A recent piece in Texas Monthly documents the hot trend of hunting for tumbleweeds in West Texas in order to sell them for as much as $200 a piece as home décor accessories. Apparently, they can be DIYed into chandeliers and Christmas trees or just fashioned into an ornamental symbol of rusticity for the corner of your living room. An iconic symbol of rural desolation if ever there was one (“Drifting along with the tumbling tumbleweeds” as the Sons of the Pioneers famously sang), the tumbleweed decorating trend may seem incongruent with our 21st century tastes, but it’s not so surprising given the current state of the world. As society emerges from the Covid-19 pandemic, and as war upends modern Europe and remakes global geopolitics, rural nostalgia is more popular than ever, manifesting itself in sometimes unexpected ways.
