Only a handful of people know about Click, Texas; Enchanted Rock Magazine had said so. I couldn’t wait to stump him.

I was hardly able to stifle my grin as I stepped into my parents’ house ready to make history. They were listening to Jim and Jesse on the CD player singing John Prine’s song, Paradise.

"When I was a child my family would travel…"

After some small talk, I sprung it on them.

"What are y’all doing tomorrow? I said.

"Nothing, why do you ask?" My mother replied. My father was staring at the remote control like it was a calculus problem, trying to adjust the CD player.

"…there’s a backwoods old town that’s often remembered, so many times that my memories are worn…"

"Oh, I thought I’d take a drive out to Click, Texas, if I can find it." There it was. The line had been scratched in the sand.

"…Daddy won’t you take me back to Muhlenberg County. Down by the Green River where Paradise lay…"

With innocent eyes, I watched for his reaction. He sat there looking back at me, not saying a word. For a full ten seconds, the earth stood still.

Suddenly, my mother catapulted out of her chair and disappeared into the bedroom. My father calmly began pressing buttons on the remote to no avail.

Two minutes later, my mother shot into the kitchen. She had washed her hair and rolled it in pink curlers. When she began banging pans together, I asked her what she was doing.

"I’m baking brownies to take to Click."

Horrified, I whirled back to my father. Without a glance, he pointed the remote and shut off the CD player.

"…I’m sorry my son but you’re too late in asking. Mr. Peabody’s coal train has hauled it away…"

"If you want to go to Click, boy, I can get you there," he said. I shook my head in disgust.

We left my parents’ house in Austin around ten o’clock in the morning. We had been on the highway for ten minutes, and no one had said a word, so I slipped a Ray Wylie Hubbard tape in the player, and said, "I got a song I want you to hear."

Just as the music started, my mother began, "ba-baaak, bawk bawk bawk baa-baawk." Halfway through the song, she and my father broke into a full-blown argument over something one of them had said within the last ten years. I punched the eject button. A Holligan family trip had begun.

I can’t give you and accurate estimate of how long it took us to get from Austin to the Click turn off because time crawls like a salted slug on a Holligan family trip. I won’t tell you where the county road is because finding it is part of the fun. But if your mother is anything like mine, you’ll know you’ve hit the right road if she screams, "We can’t go down this road! It’s somebody’s driveway!"

We bounced down the dirt road, taking in the scenery. Cattle stared at us hoping we would drop off some feed. Deer ran from us. My mother was silently convinced we were headed for danger. I told her that I have read were you needed a boat to get to Click, or at least to get out of Click. "Oh, that’s nonsense," she said, now firmly convinced this was her last ride.

When we hit White Creek, twelve turkey hens stood in the shade of a live oak upstream of the crossing. At first, they reacted to us in what looked like a slow motion panic, each turkey moving in a different direction, just slowly. Finally, they gathered their wits and meandered off together as we watched. Much to mother’s surprise, we crossed the creek without incident.

Next we came to the ford at Sandy Creek. It doesn’t take long to figure out how Sandy Creek got its name. The neighborhood cats love the horseshoe pits in my parents’ backyard, but this creek has to be what that big litter box in the sky looks like. My father says the old timers said the creek used to have a deep and narrow channel. It’s hard to visualize that now, and I can barely imagine how tall Enchanted Rock must have been before it lost all this sand. We crossed this creek without incident as well.

On the north bank of the Sandy stands a small cabin overlooking the creek. It is truly a fine cabin. The only things it’s missing are a rocking chair, a sunset, and me sipping Tennessee whiskey.

Just a ways up the road, we found Click. When I saw it, I frowned. I had been to Click before, I just didn’t know that was what it was called. In fact, my father had taken the family there seven or eight years ago. I glanced at him.

"Boy, I told you I know where Click is," he said.

"Yeah, yeah, you the man," I said, disgusted all over again.

Not much is going on in Click these days. There’s just a couple of old buildings and a windmill. However, you somehow get the feeling that the porch on the one building was the spot to be, come Saturday or Sunday afternoon. To tell the truth, it didn’t look like a bad spot to be on this Sunday afternoon.

I had done a little research on Click before we left Austin, but all I could find was that Joe P. Smith had purchased a store at Click in 1911. Mr. Smith was born nine miles west of Round Mountain in 1855. Before getting into the mercantile business at Click, he made at least five cattle drives northward, one as far as Wyoming. He was the postmaster while he lived in Click. In 1940, the post office closed, and the population dwindled to twenty-five people.

I took a few pictures for proof I’d been there, and we continued on. City dwellers like us marvel at how quiet the country can be. In the city, sirens and cars and television drown out the birds and the sleepy sound of insects buzzing and things rustling in the grass. The wind even seems friendlier out here. The folks who live out this way surely are blessed.

The next leg of our journey took us through some gorgeous scenery. We snaked down through the valley between Watson Mountain and Hickory Bluff. Looking through the evergreens up to the hills about you is reminiscent of driving down a U.S. Forest Service road in Colorado. When we broke out of the cedars, we were treated to the sight of the Devil’s Toenails, but the bluff we saw on this trip bore no resemblance. You could look at it with your eyes open. Up ahead lay Sandy Creek and two more fords.

The first crossing had a few holes and bumps, nothing to really worry about.

I faked a groan to make it sound like the bouncing was worse than it really was. I was a bit too enthusiastic though, for my groan sounded more like I’d taken a shot to the ribs from Mike Tyson. My father shook his head; my mother quietly wrung her hands and muttered, "Bawk Ba-bawk bawk."

We made the first crossing without incident, but weren’t as lucky with the second. The right, front tire fell into a depression just as I was taking a drink of coke. I poured most of it down the front of my shirt.

"You can’t drive worth beans, "I said to my father.

He smiled and said, "Boy, don’t you know it takes an expert driver to hit every bump in the road?"

We wound our way up past Enchanted Rock, back down through Crabapple Crossing, up to the Willow City Loop, and ended up at Harry’s. When we walked in, a young feller in a big hat was playing the guitar in the back room. He could really bend them strings, and sounded right at home. But, someone fired up the jukebox, so he put the guitar down.

I’d always thought you had to go east of Austin to get good sausage. I was wrong. I didn’t get a chance to ask Harry where he gets his sausage, but it rivals anything found in Elgin or Lockhart. Best of all, Harry is not bashful about piling it on a tortilla and calling it a sausage wrap. We left Harry’s full and happy. It had been one damn fine trip. Back in the truck, my father said to me, "You know that song you was playing for us earlier."

"Yeah,"

"It just proves that all you need for a song are some lyrics."

"What are you talking about," I said.