From Chicago through Tucumcari
In the summer of 1993 I found myself in a motel room In Fayetteville, AK. I wanted to check the place out - thought it might be a place to live. It wasn't.
I had a list of towns I wanted to look at - but the process was a little vague and I wasn't sure where to go next except I needed to head West as I was eventually meeting up with a friend who would be vacationing in New Mexico.
I'd been reading through a list of writers' colonies and I noticed one in Vallecitos, New Mexico so I gave them a call. A woman answered the phone and said, Sure, come on out. When were you thinking of coming?
In two days, I told her, thinking I'd drive straight through . She paused for a second, but then she said, fine. They'd have room. You're a writer? she asked, sounding not at all convinced. I am, I told her because at that moment I wasn't anything else.
I headed west. I was driving a 1989 Nissan pick-up with a camper shell on the back and I was listening to Eleventh Dream Day's El Moodio. I was listening to it very loud and I was drinking a lot of coffee and when I saw the sign for Tucumcari I tried not to think of Little Feet.
The woman on the phone told me I should stop for groceries in Espanola as that was the last town with a store. I spent a night in Santa Fe and in the morning I headed north up 285 past Tesuque and Pojoaque and into the Espanola valley where it felt like I'd come some distance from Chicago.
I continued north, driving through small villages and for miles where there weren't any villages at all. In Vallecitos there was a post office and past it I turned down a dirt road where there were four or five houses and dogs in the road and children in the road and in the yards there were horses and goats and chickens. The dogs chased behind my truck and the children stared and the older folks looked up and I turned down El Moodio.
At the end of the road was a driveway that ran along an irrigation ditch that I later learned to call an acequia. The house was two story and there was a porch on the ground floor and one on the second. A woman was outside working on a truck and when she saw me drive up she waved and walked over.
The woman was friendly but seemed a little nervous. There's something I should have mentioned on the phone, she said. Oh, I said. What's that?
Usually we don't have men here.
How come?
Well, most of the women who come here don't like men. But you seem nice. I'm sure it will be fine.
She showed me to my room which was set off from the rest of the house. The room was large with a big bed and a desk and a chair and in the corner a fireplace with wood stacked alongside. Windows looked out across a meadow and soft shaped hills rose behind it. I ate a sandwich and drank a beer and then another and then I sat down at the desk and listened to all the quiet and tried to write.
But I had things on my mind. Chickens and dogs and dirt roads and a house full of women who didn't like men. I took another beer and went outside to have a cigarette. There were things chirping and there were stars in the sky and the stars looked closer than I had ever seen them. The air smelled sweet. I wasn't alone. A woman was standing off to the side of the porch and she said, hello. You must be the guy, she said.
She told me that she had been coming there for years. She didn't write or paint or do anything like that, but she once had a partner who did and it was the partner who had brought her the first time. I wish I could stay forever, she said.
I heard a noise coming from across the way - near where the hills began to rise. What's that? I asked.
Wild horses, she said.
I like it here, I told her.
You know, she said. This might sound a little new-agey, but New Mexico is a special place. If it likes you, it lets you stay.
I told her that I wanted to check out Bozeman, but who knows, maybe I'd come back.
Come back, she said. I think you should.
It took me another month of driving around and getting very cold in Montana and Colorado and then I headed back south. For a year I lived in Albuquerque and then I moved to Santa Fe. The place opened itself up and I walked in.
I had a list of towns I wanted to look at - but the process was a little vague and I wasn't sure where to go next except I needed to head West as I was eventually meeting up with a friend who would be vacationing in New Mexico.
I'd been reading through a list of writers' colonies and I noticed one in Vallecitos, New Mexico so I gave them a call. A woman answered the phone and said, Sure, come on out. When were you thinking of coming?
In two days, I told her, thinking I'd drive straight through . She paused for a second, but then she said, fine. They'd have room. You're a writer? she asked, sounding not at all convinced. I am, I told her because at that moment I wasn't anything else.
I headed west. I was driving a 1989 Nissan pick-up with a camper shell on the back and I was listening to Eleventh Dream Day's El Moodio. I was listening to it very loud and I was drinking a lot of coffee and when I saw the sign for Tucumcari I tried not to think of Little Feet.
The woman on the phone told me I should stop for groceries in Espanola as that was the last town with a store. I spent a night in Santa Fe and in the morning I headed north up 285 past Tesuque and Pojoaque and into the Espanola valley where it felt like I'd come some distance from Chicago.
I continued north, driving through small villages and for miles where there weren't any villages at all. In Vallecitos there was a post office and past it I turned down a dirt road where there were four or five houses and dogs in the road and children in the road and in the yards there were horses and goats and chickens. The dogs chased behind my truck and the children stared and the older folks looked up and I turned down El Moodio.
At the end of the road was a driveway that ran along an irrigation ditch that I later learned to call an acequia. The house was two story and there was a porch on the ground floor and one on the second. A woman was outside working on a truck and when she saw me drive up she waved and walked over.
The woman was friendly but seemed a little nervous. There's something I should have mentioned on the phone, she said. Oh, I said. What's that?
Usually we don't have men here.
How come?
Well, most of the women who come here don't like men. But you seem nice. I'm sure it will be fine.
She showed me to my room which was set off from the rest of the house. The room was large with a big bed and a desk and a chair and in the corner a fireplace with wood stacked alongside. Windows looked out across a meadow and soft shaped hills rose behind it. I ate a sandwich and drank a beer and then another and then I sat down at the desk and listened to all the quiet and tried to write.
But I had things on my mind. Chickens and dogs and dirt roads and a house full of women who didn't like men. I took another beer and went outside to have a cigarette. There were things chirping and there were stars in the sky and the stars looked closer than I had ever seen them. The air smelled sweet. I wasn't alone. A woman was standing off to the side of the porch and she said, hello. You must be the guy, she said.
She told me that she had been coming there for years. She didn't write or paint or do anything like that, but she once had a partner who did and it was the partner who had brought her the first time. I wish I could stay forever, she said.
I heard a noise coming from across the way - near where the hills began to rise. What's that? I asked.
Wild horses, she said.
I like it here, I told her.
You know, she said. This might sound a little new-agey, but New Mexico is a special place. If it likes you, it lets you stay.
I told her that I wanted to check out Bozeman, but who knows, maybe I'd come back.
Come back, she said. I think you should.
It took me another month of driving around and getting very cold in Montana and Colorado and then I headed back south. For a year I lived in Albuquerque and then I moved to Santa Fe. The place opened itself up and I walked in.
posted by Philip Dean Brown at 6:57 PM
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