Why I wrote I'M GOING TO TEXAS/
YO VOY A TEJAS
I wrote this book because someone asked me to write it.   They needed a book that would tell children about Texas, and I thought that would be fun to write.  The project turned out to be my most popular book.
I knew from the beginning how I wanted to do this book.  Sometimes people get ideas in their minds, and it is hard to change them.  Ask anyone who has never been to Texas what the state is like, and the answer will probably be "cowboys and cactus."  Well, there are cowboys, of course, and there is cactus, but not where I live.  Houston is hot and humid so much of the time that I rarely need a coat, and it rains buckets.  Around Dallas less rain falls on the black dirt that makes up the rolling prairie.  The red dirt in East Texas grows pine forests.  The Panhandle, where the snow blows sideways in the winter, is as flat as a pancake.  Beaches line the Gulf of Mexico.  You need to go to West Texas to find mountains, cactus and mesquite trees. 
I wanted to tell about interesting things in all those different regions, and that's why you really need to read the book twice.  Follow the story across the top of the pages as the mother tries to change the child's thinking.  Then go back and read about the real Texas in the boxes at the bottom of the page.  There are so many things to see and do.   Have fun!
- Mary Dodson Wade

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