I moved back to Floresvile, Tx after being gone for 60 years. My husband was in the Veteran's Home there. I moved there to be near him. This was in 2007. I had left in 1949.
Old Veterans and Old Downtown Floresville
The old buildings sit empty and forlorn. Downtown Floresville has a few busy, happy businesses that attract customers. The block in front of the courthouse on 3rd St. - with businesses on either side of the Arcadia Theater looks pretty good. They look bright and cheerful.
But for the most part the old buildings on the rest of 3rd St. and part of C St. across from the Courthouse look pretty dreary and run down and sad, like some of the old men I see at the Veteran’s Home where my husband is now. They all sit there waiting for someone to come and talk to them. Lonely and sad. Their eyes brighten up and look expectantly when someone new walks in. Life is boring in an old folks home.
Just like Old Historic Downtown Floresville, it is boring except for a few busy happy businesses trying to make a go of it. The deserted places and buildings are just like those old men. Empty, vacant and sad. They used to be full of life and useful. Now they just sit there with nothing to do.
I see there is some restoration going on with one of the ancient old buildings. I know people are trying to do the best they can. Businesses move in then close up. They can’t make a living at what they are doing. I can’t really blame them. There must be an answer.
But what is it?
There was a time when all of those buildings were full of businesses, people and activity. Many people can remember those days of long ago. I surely can. When I go into the Old J. C. Turner building it really makes me sad. Talk about a sad old building.
I go to Our Town Beauty Shop in there. I am so glad I found that little jewel. The ladies who do your hair and nails, Janet and Maria, are friendly and chatty, just like I like my hairdressers to be. I even like the old chairs and equipment in the place and also Maria’s Coca-Cola collection. The Coca-Cola tables and chairs give the place a very nostalgic look.
But, walking into the old double doors from out on the sidewalk into the hall, it is kind of spooky. The hall is wide and empty and your voice echoes throughout the building. I don’t see a soul or hear any voices. I know there must be something down the hall, past the beauty shop, but there are no signs or anything inviting you to go down there.
They call it a mall. That is the quietest, emptiest mall I ever saw. It seems deserted. I wish it were more enticing!. It could surely use a coat of paint. It really does make me sad to drive by and see that old building. And even sadder to go in!
I wonder why the owner doesn’t use the corner doors for the entrance to the “mall”? Painted and fixed up, those doors would be so beautiful and inviting.
But the beauty shop is like a little oasis in a desert. You can come in and get refreshed in that place. It’s a bright light in the darkness. But it is hidden where no one can find it.
I remember that building from the 1940’s. J. C. Merchant had his grocery store there. That building is where Mother and Daddy did their grocery shopping. I loved going in the big store. It had everything in it. That is where Mother bought a few loaves of “store-bought-light-bread”, as we called it. What a delicacy for us on the farm. We had to eat home made bread and so once in a blue moon we were treated to store-bought bread from J. C. Merchants Grocery! Mother also bought all her staples there, like sugar, flour and coffee. That was on Saturdays when she and Daddy drove into town from the Kasper community. Saturdays in downtown Floresville back then was one busy place. If they had enough money to bring us kids, so we could go to the picture show at the Arcadia and eat a hamburger. Also we may be lucky enough to even to into Ballard’s Drug Store and get an ice cream cone. Those were special days for us kids. Downtown Floresville was special.
It makes me sad to see something that used to be so lively and useful and busy, like some of those old stores down town – and now many are useless and lonely and sad. I know many have tried to revive the old downtown but if people don’t come to shop or eat or do business there, and want to go to the new places out on the highway, they have no alternative but to shut the business down. It breaks my heart.
And so the old stores in Downtown Floresville are really a lot like those old men who served our country and protected us and fought in wars all over the world who are sitting listlessly with nothing to do, at the Veteran’s Home. No one seems interested in them, no one cares, no one visiting them. It seems that everyone is just waiting for them to die, just like Old Historic Downtown Floresville.
A well-written, touching description of downtown Floresville filled with nostalgia, along with the sad analogy of comparing it to some of our old, forgotten veterans.
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