The Beauty of Central New Mexico

It isn't hard to find beauty here in the magnificent mountains of western central New Mexico. I think I'm getting spoiled! Here are just a few recent photos of the place I call home. If you click on one, you can see it in its original (larger) size. Note: none of these pictures were enhanced in any way!

cows near the road that leads out of our property

the forest behind my house

sunrise over Davenport Canyon



the road to town

Rock formations in some nearby mountains

another forest scene

fiery sunset from my window

the Datil Mountians

My son

I am so proud of my boy! He's learning so much here at this wilderness boarding school where we live... horseback riding, hiking, camping, rifle shooting (yeah, it's kid-paradise here)... he is also learning a lot about building things and taking care of property, working as an assistant to our Estates Manager. He's a natural leader, too. He's in charge of all of the animal chores, making sure the other kids do their work.

AND, he is now FLYING along on his studies... 3 grades ahead in Math... he will probably graduate high school a few years early!

(((((sigh))))
Proud Mama

Aunt Helen

I wasn't expecting the morning call
That my Aunt had passed through
To a world
That I couldn't see

I wasn't expecting
The flood of tears
For someone who held the same name
As me

For we hadn't spoken in so many years
Birthdays came and went

But the phone rang three times
And no one was there
As she began her skyward ascent

And my fingers were ice
When she held my hand
Asking directions of me

Her breath ever still and
Her voice always soft...
I told her that she could just Be

In the mountains so tall
In the valley so warm
In the clouds ever changing above

Beside me
Within me
Around me...
Wherever
She wanted to love

With death comes reminders
Of futures to know
Of changes demanding we learn

Beginning new dreams of
Tomorrows unseen, of
The wisdom we desperately yearn

Unprepared as I was
For this visit from Death
Life a thief, how he stole my breath

I could still feel her smile
As it landed beside me with
Her laughter to guide me
Along

Were her dimples still mine
Where the angels had kissed me?
She whispered a yes with a simple good-bye as
She melted into the sky.



...

Datil, New Mexico

While my new "home" is off the beaten path, it is very rich in history and adventure!

Along U.S. 60 in the northern part of Catron County, the largest county in New Mexico, three towns interrupt the remote mountain landscape. Datil, Pie Town and Quemado are a day's horseback ride from each other. Pickups have replaced the horses, but ranching remains the main occupation in the area although real estate development is gaining a toehold.

With more elk than people, the emphasis is on outdoor recreation in northern Catron County. Hunting for elk, deer, bear and wild turkey is extremly popular during fall and winter. The temperature averages range from 32 degrees to 70 degrees over 350 sunny days a year. Monsoon showers hit hard in July but do not last long.

Thirty-six miles west of Magdalena, at the western edge of the San Agustin Plains, the Datil Mountains rise and pinon and juniper trees emerge from the bush and grass. At the intersection of U.S. 60 and S.R. 12 at an elevation of 7500 feet sits the town of Datil.

To the Spanish settlers the seedpods of the prevelant yucca resembled dates, and "datil" is the Spanish word for date. Levi and Fred Baldwin established the first Datil store and post office in 1884 to serve the cattle ranching families. One of the early settlers, Agnes Morley Cleaveland, described ranching in Datil in the 1880s in her well-known book, No Life for a Lady. A monument to her parents can be seen on U.S. 60 five miles west of Datil.

The hub of Datil is the Eagle Guest Ranch which dates from the 1920s when Agnes Morley Cleaveland's sister, Loraine, and her husband, Tom Reynolds, opened the small store. With a cafe, motel, general store, gas station, and RV park, the Eagle Guest Ranch today serves as a general meeting place for the 150 townsfolk and the surrounding community of ranchers.

The Datil Well Campground, south of town, commemorates the site of a cattle watering well on the historic stock driveway from Springerville to the railhead in Magdalena.

Originally called Norman's Place, Pie Town is located 22 miles west of Datil on the Continental Divide. The altitudes of 7,900 feet has proven healthy for the town's 55 inhabitants.

Pie Town earned its name in the 1920s when Clyde Norman, owner of the town's gas station and cafe, began selling pies to automobile travelers on U.S. 60. In 1934 the area around Pie Town was opened up to homesteaders. Using dry land farming, the homesteaders grew pinto beans until 1956 when the lack of snow and rain made this unprofitable.

The Pie Town Pie Festival, held on the second Saturday of September, brings over a thousand visitors to the all-day affair featuring a balloon ascension, pie-eating contest, horny toad race, Old Time Fiddle Contest, western pit barbeque, and pie baking contest. Pie Town boasts two cafes, both serving pie. For the overnight visitor, camping is free in Jackson Park.

Twenty-one miles further west on U.S. 60 at the lower altitude of 6970 feet lies Quemado, named for the Spanish word for "burned." When Jose Antonio Padilla settled by a creek east of the present town in 1880, he found that the surounding brush had been burned by the Indians, so he named it Rito Quemado.

With three cafes, three motels, two garages, general and hardware stores and the only high school in the northern part of the county, Quemado is a service center for the surrounding ranching community and the 250 inhabitants of the town. The cut stone small Catholic Church at the east end of town with its tiny graveyard is well worth a photograph, as is the tree made of deer antlers.

Quemado Lake, 14 miles south on SR 32 in the Apache National Forest, offers excellent trout fishing, camping and hiking.

Great Pie on the Great Divide

The Continental Divide (also known as The Great Divide) in the Americas is the line that divides the flow of water between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Ocean. Rain or snow that drains on the east side of the Continental Divide flows toward the Atlantic Ocean, while precipitation on the west side drains and flows toward the Pacific Ocean. The divide runs from northwestern Canada along the crest of the Rocky Mountains to New Mexico. Then, it follows the crest of Mexico's Sierra Madre Occidental.

On my first trip to Pie Town, along the 2-lane ribbon of asphalt known as Highway 60, we drove by a sign that said "Continental Divide 6,355 Ft." It seemed rather uneventful. At first, I had wanted to get out and take a picture. But it was just an ordinary, green road sign without much of a view behind it. Then we got to the top of the Divide and I saw in the distance a small cluster of buildings, rundown and abandoned. A short distance ahead of that was a quaint downtown, nestled in the high hills, between juniper trees. And then I saw it: The Daily Pie Cafe-- our destination. "Great Pie on the Great Divide... it's all Downhill From Here" is their slogan.

Being from New York and having lived in LA, I'm no stranger to good food. Being a baker myself, I was a bit skeptical when I was told this was the best pie I would ever eat. I said, "I'll bet it won't be better than the Key Lime pie at Blond Giraffe’s in Key West!" I had one slice of blackberry.... now I'm willing to eat my words. And more pie, please!!

At this down home restaurant you can chat with locals, drink a bottomless cup of coffee for $5 (and then keep the souvenir mug), and order from the ever-changing menu board, otherwise known as "The World's Only True Pie Chart." Their cozy gift shop features T-shirts with aliens saying, "We came for the pie." Their mouth-watering array of heavenly slices are worth the drive from any star system. I'm still gathering the courage and the taste buds for their New Mexican apple pie, made with green chilies and pinon nuts!

Some Haiku from my book in progress

The Mountains Whisper

Having Tea With God

Sweet air rising to the rhythm of my rhapsody
Takes me by surprise as the early morning melody
Captures me aloft

Songbirds serenade the trees and they oblige with grace
Dancing in the breeze to some imaginary place
Like clouds so soft…

The earth beckons, how rich her taste today
So much life within -- a colorful array
Can you feel His creation?

A neighbor waves a kind hello, steps out to get his paper
“Having tea alone today?” he asks haphazardly.

A smile my only reply, then a pause as
Our eyes meet and he recognizes the
Long forgotten elation of
Having tea with God.

photo "Cascade" by Luke

"With this ring, I thee wed?"

Be forewarned. This is a rant post. Okay, here’s the thing. I’m into observing the obvious. And it’s obvious that about half of the married men that I know don’t wear their wedding rings. And ALL of the married women that I know do wear their wedding rings. Hmm.

So I did a little survey and whenever I would see a male friend or associate who I knew was married and ringless, I’d ask why. Here are some of the responses:

It’s annoying.
It’s too tight.
I work outside and when I sweat it slips off.
Why should I?
I lost it.
I grew out of it.
It’s not important.
I’m allergic to metal.
I hate jewelry.
It gets in the way. (Really?)
I forget to put it on.

Alright, you get the idea. But the thing is, GUYS, I’m a single woman. And when I happen to see a man who catches my eye, the first thing I look for is a ring. What if there isn’t one? I figure I have a 50/50 chance. So what if? What if it’s a full moon (my excuse for all inappropriate social behavior) and I throw caution to the wind and approach him? And he’s married? Oops. Too late. “It’s already out there,” as Harry would say a la When Harry Met Sally.

It’s a symbol. It's a custom. Try to live with it. Either that or you can always wear a sign; “Sorry, I know I’m not wearing a ring and I look really hot tonight but I am married, so please look away.”

Italian Soul Food

This post was inspired by my cousin, Bill, who told me in an email today that he went out for his birthday dinner to an Italian bistro on Long Island... for calamari. Oh, I can taste it and smell it now...

There is something about the food we grew up with that is definitely soul-satisfying. I remember when I was young, coming home from church on Sundays, usually around noon. The spaghetti sauce (home-made of course) had been simmering since about 8:00. The whole house was imbued with the smells of garlic, fresh tomato and the fresh baked bread that we just brought home from the Italian bakery.

This was long before we were all spoiled whiny babies, eating out at restaurants all the time. There were no Macaroni Grills or Olive Gardens. There was just Mom's Sunday Dinner. A fresh salad, garlic bread, home made sauce with pasta and meatballs... Simple. Rustic. Satisfying. You can't buy food like that. Well, maybe you could. But you can't buy the feeling of coming home to a meal that you knew was prepared just for you. Sitting around the table after the meal, enjoying quiet conversation... it's family. It's home. It's love. It's Italian soul food.

$746 Million for Afterschool Snacks

I am a Republican. And I voted for Barack Obama. There. I said it. But what I thought might happen is happening. I wouldn't want his job. In fact, you couldn't pay me all the money in his stimulus plan to take it. I voted for this man because, in his words and his promises, I saw some speck of hope. But what is now happening is what I thought might. Our current government has mutated into such a huge monster, devouring our civil liberties within an economy spiraling out of control, that even the most well-intentioned of politicians couldn't rescue it. No, it would take the Super Human effort of a David without fear of Goliath to pull us out of this mess. There is only one such person that I am aware of who has the experience, the knowledge and the COURAGE to be able to accomplish such a feat. But this person was never given the media exposure necessary in the primary elections to make his presence and his plans known... instead the Bilderbergs and their crew maintain the reins. Well, at least we won't be at war "for the next hundred years" (or longer).

Stimulus for Who?

This week the House is expected to pass an $825 billion economic stimulus package. In reality, this bill is just an escalation of a government-created economic mess. As before, a sense of urgency and impending doom is being used to extract mountains of money from Congress with minimal debate. So much for change. This is déjà vu. We are again being promised that its passage will help employment, help homeowners, help the environment, etc. These promises are worthless. This time around especially, Congress should know better than to pass anything of this magnitude without first reading the fine print. There are many red flags that I have found in this bill.

At least $4 billion is allocated to expanding the police state and the war on drugs through Byrne grants, which even the Bush administration opposed, and the COPS program, both of which are corrupt and largely ineffective programs.

To help Big Brother keep a better eye on us and our children, $20 billion would go towards health information technology, which would create a national system of electronic medical records without adequate privacy protection. These records would instead be subject to the misnamed federal “medical privacy” rule, which allows government and state-favored special interests to see medical records at will. An additional $250 million is allocated for states to nationalize individual student data, expanding Federal control of education and eroding privacy.

$79 billion bails out states that haphazardly expanded their budgets during the bubble years, but refuse to retrench and cut back, as their taxpayers have had to, during recession years.

$200 million expands Americorps. $100 million goes to “faith-and-community” based organizations for social services, which will further insinuate the government into charity and community service. Private charities are much more efficient and effective because they are directly accountable to donors, while public programs tend to get rewarded for failure. With its money, the Federal Government brings its incompetence and its whims, while creating foolish dependence. This is sad to see.

Of course the bill is rife with central planning projects. $4 billion for job training, much of which will be used to direct workers into “green jobs”. $200 million to “encourage” electric cars, $2 billion to support US manufacturers of advanced batteries and battery systems, which is yet another function of government I can’t find in the Constitution. Not to mention $500 million for energy efficient manufacturing demonstration projects, $70 million for a Technology Innovation Program for “research in potentially revolutionary technologies” in which government, not supply and demand, will pick winners and losers. $746 million for afterschool snacks, $6.75 billion for the Department of Commerce, including $1 billion for a census.

This bill delivers an additional debt burden of $6,700 to every American man, woman and child.

There is a lot of stimulus and growth in this bill – that is, of government. Nothing in this bill stimulates the freedom and prosperity of the American people. Politician-directed spending is never as successful as market-driven investment. Instead of passing this bill, Congress should get out of the way by cutting taxes, cutting spending, and reining in the reckless monetary policy of the Federal Reserve.

By Congressman Ron Paul

Epiphany


I’m not sure if it was the way the sun was shining
through the deep liquid-blue paint of the Chrysler
Or the warm breeze that swayed my soul

Or the smell of the sweet air taking me to some memory of you
But for an instant
How much I knew

I saw through some kaleidoscope in my mind
How the universe blended

And for an instant
How lightly I flew

I could sense the curve of the earth
The infinity of the sky
And the wonder of you and I

Together within
Together again
At some distant space ahead in time
And the simplicity of it all
Was truly mine

But as quickly as visions come and go
Before I could even say hello
The magic quietly disappeared
Into clouds of pink and white cotton

Into some childhood of mine
Some elusive epiphany-- long forgotten.