Day 26: Albuquerque, New Mexico, to Lubbock, Texas

Friday 18 October – Another desert walk this morning, with R.L., who retired here after decades of dreaming and planning for that goal.  New Mexico calls itself the ‘land of enchantment.’  When I was in grad school I needed to research that word, ‘enchantment.’  Its antecedents are the French ‘chanter,’ ‘to sing’ (and whatever Latin roots the French).  To ‘enchant’ is to ‘sing against.’  The word originally had a malevolent connotation, not the dreamy, floating sense of ‘Some Enchanted Evening.’  I suspect R.L. would say the Albuquerque, high-desert landscape sings with her, resonates in her.  I’ll have to check on that, though.

Enchanting

Volunteer squash at front of photo

Certainly hers are insightful eyes through which to see this stretch of earth.  She pointed out that the pockets of light and shadow on the Jemez Mountains aren’t sunshine and shadow, but variation in leaf color.  In some pockets, the aspens have started to turn yellow, so that stand of trees looks as if it’s in a beam of light.  She also introduced the ‘volunteers’ that spot her neighborhood.  These are squash and sunflower plants that arise where birds have – ah – deposited seeds, after eating them from birdfeeders and compost piles.  Many flowers and fruits arise from this avian activity, and each one seems a small celebration of the natural world.  The sunflowers are what R.L. calls New Mexican sunflowers, with many saucer-sized blooms on each stem.  She’s an artist, and wants to paint or draw the spiral the seed bed creates in the central disc – but can’t decide whether to take a photo and work from that, or clip a flower and use the real-life model, and risk that very minor disruption to the natural order.

Volunteer sunflower

She also identified for me the bird with the distinctively lovely song, and the tree on which it was perched.  It was a lark on a juniper, and once I knew its name I noticed its relatives, again and again, on junipers.  I’ve often read about the beauty of larksong, but had never heard (knowingly) an actual lark before.  It warrants the praise of poets, and the simile “singing like a lark” will now always be more evocative for me.  And then there’s her side observation that ‘windshields go fast around here.’  I didn’t ask what that meant.  What could that mean?

R.L. also offers insightful conversation, over huevos rancheros Christmas-style, which means with red chile sauce and green chile sauce.  She holds her hands cupped over her breakfast briefly before starting to eat, and I’m reminded of grace before meals at several other friends’.  She talks about a ‘transfer of energy,’ which is surely one of the graces with which this world gifts us.  One of the qualities of this woman that I most admire is the way she pays attention to her life and her self, tries to act on what she learns from that observation.  To a significant degree, she understands and trusts herself, and doesn’t chase ‘what Madison Avenue is selling’ as the ex would put it – not without due consideration of whether that’s what’s right for her.

New Mexican sunflowers in the desert.

Driving away from Albuquerque, I was absorbing her inspiration (and the pleasure of gas for $2.99⁹/₁₀) when what should appear but  – a cornfield!  After four days of desert, a cornfield seems pretty exciting, although – maybe especially because – it’s a miniature one by Illinois standards.  There was still plenty of desert to see, but moving east there was more agriculture in the mix.  A few cows.  The plants conjured the term ‘rangeland,’ with the little juniper trees, scrubby bushes and occasional ponds, fed by barely- or in-visible creeks.

R.L. had mentioned that her neighborhood used to be grazing land, a century or so ago.  The grass is shorter now than it was then.  I wonder if the colors are the same; crazy to think it might have been more varied then.  The grasses I see in east New Mexico are silvery at the base, shading to pale green, like the inside of a lime, and then inky purple at the top, where the feathery seeds are.  There’s a wind farm on a distant hilltop, maybe 50 stark-white giant stalks rising from a puce and pink hill, pushing into a sky the color of English bluebells.

I am not now, have never been, and never will be a visual artist.  (I think, but then life, as I’ve recently realized, can take surprising turns.)  My drawings of horsies and doggies are not even laughable; they can inspire only a mild pathos.  Nonetheless, I am powerfully affected by color.  One of my artist friends once told me he hates brown.  Ugh!  Brown!  I cannot imagine how anyone can dismiss an entire color, especially when colors inherently combine well.  Redheads in lilac t-shirts; autumn-blue skies seen through pale yellow trellises covered with green leaves and pale red roses; dark brown chocolate cakes dusted with white sugar and dotted with raspberries and crystallized violets; C.J.’s deep red bathroom with the gold-bronze framed mirror, mahogany trim and brightly multicolored little Peruvian carvings.  Or the lamps in this motel room in South Africa, where I’m typing up these notes:  dark, dark brown bases, maybe ebony, decorated with etched metal in copper and bronze shades, topped with off-white lampshades with dark tan damask paisleys.  I think they’re beautiful.

So what is it in me that makes me notice these combinations?  I know there are people who see a wind farm and think about BTUs, or bird strikes, or returns on investments.  I see one, and I think about the puce and pink shades of its hill.  Mysterious.  Marvelous.  Sometimes confusing.

And not enough to dispel from my head the Little Feat song ‘Willin’.’  You know this song.  Lowell George singing, “I’ve been from Tucson to something-that-sounds-like-Tucumcari-but-that-can’t-be-right/Somewhere to la la laaaa/Driven every kind of rig that’s ever been maaaade/La la the back roads so I wouldn’t get weighed,” except I always substitute ‘laid’ or ‘paid’ or ‘made’ for ‘weighed,’ I don’t know why.  Anyway, turns out Tucumcari is right; it’s a big enough city in northwest Texas that they start telling you to expect it about 300 miles before you get there.  So that’s like, Coeur d’Alene big.

Cline’s Corner, New Mexico, is a lot smaller than Tucumcari, and is on its own for civic boosting.  It’s done the job right, though, with dozens of billboards offering inducements like, “Ice.”  Or “Magnets;” “Hat Tacks;” “Homemade Fudge;” “CLEAN Restrooms;” each with the tagline, “Worth Stopping for Since 1934.”  These inducements were insufficient for me (I don’t know what a hat tack is), so you’ll have to check into it for yourself.  And while you’re there, note the size of the sky.  It’s really big around Santa Rosa and Cline’s Corner, New Mexico.  New Mexico, Montana:  kindred spirits.

Puzzled tourists on land; divers in hole.

Santa Rosa is where you’ll find The Blue Hole, according to Wikipedia one of the most popular destinations in the United States for scuba diving and training.  I thought it was just the third-least interesting tourist attraction on my mental list.

Also like Montana, New Mexico can get rather chilly at night; by 5:00pm I was in industrial-agricultural Clovis, New Mexico, seeing the sun just above the horizon in the rear-view mirror, and ready to close the sunroof to keep out the cold.  Then there was a sign for Texico, New Mexico, and then I bumped over some railroad tracks and into Palmer County, Texas, which was full of cotton fields.  Then I phoned A.T. to say I am so sorry but I thought west Texas would be mountain time but I just realized that’s it’s central so I’ll be an hour later than I thought.  Her husband pointed out that Arizona’s failure to move into daylight-saving time makes the whole thing that much more confusing, and he is so right.

It’s not too far to Lubbock, though – through cultivated land featuring cotton and dairy cows and much taller grass for them to graze.  There was a burnt chemical smell to Sudan, Texas, which hosts a water-tower-like structure, a black one, blazoned in bold white letters, “Central Compost.”  Littlefield, Texas, may be one of the suppliers, as it offered up a strong smell of manure amongst its many dairy farms.  And somewhere there was a pecan-tree orchard, which I know because they labeled it.  Otherwise I’d only have known the ‘tree’ part.

Sunset over Texas

Somewhere between Sedona and Albuquerque, my hair started to get all static-y, as it does in winter in New England and the mid-Atlantic.  About ten miles from Lubbock, I happened to notice it was about three times worse.  So I arrived at A.T. and R.T.’s with my hair sticking out every which way to stand the accusation that I’d brought this cold – it was 42 degrees Fahrenheit that night, and the day before they were still in summer.  It was the first time on the trip that I’d been guilty of bringing less-than-ideal weather.

Moonrise over Texas

Days 24 and 25: Sedona, Arizona, to Albuquerque, New Mexico

View from semi-swanky hotel.  After three weeks of
Days Inns, a Hilton is seven or eight stars.

Weds and Thursday 16 and 17 October – With the ‘resort fee’ waived I went a bit wild and had a fancy dinner on the hotel’s patio, perusing the menu of classes available, as many as I want, for free at the spa.  There’s Zumba and Muscle Mix and yoga of several varieties and T-fit.  I want Pilates, yoga and Effortless Power.  Who doesn’t want Effortless Power, though?  Awaking on Day 24 feeling more civilized than I have for several weeks – I booked two nights at this resort hotel thing – what I wanted most was to explore the rocks.  Bell Rock is a bit more than a mile up the street, and I decided to leave the car at the hotel and walk.  There are several trails connecting near the base of the rock.  I’m not sure which one I took, but I looped around for about five mostly-flat miles, marveling and happy.  At some point I realized I would miss the Pilates class, and at some point not long after that I realized that I didn’t mind.  The trails are governed by various rules, including limiting vehicles (bikes, mostly) to certain paths.  There’s also a request that people keep groups quiet and small – no more than ‘twelve heartbeats,’ so you can’t claim the two dogs and three babies don’t count.

A group of four cyclists – two struggling, two not – made a good bit more noise than I like, what with shouting encouragement to each other.  There was also a small mob of Aussies, who’d split into sub-groups.  The first one I encountered demanded to know whose boots I was wearing.  He thought they were French.  Confused, I said, “I don’t know,” while thinking, ‘They’re mine.’  He explained a bit further:  he owns a pair of the same brand, which he was sure of on closer inspection of the logo on my boot tongue.  He hadn’t brought his on this trip, but he was still unusually excited to see someone else, on another continent, wearing boots made on another other continent, that are the same kind he wears on his continent.  Or something.  I did not know what to say.  In the second group, one woman wished me g’day and when I excused myself for passing her she said, “No problem.”  I’m not certain there wasn’t a “mate.”  If she’d been in a movie I wouldn’t have found the character convincing.

Mostly, though, I got near silence.  Back in NoVA, I spend time in the woods – and there are some glorious woods there – but silence is hard to find.  Even if you can get far away from the roads, there are always planes flying overhead, to or from two commercial airports and who knows how many military and State Department and executive and congressional and and and airfields.  But planes here are few, the road is lightly traveled and a few miles away, the wind is low and the animals are under cover as the sun rises higher and hotter.  Deep quiet brings an awareness of how much is going on.  I always think about this in the desert, but it remains fascinating:  even under these strenuous conditions, there are dozens and scores and maybe hundreds of kinds of plants thriving.  I rarely see animals in the desert, but I’m very aware of their presence, somewhere hidden.  (And frankly, I was delighted when one of the hotel managers pointed out that October in Sedona is a bit chilly for snakes.)  The silence, and the sights, and the occasion exotic smells are, at least momentarily, transformative.

Deliberately brought the phone;
deliberately left the camera behind.

I chose not to bring my camera today.  I mentioned in one of these posts that photography used to be a very low priority for me when traveling.  Given how often I unslung the Canon yesterday, I wanted to revert to that earlier mode of experiencing my surroundings only with my native senses.  It’s definitely different; I was faster and lighter, for one thing, with no camera to carry and protect, and no stops for photo opps.  I had to make a point of stopping anyway, and spending a moment absorbing my surroundings.  Perhaps I ought to change my name to Pangloss, but both ways seem perfect to me.  I do like having photos, though, and grappling with light and angles and framing, so with-camera is my preference.

Better than a pedicure.

Back on the road, I am aware again of the blisters-on-blisters situation.  I’m pretty sure my small right toe is more abscess than toe at this point.  If the hotel offered a reasonably-priced pedicure, I’d get two, but $45 for the basic is just silly.

Missed Pilates but made it to Gentle Flow Yoga.  The classroom was packed; the teacher was great; the workout was wonderful.  Journal and hot tub and then back to the patio for dinner.  Suddenly my camera wouldn’t work.  I thought about panicking and then decided to pay attention and hope for the best.  The drinks are good and the food is good and there are worse things than a dearth of photos.

The restaurant had a guitarist this night, and he played quite beautifully, with all the propane flares going and people applauding from their balconies.  Occasionally he turned his drum machine up a bit high, and the clicking got annoying, but mostly the guitar dominated and sounded very gently appealing from my slight distance.  I shouldn’t have wished, though, to be right in front of him.  I wonder why so many restaurant musicians choose to bring a drum machine along.

The two 60’ish couples at the next table quickly got to their second or third cocktails, and when I tuned into their conversation they were guffawing enthusiastically about the idea of watching an earthquake from a helicopter:  “and the little Chinese kids... trying to hang on to their mothers... and people going over the edge...”  har har har har har.  Note to self:  as one ages, one’s tolerance for alcohol declines.  Start cutting back around 50.  I outlasted them and enjoyed dessert with a view and some disquieting thoughts.

Still, I bounded out of bed on Thursday, aware of check-out time looming, wanting to walk, curious about   

Effortless Power class, hoping to wedge in swim time or hot tub time, eager to see R.L. in Albuquerque at the end of the day’s drive.  Oh, so much to do.  First world problems, ladies and gentlemen.  First world problems.

Oak Creek - you call this a desert?

All the opportunities added up to arrival at Cathedral Rock as the sun was still coming over the rocks.  My camera was still defunct, but I brought my phone and used that for several dozen photos, available here.  The trail started by taking me to a creek; how odd.  I heard the water first, then the ducks, and had to negotiate with myself on exploring further or making it back in time for spa class.  The internal debate reminded me of these classic lines:

But always at my back I hear

Time’s wingèd chariot hurrying near

And ducks.  Though ducks, in fact, in front of me

Quacking quite delightfully.

Down.  Often trickier than up.

I climbed part of a path that ascended a gently sloping rock wall, but it was a little too sloping and not enough gentle for me this morning.  This trail, or amalgamation of trails, was a lot hillier than yesterday’s, and a bit wilder.

Five miles was sufficient to send me pell-melling into Effortless Power class two minutes after it started.  It turns out to be a tai-chi-inspired workout, with gentle choreography and lots of attention to the flow of energy through the body.  It’s much less demanding of the muscles and tendons than yoga is, but very mentally stimulating.

No swimming, no hot tubbing, just shower and re-pack and get out of the room – it’s a ‘big turn’ day for the hotel, and they could only give me 30 minutes of late-checkout time.  Joke’s on them, because I wound up camping in their lobby, with devices plugged in hither and yon.  I’d been thinking about my camera, you see – how to fix it.  An internet search yielded answers to other people’s camera problems, and I considered buying a new one, but Best Buys were few, and that’s an expensive solution.  Even if I could find a repair shop, I wasn’t sure how long they might need, and I couldn’t grapple with the idea of leaving my camera in Arizona for shipping to Kansas three days later.  Of course, I could just keep using the phone, or give up photography for the rest of the trip.

This perma-cairn is a guidepost from the park rangers,
or from the universe, as you prefer.

Nothing felt right.  I don’t know when the answer came to me, but it did:  I bought the camera at Calumet, a photography specialty store, and they would be able to help me.  There aren’t any Calumet branches in the southwest, but I phoned the shop in Virginia where I’d gotten my camera for advice.  The woman who answered the phone, not my salesperson, did troubleshooting on the spot, had me try a few different things, and it was the third or fourth one that worked.  Everything worked, just fine, again.  In my still-young effort to pay better attention to what the world is teaching me, I think I see a few lessons here.  First is that I have resources beyond the obvious.  Camera doesn’t work?  Use phone.  Use eyeballs.  Look for fixes.  Second is that there’s help available, and no need to give up.  Whacking and twisting and pressing and turning on and off and hoping don’t work?  Ask an expert; get advice.  The expert isn’t necessarily the obvious one, either; I remember Aaron Corbeil in Fairbanks, hotel clerk and expert photographer.  Probably someone at the Hilton Sedona would have had some ideas if I’d needed them.  Trust others.  And, of course, don’t shop at Best Buy.  Imagine calling them and having someone with real expertise spend twenty minutes on the phone with you, the same model device as yours in front of her, until she’d solved your problem.  Yuh huh.

Repaired and happy, I collected my scattered possessions from their various resting points around the lobby, and in two or three trips re-loaded the car.  North to Flagstaff (7,000 feet elevation, the sign says in this direction) and then east again toward New Mexico.  There are more furry corpses on the highway-side, and I wondered whether there’s something specific to Flagstaff that results in all these bodies.

No cluster of human habitation I could see;
just a power plant.

Descending again, I realize that I’ve never seen an all-sand desert-scape, as in an old movie.  Maybe that’s what the Sahara or Mojave offer, but here there’s grass and bushes, albeit small and sparse, and the ground is flat flat flat, albeit with mountains on the far distant horizon.  That’s around Two Guns, Arizona; by Joseph City there’s the sudden, eerie intrusion of the Cholla Power Plant, a different kind of fantastical formation dominating the view.

Near the New Mexico border, the shrubbery got denser, trees came into play, and buttes and mesas started to break up the flatness.  The ‘Welcome to New Mexico’ sign was decorated with one red and one green jalapeño, and there was a nearly-full moon rising over a mesa.

The half-light of sunset and moonrise barely affects the desert.  There’s not much shadow to lose, nor much color variation to be bleached and dulled away.  It does seem less stark, though; softer by the softer light.  And I like that the billboards vanish in the darkness, rather than being lit by incandescence and neon.

And I like that Albuquerque is in a bit of a valley, so I can see the whole city as I approach it, glittering like a split-open quartz geode, surrounded by black desert.  R.L.’s home is just north of the city, and I’m eager to get there, despite the promise from some highway-side motel of, “Free breakfast.  No train noise.”  I believe I crossed the Rio Puerco three times today, and passed through a town of the same name.