(Photo credit: the Baylor Lariat)

Last week was categorically horrible.

In between bombings and wild manhunts in Boston, a fertilizer factory in West, Texas exploded, leaving several dead and even more injured. When I heard the familiar, almost exclusive to Central Texas phrase “West comma Texas” on the radio, I could not turn away.

I grew up 15 minutes away from West. Several of my friends still live there. My memories of going to West for UIL contests, spring festivals, late-night kolache missions, and warm Friday autumn evenings playing drums on the Trojan football field are fond.

Friday night lights, indeed.

That football field turned into an emergency triage site after the explosion. Many of the people from my own hometown were first responders: brave nurses, firefighters, and EMTs put into the line of a real, scary fire to help their neighbors. My dad, a minister, listened to pained survival stories in the immediate aftermath. The kids I went to punk shows with were treating traumatic brain injuries after their old district rivals were thrown several feet into the air and came crashing down.

Unreal city. 

Central Texas, particularly the Waco area, is difficult to define and sometimes, it’s too easy to lump the entire place into one monolith.

But not West. Never West. It stands out.

This is town dominated by Czech culture and old customs more than willing to play host to modern sensibilities and never surrendering to cheap thrills. There is a respect and a reverence that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and looks forward to the future in the meantime. Not many small towns can claim such a strong personality, especially in the long-term.

West has been through hell. But West will recover. And we are the ones that will benefit.