories, I think very little about my past.

That’s how I feel now. Getting ready for what I know is a big show. (Big show for us). Big show for my family. Big for my future. And it is on a small scale. With small moments. And small movements.

What is done, I like to leave done.

A song. A verse. A word. A look.

Maybe this is me keeping a few memories for later? For a day when I will want to look back.

They are all but small consequences to the world. Everything to me is no thing at all. What a feeling.

But, after I close this story, I won’t look back for a while. Not on this moment. This is the present. The first step. The first move. I am driving up a blank slate. - keep telling yourself Rene... - well... lately my past and future blurring together. All because of New York. 20 | EXPLORE

I can marvel at the big pictures. I can know or learn or be aware of big trends. Cultures. Of stars and currents. And gravity. And ages and ages. But I can only work in small moments.

New York.

A son of South-Texas, and two of the most beautiful souls I’ll ever know. Writer, dreamer, singer of songs, bass player, and professional observer. Toured the world with my band of “real-blood-tied” brothers, and friends as Hacienda/Fast-five. Recorded three albums, written countless songs, played countless shows, including two national tv late-night extravaganzas, festivals, throwdowns, parties, and hoot-nights. Lover of books, vinyl, dancing, people who laugh loud, walking, vintage craftsmanship, and my home in Boerne.

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22 | EXPLORE

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14th Annual

October 14-16, 2016

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS...

Boerne Professional Artists (BPA) will host their premiere art

Preview and Opening Night

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 14 6pm – 9pm

show and sale in the Cana Ballroom of St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Church on October 14 - 16 of this year. With 40 talented artists participating, it will be the best show in the 14-year history of this event. Works of art will include paintings in oils, acrylics, pastels and watercolor; graphite, photography, pottery, jewelry, fused glass, encaustics, reliefs, sculpture and mixed media.

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 15 10am – 5pm The Beginning of the 2016 Texas Hill Country Invitational The Texas Hill Country Invitational will be open to the public with artists in attendance to tell you all about the works they have on display. Artists’ lectures and demonstrations will be held from noon – 4pm.

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 16 10am – 3pm The finale of the 2016 Texas Hill Country Invitational

Additionally, featured artists will conduct a series of “how-to” lectures and demonstrations throughout Saturday afternoon. And all of this will be held in the heart of Boerne in a most elegant venue with breathtaking northern Hill Country views that is easily accessible with plenty of free parking.

Make your reservations now to stay in the beautiful Hill Country town of Boerne, so that you don’t miss a single day of this spectacular event! Special hotel rates are available at: Comfort Inn and Suites Texas Hill Country • 830.249.6800 Fairfield Inn & Suites by Marriott • 830.368.4167 Just use the code “ART” when you call.

www.BoerneProfessionalArtists.com

October 14 - 16, 2016 to be held in the elegant Cana Ballroom of St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Church, just off Main Street at 202 Kronkosky

Boerne Professional Artists (BPA) will host their premiere art show and sale in the Cana Ballroom of St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Church on October 14 - 16 of this year. With 40 talented artists participating, it will be the best show in the 14-year history of this event. Works of art will include paintings in oils, acrylics, pastels and watercolor; graphite, photography, pottery, jewelry, fused glass, encaustics, reliefs, sculpture and mixed media.

2015 Art Show Winners’ Circle

SCHEDULE OF EVENTS FRIDAY, OCTOBER 14 6pm – 9pm Preview and Opening Night

THE 14TH ANNUAL TEXAS HILL COUNTRY INVITATIONAL ART SHOW & SALE

OCTOBER 14 - 16, 2016

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 16 10am – 3pm The finale of the 2016 Texas Hill Country Invitational Make your reservations now to stay in the beautiful Hill Country town of Boerne, so that you don’t miss a single day of this spectacular event! Special hotel rates are available at: Comfort Inn and Suites Texas Hill Country • 830.249.6800 Fairfield Inn & Suites by Marriott • 830.368.4167 Just use the code “ART” when you call.

THANK YOU TO OUR GENEROUS SPONSORS

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28 | EXPLORE

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30 | EXPLORE

GENERALLY SPEAKING

his ministry work. In 1982 Junior became president of the H.E. Butt Family Foundation, founded by his mother as a philanthropy for underprivileged children (Howard Sr once said “I make the money, and Mary spends it (on worthy causes). And I am glad she does.”) His parents had established, way back in 1934, some of the first charitable organizations in Texas, and throughout the years, the Butt family’s philanthropism has gone to help fund public school programs, build libraries and playgrounds, to aid disabled, seriously ill and at-risk children, to building and funding hospitals, and in disaster relief programs.

Well anyway, we’re not going to be talking about HEB today, but what everybody did before Mrs Butt and her sixty dollar investment turned HEB into a household name. Where did our Boerne foremothers get all the stuff they needed to make supper? What stores did we have in town? Where did the pioneers get their TVs before HEB had an electronics department, and perhaps more importantly, how did they turn them on before there was electricity, and were there any good shows back then? So first of all, in the beginning, there were trading posts. These posts were established way back when, along ancient trade routes, mainly for the fur trade between Native Americans and the European settlers. One of the first trading post records date back to 1662, when someone traded ten pounds of tobacco for enough fur to make a hat.

And it all started with a guy with the dreaded consumption, a wife determined to support her family, and sixty bucks in cash. See, Charles Butt, father of Howard Senior, was a pharmacist in Memphis when he contracted the most deadly disease of the time, the dreaded “white death”, tuberculosis, and the family moved down from Tennessee to Kerrville because of Mr B’s illness. And it was in Kerrville that the enterprising Mrs Florence Butt, with sixty dollars, bought a stock of

In Boerne, John James and Gustav Theissen located their new town along the old military road called the Camino Viejo on purpose. This road was a spur of a much older route, the Pinta Trail, that had long been used since time out of mind. Around the time Boerne was established, the Camino Viejo had become the easier, preferred route used by settlers, soldiers and travellers from San Antonio to Fredericksburg and points further north and west. It was alternately called the Military Road and Fredericksburg

By Marjorie Hagy

I see where Howard E Butt Jr died the other day, at the age of 89. Mr Butt was the eldest son of the founder of HEB, who went to work at the age twelve as a cashier in the family store- and we Hagy kids know from that kind of child labor, having been forced to work in our dad’s tobacco shop as mere babes. (I learned from that early experience that people purchasing Zig-Zag papers are always anxious to clarify to thirteen year old shopkeepers that they roll their own Prince Charles or, in our case, my dad’s own tobacco blend Hill Country Heather, and definitely NOT any of that funny stuff, heh heh heh.) Howard Junior headed up the HEB operations for many years, but he felt he had a higher calling, and in 1971 he handed over the reins of the business to brother Charles and went full-time into

32 | EXPLORE

groceries and founded the family fortune in the room below their apartment. She called her little store the CC Butt Grocery, and from that very small beginning she and her son and grandsons grew the business into the largest private employer and family-owned company in Texas.

Road, and over the years would go on to become State Highway 9, then Highway 87, and finally Interstate 10. So the location for James and Theissen’s new venture was carefully chosen: it would be a distinct commercial advantage for people to buy property in the new town along an old-established trade route. And sure enough, as soon as they laid out the town, along comes a fellow to open the first store. Adeline Wueste Staffel was a homesick young lady who in 1852 came over from Germany with her family, including her husband and his brother, and in one of her earliest letters home she mentions this “new town” they’re building between San Antonio and Fredericksburg, and, she writes, “everyone believes that it will be a good speculation to purchase land there.” Later we find out that they’ve pooled their dough and have actually bought a lot in the new town, and then this: “August [the brotherin-law who made the trip over with Adeline and her husband] has bought a stock of groceries and will start a store there. He will move there in four weeks.” This is in 1852, and pretty soon here comes one August Staffel to set up shop in the brand-new village of Boerne. The lot that the Staffels pulled together to purchase was the one at the northwest corner of Theissen and Main Streets, and like most of the original lots, it ran all the way back to the creek in the back, where the enterprising August would eventually add a saloon, a livery stable and wagon yard. But the store, the first of August Staffel’s ventures in this brand-new town, was the place that would soon become the most happening spot in Boerne. The walls were built of logs and brush, the roof was thatched, it had a dirt floor and it was a tiny place by our standards, but this little store became the heart and soul of the fledgling village for a long while. Many little general stores like this were not only places to buy your necessities, but also served as the post office, and a social center, news outlet and political debate forum. Somewhere in the store

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meeting people they rarely got to see, and then the long,tired trip back home in the lengthening shadows of the evening. After the Civil War when the charcoal burners began to settle in their camps out near Kendalia and Bergheim, the people occasionally made the 10-mile trip into Boerne to trade at another general store that had cropped in town, A&W Wendler’s, and there they stocked up on their sugar and cornmeal, rice, soap, chewing tobacco, beans, sow belly and salt pork. The women also bought flour in 4-pound sacks and made sure the sacks were of good quality suitable for making clothes, and sometimes they got a yard or two of calico as well, for their bonnets. At lunch time everyone went around back of the store to the table and benches out there, hitched up their teams and lunched on cheese, crackers and sardines. The kids ran across the street to get red and crème sodas from Krause’s Saloon. Later on, the people of Charcoal City traded almost exclusively at Engel’s Crossing, the trading post Andreas Engel ran on the west bank of the Guadalupe for nine years before he founded the town of Bergheim- in fact, Mr Engel started that store mostly with the cedar choppers in mind, as he had been one of them for a while, and they were his friends. And the cedar folks were still his mainstay when he founded Bergheim in 1901. Engel traded them food, clothing and other supplies for their coal, which he then hauled to San Antonio himself and traded for other merchandise for the store. One grateful charcoal burner said, “It was seldom that any money was exchanged over the counter. Us charcoal people should love Mr. Engel, as he kept many a one of us from starving to death.” In those days mail service to Charcoal City was infrequent- in fact, the name itself, Charcoal City, applied more to a region that a specific settlement, the charcoal people living in various camps along the Guadalupe going by names

It was in Staffel’s store, a typical Mexican jacal, under whose straw roof every stranger found hearty greetings and refreshment. Here could be had a drink of whiskey, the only one available between San Antonio and Fredericksburg.

would’ve been posted town notices and announcements of all kinds- from local events like dances and church picnics to elections, auctions, death notices and even wanted posters. It was to Staffel’s store that people from the outlying farms and ranches would come to exchange news and to chat and visit around the pot-bellied stove and to berate the government and debate the weather and talk about the crops. August Staffel did open the first post office in his store, as well as serving as the first postmaster of Boerne, and it was Staffel’s store where the people went to vote. His place was also where the stage stopped in town, giving the area where the Cibolo and Frederick Creeks meet just below his old place the name OST- not the old Spanish Trail, as elsewhere in Texas, but the Old Stage Stop. A visitor to Boerne in 1855, one C Hugo Clauss, mentioned that old store in an account of his travels: “Though but an infant settlement,” he said , “one found a most hospitable reception there by the early settlers and it was in the straw thatched Mexican-like jacal, the little store of Staffel’s, where the stranger found refreshment from an arduous journey, the only store between San Antonio and Fredericksburg.” Like Laura Engalls and her family, the weekly (or monthly) trip to the store would’ve been the event of the week (or month- or whatever, you get it) and the whole family would ride in the back of the wagon, Vater driving, with whatever goods they might be bringing to trademilk and cream maybe, chicken and eggs, vegetableswhatever they produced and could trade for things like cloth and tobacco, nails, lanterns and leather, coffee- all the things that couldn’t be made on the farm. And candy, if the kids were lucky. They’d take a lunch along with them and make a whole day of it- the trip in, the bartering,

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like String Down, Happy Valley, Richter’s Flats and Willke Bend- and letters for the charcoal people were addressed to the Guadalupe Post Office which caused much confusion. So in common with so many little storekeepers, Andreas Engel established a post office at his store so the charcoal people would be sure to get their mail. A lot of the time, especially when Boerne was very young, the stores were tiny places, as small as a living room in an average house. And the goods they supplied were of a very limited variety- mostly things like flour, sugar, salt and coffee, that kind of thing. Getting even these essentials was a process for the first shopkeepers like August Staffel and the Wendlers, as there was no railroad to Boerne yet and the trip into San Antonio to get ahold of one’s stock meant at least a whole day to get there and another one to get back again- by stage the journey took seven hours, and hauling all those goods into the big city and back with your own team and wagon would’ve taken a helluva lot longer- and these travel times held good only if the weather was ideal and the roads intact, which wasn’t always the case by any means. For a long while during the 19th century, roving salesman called drummers had made their rounds through the countryside all over America, carrying with them all kinds of necessities to peddle door to door at isolated houses far from any city. They also provided services such as tin repair and scissor-sharpening, and were often welcome visitors to the scattered and lonely farmhouses where trips to the nearest town or city were hardly feasible and undertaken only rarely. A lot of these itinerant salesman would work this way until they saved

up enough to open a brick-and-mortar (or straw-andlog, or unpainted frame) store of their own. After the Civil War, more of these drummers began showing up in town to peddle their wholesale wares to the shopkeepers themselves. The salesman usually represented large wholesale houses and manufacturers in the big cities and ports, and brought their company’s products right to the shopkeeper’s door. The Becker House hotel, which stood right about where Ebensberger-Fisher funeral home is today and which was run by the first white child born in Boerne, one Mary Becker, was said to have “catered especially to the ‘drummer’ trade, that old time style... of traveling salesman [which] has become practically extinct”, according to a 1932 San Antonio newspaper piece. But in their time, these “knights of the grip” would drive out of their way in order to stay at Mrs Becker’s place, which, in addition to the full turkey dinner she served every Sunday, featured a display room where the drummers could lay out their wares so that local shopkeepers could come by and check out the stock. Boerne kids of the day would watch eagerly for their favorite salesman, a representative of the Duerler Candy Company of San Antonio, who handed out free samples with the help of his pet monkey. Also after the Civil War and Reconstruction,when people in Texas (if not in the other, harder-hit Deep South states) started to have a little more ready cash, more luxury items began to appear in the old stores. Jewelry showed up in some general mercantiles, and a greater variety of cloth material for dressmaking, ladies hats and children’s shoes. And an enormous boon to Boerne storekeepers was the advent of the railroad in 1887- now they could simply take the train to the wholesale markets in San Antonio, and have their wares shipped back, easy as you like. And after that, little stores popped up like crazy in town. Actually, starting a little grocery store was a good way for a young man or woman to get started in life: it didn’t take a lot of capital to rent a place in those days and to get a stock of items, and anyone could do the work. In addition to so many general stores being social gathering places and housing the post office, many storekeepers did a little banking as well, they often had to market the crops they took in exchange for goods, and some would sell you a life insurance policy along with your vinegar and work boots as well. So a lot of times the country store served as a kind of business training, and the proprietor would one day move on to other commercial ventures, like banking or the insurance industry. August Staffel, the very first shopkeep in town, would loan the newly-minted Kendall County three thousand bucks to build the courthouse, and was a signer, in fact, of the petition to create a new county in the first place. “In the past, young men who wanted to come up in the world have always been able to start businesses like grocery stores,” said economic historian Marc Levinson in an NPR interview. That’s what happened with HL Davis, one-time schoolteacher from Kentucky, who moved to Boerne in 1910 and started his own grocery store in a little rough-cut limestone building between the Phillip House hotel and the tiny St Peter’s church on the hill- a building which still stands, the oldest commercial building still in existence in Boerne. Mr Davis went from groceries into the insurance and real estate business, opening his own insurance/realty office in 1916. Davis Insurance was carried on by his son Harry, a beloved Boerne fixture for many years, and afforded the Davis family a fine lifestyle in the Hilltop Mansion where Care Choice nursing home is today. Other folks ran their own little grocery businesses out of that same little building through the years, including a fellow by the name of Fred Beissner who bought the building in 1886 and ran the shop until his death the next year; George Coryell had his store there in the early 1900s, and Margaret Kaiser and William Schwarz in the 1920s. The Schwarz’s daughter, Crescentia Schwarz Pechacek, remembers the fun of Saturdays at the store when “everyone came from miles around with their wagons to buy oats and grain which were sold by the bushel, among other items.” Can’t you just imagine the excitement of one of those trips if you lived miles out from town and never saw anybody but your sisters and brothers and the cousins you went to school with- the bustle of getting the wagon loaded, the lunch packed, the long trip into town and then the fun of meeting with so many people, a picnic

WWW.HILLCOUNTRYEXPLORE.COM | OCTOBER 2016

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lunch, a penny candy? I can even kind of smell that old country store scent- having grown up out near Bergheim, we went to Engel’s Store often as kids and I’ve caught that ghost of a whiff, a smell of coffee and new denim from the stacks of jeans, pickles and feed and leather, soap flakes, maybe, and perhaps a hint of kerosene and tobacco smoke, and just that kind of aura of raw wood floors and the cellar and all of the people who’ve walked in and out of the screen door from the porch. All these little stores might not be as clean as we’d demand today, especially back before the streets were gravelled and horses were still transportation, and chickens roamed the dusty Main Street at will- and they did. The first decade or so of the twentieth century was really the golden age of the general store in Boerne. Just before the new century opened, Mrs Ottilie Phillip Vogt ran a clothes store in a rock building on the southeast corner of Theissen and Main Streets, and she and her husband Joe eventually bought the store as well as a two-story frame house right behind it. They tore down both buildings and Joe Vogt built the limestone building that stands there now, home of the Bear Moon Bakery, in 1912. Mrs Vogt opened a dry goods store, which she ran for many years, on one side of the building, while her son Albert ran a grocery store from the other half. After her mother retired, Vogt daughter Ida Seeger carried on the dry goods business, while Max Theis Grocery eventually took over Albert’s business. Not to be confused with those Vogts, but quite likely related to them, one Eddie John Vogt opened his own store across Main Street and to the north a block or two, in 1909. His was a general merchandise store in which, according to his son, “he carried everything from groceries to clothing and hardware. At his store you could purchase everything from fresh groceries to dynamite.” Mr Vogt died in 1943, and his wife and daughter took over the business until it was sold two years later. The new owners went bankrupt within two years. “It was at about this time,” according to Vogt Sr’s son, John Eddie, “that I graduated from high school and decided that I would give retail merchandising a try. At that time there were two other dry goods stores in Boerne and there were a number of years of pretty rough sledding.” But our own John Eddie sledded through the rough patches, and his store, just a door or two down from his father’s old place, only closed in the summer of 1978. JEV ran a notice in the Boerne Star, thanking his two loyal employees, Vera D’Spain and Lois Soell, and his wife Nelda, and all the customers who’d kept the Vogts in business for sixty-five years.

Another Boerne fixture for many years was HO Adler’s place, the ‘store of a million articles’, where they sold everything from hog troughs to lady’s shoes to neckties and fresh milk and eggs, purchased fresh every morning from the farmers who trucked their produce into town. Henry Oscar Adler, like Joe Vogt down the street, also operated for several years out of a small frame building, built in 1902, before he tore that down and built the twostory Victorian brick building in 1911, with the family living quarters upstairs and a cellar underneath. The vast, cavernous upper story was used as storage and warehouse space as well as the family home, and the cellar was also used for storage and for off-loading goods through a chute from street level. Then there was the Dienger store, down on the northwest corner of Main and Blanco Streets, on the corner of Main Plaza, later the Antlers Restaurant, still later the Boerne Public Library, one of our most famous Boerne landmarks. Joe Dienger, eldest son of Professor Karl Dienger, first schoolteacher in town and the founder of the Gesang Verein, first built a one-story building for his general store, completely stocked it and set up for business, before going on to build the second story on top of it. Like the Adler family, the Diengers lived above the store, but Joe Dienger made use of all that extra space up there by turning half of it into a meeting room. This was where most of Boerne’s societies, clubs and fraternal organizations met, and where people and groups threw their bashes. The one-story building next door to the Dienger building, and included in the construction of the library, Joe built later as a dry goods store for his maiden sisters, Lina and Louise, who devoted their lives to their store and to the care of their widowed mother, who lived to be ninety-three years old. And these aren’t all, not by a long shot. In those days, that area of town behind Main Plaza, between the Cibolo and Frederick Creeks, known as The Flats, was like a village within a town, and the black people who lived there first and then the Hispanic people later, had their own stores and restaurants. The house still standing at the corner of Brackenridge and Irons Street used to serve as a tiny shop, with the buying and selling transacted through a window on the Irons side of the home, while the family lived in the rest. This was the store and home of Monte Leal, who also had a barbershop in a little place behind the housestill standing as well, in spite of the best efforts of the 1964 flood. And further back into The Flats was Sotello’s store, which stood for many years.

The larger general stores- HO Adler’s and Joe Dienger’s stores, in particular- were big, dim, cavernous places with big display windows in the front that, back in the day, would’ve been cluttered with ad signs and sales notices, as well as an enticing array of goods to lure in the customer. Inside were long counters and a central display case where the tills, and later the cash register, were kept- HO Adler’s Store, now Bergmann’s Lumber Co, still has that central counter. There would be glass showcases and the walls were lined with shelves, bins and drawers- you can see something like it in the old store at Luckenbach. Things hung down from the pressed-tin ceiling: lanterns, buckets, ropes, harnesses and other horse tack, while in the early days barrels would be lined up beneath the counters, holding flour and sugar, salt, pickles, crackers, potatoes, and all kinds of other things. There would be bins of nuts and beans and nails, and baskets and boxes of produce. Along the shelves would be crowded fabric and stacks of blue jeans, shoes and dishes, pots and pans, soap and medicine and guns and shovels and hoes and knives and buttons and pencils and...well, Adler’s, at least was billed as the store of a million articles, so you can just picture it. On those long countertops would be scales for weighing your goods- this wasn’t self-serve, after all, you would ask the grocer for two pounds of flour and he’d weigh it out for you from a barrel, and pour it into a bag. A pound of oats- same thing. There would have been stacks of brown paper and rolls of twine for tying up your purchases into a package, and there’d be a coffeemill up there, too, for grinding your beans once you’d placed your order. And then there would be the candy- glass jars lined up and the penny candy shimmering like a dream- lemon drops and peppermint sticks, licorice and lavender, jelly beans and sugar plums and something called horehound. And over all that, hanging invisible in the air, that smell, that unique scent that you can only ever smell in the dim recesses of a real, old country store. They didn’t sell everything though- for meat, in those days before home refrigeration, the haus fraus of Boerne would be out on their steps or carriage blocks first thing in the morning, listening for the call of Henry Fabra, or his father before him, calling “Meat! Meat!” from the seat of the butcher’s wagon. The ladies would buy what meat they needed for day. Milk was delivered to the doorstep, or extracted from the family cow, butter came with the milkman as well or was produced by the family, and vegetables for the table came mostly from one’s own kitchen garden out back. Things began to change in the grocery business as soon as 1917, when Piggly Wiggly secured a patent for their concept of the “self-serving store”, where instead of handing one’s list to the grocer, one wandered around the store picking out one’s own stuff. Piggly Wiggly was also the first store to set up checkout stands, and in 1937, provide shopping carts with which to cart your stuff to the registers. There was a Piggly Wiggly in Boerne, too, in the 1940s, where Green Bull Jewelry is now, but this business of going to fetch and carry your own groceries was slower to catch on in little country backwaters like ours, and we preferred the way we’d always done things, thank you very much. Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple, in later days as “progress” came unwelcome to her own small village, listens to her friend’s grievances at the supermarket system: “And you’re expected to take a basket yourself and go round looking for things- it takes a quarter of an hour sometimes to find all one wants- and usually made up in inconvenient sizes, too much or too little.” At your friendly neighborhood grocer, you got exactly how much you needed, not one jot more or less. Miss Marple and her friend much preferred the old days, in which the local grocery shop provided “comfortable chairs to sit in by the counter, and cozy discussions as to cuts of bacon, and varieties of cheese.” You know, come to think of it, the enormous new super ultra HEB with its tomatoes and tvs, detergent and DVRs, might not be so different after all from those old general mercantiles where you could get your bib’alls and your saddle and your lady’s corset and a bolt of calico all over the same counter. But...no. No, its different, much different, and no matter how wonderful HEB is- and it is- it’ll never have that sweet old smell of an old country general store.

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• Ken Nietenhoefer •

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but instead we see our struggles. We do not feel the presence of God, we feel abandoned. We stop praying to God, but in a way, we begin to pray to OURSELVES. All these little “You can do it!” prayers that we say to ourselves as the depth of our prayers get shallower and shallower and we begin to push God out, and attempt to use our own feeble strength to get through our struggles. We become our own “God” as we feel neglected by God Himself and so we pray less and less and, perhaps, even find some anger for God that He has allowed all of these issues that we don’t want in our lives. Perhaps there are some of you that experience FEAR that do not do as I do, but rather, you hit your knees and lean on God. If that’s the case, then I’ll just admit that I’m worse than you. I’m fine with that. I will say, though, that it’s a bit of a degenerative disease. When hit with a stressor or fear, we might instantly turn to God, and that’s good. However, when you get hit again and again, day over day, year over year, you are sometimes left so bruised and bloodied that you too might find yourself in the position of struggling with your relationship with God. Like me, at times. So what do we do? How do we not fear FEAR? How do we find peace amidst the storms of our lives? Man, if I knew how to do THAT, I’d be in one heckuva better state of affairs this evening. That said, I know the answer to my maladies, and maybe that’s why God takes us through them: in order to teach us the lesson of trusting in Him. I don’t want to do that, but what choice do I have when faced with FEAR? I read a quote one time that I liked: Sometimes God takes you to the depths not to drown you, but to cleanse you. I have GOT to be clean by now. I have to be. But for whatever reason, He has taken me to the deepest of depths, and has basically held me there. I have prayed and then prayed some more. I have found myself praying to myself, and then trying to come back to God. I get mad and I yell and I shake my fist at God, and then eventually, I crawl back to Him. Rinse and repeat. And perhaps that’s MY reason for being dragged to the depths: to teach me that I can do NOTHING without Him. Nothing. Nada. Not a darn thing. But sure enough, in my own self-righteousness, I sure want to believe that if God won’t change my circumstances, then I will do it my dang self. Yup, I will simply arm-wrestle my way through life and will eventually rise to the surface and free myself of the chains that seem to bind me.

FEAR By Kendall D. Aaron

Fear.

I hate fear. It’s such a crippling, soul-crushing emotion and is more than a little frustrating to try to make sense of it. I’m not talking about the “I’m scared of a boogey man in my closet” type of fear, but rather, the “what if ” fear that can plague us all. What if the doctor’s results are bad? What if I really do lose my job? What if my ex really does these terrible things to me that he/she is threatening? Welcome, FEAR. I think that many of us out there glide through their lives with very little fear or anxiety. They lead relatively easy-going lives that do not expose them to much in the way of crippling fear. It’s not that they don’t have episodes that cause them fear, but it happens at a rate that does not

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force them to consider fear something that they encounter with any regularity. I envy these people. Then there are those unlucky souls that, for whatever reason, have FEAR as a constant companion and something that they have to face on a virtually daily basis. I know the differences between these two people because I have been both. I was the former and have now been the latter. I can easily tell you I prefer the former.

Yes, I know it’s laughable, but you’ve probably done the same thing.

It’s a very counter-intuitive process for what FEAR does to you spiritually, but let me tell ya, it will set you back quickly in your spiritual journey and I’m more guilty than most. When one has a relatively peaceful existence, they quickly turn to God and pray “Gee God, thanks for all my blessings. I am so blessed, and it’s all due to you, and I am just at peace and I would like to give the Glory to you.” The simplicity of life and the blessings that we have are readily seen, easily felt, and hopefully, we turn and recognize that it’s due to our God.

I have always liked Mark 4:39. “He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” The mental picture of Jesus turning and yelling at his disciples is such a fun image. As if He turns and says “Seriously guys – why are you freaking out? You do know I’m Jesus, right? Sheesh.” So if Jesus’ disciples can have a “moment” and become FEARful, then I suppose it’s not outside the realm of possibility that we all will have them. But we have God. And He has brought us to the depths for a good cleansing. I know this is hard, but why not use it as a test and do what you KNOW to do. Lean on Him. Take what comes and thank Him for blessings. Receive the hardship and rejoice that you have been brought to a place where you can glorify God.

When a soul exists in a state of FEAR, the opposite tends to occur (or is that just me?). We do not see our blessings,

Stop the FEAR. Find the FAITH. No, it’s not easy but growth rarely is.

Dr. Sara Stuart, DO

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Nancy Frazier, owner of Massage Matters has fast become one of the area’s most popular Massage Therapists. Utilizing her knowledge in her industry, coupled with good ol’ fashioned customer service, Frazier has helped thousands of clients heal quicker as well as simply relax, and her motivations run as deep as the knots in your back. By Ben Schooley

She begins, “I was a retired flight attendant and then right after that I managed a jewelry shop in New Mexico. I needed a life change, so I moved to Boerne and didn’t a soul. Oct 2008. The town I was in was so small and I was single, and I prayed about it, and I just asked God to bring me one job. So I looked for months up and down the entire area…and I got one job offer. That job offer was in Boerne.” Frazier’s job was with a local jeweler, and though she didn’t much want to continue in the jewelry business, it was the job that would get her to Boerne so she did it. She continues, “I wanted to make a change, but the Lord told me to stay in town, and I had been here long enough to get my home which was a big deal for me. So I prayed. I knew I just got here, and I just got this job, but I just didn’t feel at peace about it. A massage school commercial came on and I thought ‘That sounds interesting’. I kept thinking that it looked really interesting, and I knew that if I was going to do this, I needed a sign. I’m in my late 40s, single, in a town I’m unsure about, and this is a big change. I opened my Bible and I came to Isaiah 65:22 which explains “My elect shall long enjoy the work of our hands.” I still get teary-eyed over that. And that was my sign.” She gave her two weeks’ notice and quickly began her schooling. Upon graduation, she quickly entered the workforce, but knew that business ownership was in her future. “I was working part time at Massage Heights and part time trying to start my own business here. I opened Massage Matters in 2010. Owning my own place wasn’t my original plan, but in learning the business I knew that there was a lot of things that I didn’t want to do in terms of running a business, so my model was sort of the exact opposite of every other massage business. Robert Mata (local masseuse) was my mentor here locally and he really taught me a lot.” As her business has grown, her knowledge has grown, and so has her inspiration for what she does. “I love seeing the surprise on people’s faces when people come in with an ailment and we can use massage to repair those things in oftentimes one visit. The surprise of how good they can feel when they leave after being in so much pain upon their arrival is really rewarding.”

Furthermore, many of the techniques that she uses at Massage Matters are truly cutting edge, and certainly assist you with more than just a sore back. “There have been many people that we have seen that were on their way to get surgery that don’t have to get it now. They have been to endless amounts of Physical Therapy and don’t require it any more. We look at the range of motions and assist them with improvement. Clients tend to hear simply “injections or surgery” as it comes to ailments. We gradually work on that shoulder to increase the range of motion. We have many different techniques, like the cupping that was all over the Olympics, and we’ve been doing that since we opened. That’s what I like about myself and my staff, is that we’re probably in the top 10% in a 100 mile radius of the most educated and therapeutic group out there – that’s what sets us apart. We do an insane amount of Continuing Ed. Our education never stops.” As her business has become known, she has grown an appreciation for Boerne that is widely shared. “At first I was panicked about opening a business in a small town, but I knew the power of word of mouth. I would see businesses collapse every quarter and it was terrifying to see so many fail in town in my early days. I think that if you treat people like family they will come back, and they are excited to be back, and they’re going to bring their family. We have a tremendous amount of families coming in, and that is a testament to the quality of our service. We treat them like family, and they are loyal forever. Some places charge you for an hour massage for what is really a 50 min service, leaving only 10 minutes for them to get you out, shake your hands, and move on to the next client. We allow 30 minutes between clients just so that we can talk to you, get to know you, allow you to take your time changing, and really understand what is going on your life. I know them very well, and it gives us the ability to work with you about all aspects of their lives. Sometimes people just want to talk to you, and we want to be there for that and not rush them.” Nancy Frazier has taken a happenstance commercial on TV and found a passion that is highly rewarding, not only for her, but for her clients. Through the leaps of faith that ultimately brought her to the city she loves, she continues to build on that foundation of service, knowledge, and dedication in the most rewarding ways possible.

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OLD TIMER

Well, the issue of Buc-ee’s dominated our universe last month, and I don’t know about you, but I’m fatigued with it at this point. The EDC and the City Council pulled yet another fast one on us, and managed to keep the whole thing a secret until days before the vote. And just like that, we have us a Buc-ee’s.

Whoop-de-freaking-doo. I have come to learn that this is the norm and not the exception with this Mayor and Council, so with that said, let’s move on, shall we? Since we are growing exponentially and are welcoming thousands upon thousands of new residents each month, I think that it’s high time that we have a little talk about the “rules” around here. And there are rules. Little things that newcomers should know so that Old Timers don’t get pissed. Yes, you are here and we’re fine with that (although begrudgingly), we feel that you should at least understand a little bit about how things work around here and how to stay in line. Ready? Here we go.

CHANGE

COMMUNITY

PROTECTION

KNOWLEDGE

DUCKS

Do not, under any circumstances, try to change ANYTHING to the way it is “where you are from.” This will earn you a tongue lashing, and it will be well-deserved. The way that your town handled something was guaranteed stupid because it was done in a town that you left. You moved here, so you’ll do it OUR way. YOUR way was probably back-ass-ward and too slick and we already don’t like you. Just stand quietly in the corner while old timers handle the issue and learn something.

Make sure that you attend Berges Fest and the Kendall County Fair. I don’t care what you have going on, if you are new here, it should be mandatory by law that you attend. You’ll see livestock and rodeos and silly rides and kids with cotton candy. Yeah, there’s not much “small town” left around here, but the fairs are as close as it gets anymore. Go, drink beer, and shake someone’s hand. Oh, and you better have on some Wranglers.

Sign the petition (that doesn’t exist yet but SHOULD) that the entrance fee to Boerne Lake should be raised to $200 per car for someone that doesn’t live in the county. What was once a real gem for local residents to enjoy (and for high school kids to party at on the weekends) has become awful. Blaring tejano music, trash everywhere, and a line out the gate of cars backed up almost to the interstate. It has to stop. So get in line, sign where we tell you, and just trust us that this is the right thing to do.

READ about your new town. Boerne has a cool history and there’s a lot of things that have happened here over the decades, so learn a thing or two, would ya? Learn about the founders, some of the history of the buildings that you see around town and about some of the amazing tales of yesteryear. You moved here because it’s “quaint” and “peaceful” so invest some of your knowledge into this town. If all you do is drive home from San Antonio and consider this town nothing but a place to lay your head, well, you are all that is wrong with Boerne.

Be sure to stop and feed the ducks. I’m kidding, we all hate them. Run them over when you can. Those people that stop for the ducks are newcomers that don’t know any better. We like our population control methods for the ducks, and it involves hitting the gas if you see one of those little bastards waddling across River Road. By the way, has anyone noticed that we bought a statue of kids feeding the ducks and then put up a zillion signs asking people to NOT feed the ducks? Oh, this city sometimes.

There’s more. Oh boy are there are more. There are volumes of these types of rules in the library if you know the right librarian to ask about them. I don’t have the time to run through even a fraction of them, but my point is this: understand that this city has existed for a very, very long time without you, and would do just fine without you. Respect it, and find a way to appreciate it for what it is. Run over a duck, yell at out-of-towners that use our facilities, and wear some Wranglers. Do these things, and you’ll be fine.

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