This time last year I was readying for a move, south out of the northern Colorado Rockies where I live in the woods to warmer climes and enchanting new places. Our state neighbor to the south was little known to me. They call it New Mexico. Might as well have been a foreign country, as many people think it is. Yes, there are many fine folks here in the United States of America who evidentially think New Mexico is part of (Old) Mexico, which is a completely different country. There’s even a Facebook page called New Mexico Is Not Part of Mexico, You Dumb Ass! But they probably think New England is part of (Old) England too, whoever they are. Don’t get me started …about them – whoever they are.

  I’d been to Taos and Santa Fe a few times, because they’re two fine towns that are close to Colorado, just south of the San Luis Valley on the Big River, the Rio Grande – Ree-O Grand-A. My plan was to see it all, from stem to stern, all the way down to Mexico, living in my little camper, Cochise. I gave it a shot. Best laid plans…mice and men…often go…awry. But, that’s another story.

  I did make it into New Mexico, pulling too big of a trailer behind too small of a horse, too late in the season. My bad. My good was that I had Storrie Lake State Park in Las Vegas, New Mexico, all to myself. I felt as though I was an explorer. Hell, I was. I felt as though I was in a different country. But, I wasn’t. I guess I’m a bit of a dumb ass, too.  Must be our educational system. Whatever.

  I bought a non-resident annual state park pass for $225 and planned to keep moving south. Elephant Butte Lake has a state park on New Mexico’s biggest reservoir just outside of Truth or Consequences, which is the name of the town based on an old radio/tv show and known locally as T or C.  Lots of artists, meditation instructors and massage therapists, fancy hot spring spas…and some poverty. On the Big River, rolling down to separate Old Mexico from the New World. Going slow. Because of drought. And heat. But it’ll make it. Manana. Mahn-yah-nah.

  Then, the plan was to bust it down to Deming just north of the border and kick it in the state parks around there:  City of Rocks, Rock Hound, and Poncho Villa. Hell yeah! Check me out, mi amigos. Orale! Well…mice…men…plans…awry. Whatever. Whut-ev-uh! (Fingers on forehead in the shape of a W, vacant look in the eyes.)

  Nasty weather hit. My horse got scairt. And I got stuck. A buck-twenty-five miles into New Mexico and hunkering down. Roll on Big River. I’m staying here. In a town of 12,000 I’d barely heard of, and that had obviously seen some better times. Much better times.

  But when I looked out my window over the snow-covered grass surrounding the lake and into the tailing descent of the Sangre de Christo Mountains I felt more alive than I had in an awfully long time. Long. Not awful. You know what I mean.

  I also had electricity, although the water had been shut off for the winter. No showers at the camp comfort station, but there was a weather-proof spigot to fill my 5-gallon jugs. Good enough, for this explorer. My dog Rambeaux was happy too. I prepared myself for the Golden Years. To hell with mice and men.

  I drove the several miles into town, past the welcome billboard that proclaimed Las Vegas as the place where “The Mountains Meet the Plains”. And it was. It absolutely was. Looking right I saw the tail end of the Rockies come to ground. Bam! Looking left I saw the endless nothing of the Llano Estacado, the “staked plains” that extended into Texas and was part of what was once called Comancheria, traditional running land of the Comanche – the Lords of the Plains, and possibly the best horse-riding warriors the Texas Rangers and US Cavalry ever had to face. Plenty of Apache there too. Best at living off the unforgiving land and evading their enemies. And the Navajo. More interested in raising sheep than fighting, but damn good fighters when they had to fight. And they did. Made some mighty fine rugs too. Look for the spirit line. It’s there.

  And there I was. Las Vegas, New Mexico. First thing I noticed was the license plates. They have beautiful license plates in New Mexico. Yellow with red lettering. Black with yellow lettering. Aqua. More yellow. The sun symbol of the Zia (Puebloan) people, which is the state symbol. Green chilies, which is the state claim to fame. Roadrunners. That bird that dogs Wile E. Coyote in those old cartoons. Great license plates. Worthy of tattoos. I want one.

  Then, I noticed the food. Going to the grocery store was a trip into a different world. The chilies and peppers and spices and cans and jars with Spanish names made you think you were in Mexico. But you aren’t, (I almost said dumb ass). It’s cheap there too, especially compared to Colorado, which sometimes seems to think cheap is only for poor people. That’s stupid. Isn’t it? I don’t know… Whatever.

  But I can’t cook well in my itty-bitty camper, which is a little too big for the horse I had – a six-cylinder Nissan Pathfinder with coil springs for suspension and not enough mass to handle a tandem axel vintage trailer with an all steel frame. Live and learn, I guess.  So, I went exploring. First on Google. Then on foot. My feet found home at a place called Dicks Pub and Restaurant, so named – according to the locals – because it’s mostly dudes that go there. So, they hired beautiful bartendresses – and two good looking young guys in case any women did venture in, which they seldom did.

  I had chicken enchiladas, which is my go-to dish. Maybe I was especially hungry, from too many convenience store road meals on the trip down from Colorado. Maybe I just had low expectations, because the place wasn’t what you’d call fancy. The enchiladas were beaucoup bomb tasty and the sauce was too, but what really blew me away were the simple side dishes: non-mashed pinto beans and something called posole – which is just whole kernel white corn soaked and seasoned and slow cooked with magic and secrets. I said, Damn! I asked the bartender what was in it and he kind of looked at me like I must have just fallen out of the sky, and when I pronounced it wrong a few times he chuckled and warmed up, realizing I wasn’t from the area. Every time I try to speak Spanish I make people who actually do speak it laugh. I should move to Mexico and do comedy at clubs. All I’d have to do is read a menu, or newspaper. Anything. Good to have a Plan B.

  I think of that meal now, and my own feeble attempt to recreate it in Cochise. I think of the cheap tacos – $1.50 each – they have on Taco Tuesday and the mango-jalapeno salsa. Cheap domestic bottles of beer. Those beautiful bartendresses. I had the nerve to try to flirt with the only one near my age who happened to manage the bar, but Mama D shot me down with a look that left powder burns. The youngers were kinder, and indulged me like a Catholic bishop. But, I’m Lutheran and we’re not into indulgences. Whatever.

  I think of them now. Not just those beautiful young bartendresses: Angela the Angel, Estrella the Star, Breanna the girlfriend of Lupe and all the others. I think of the dude bartenders back there too, the two youngbloods who treated me well and made me feel welcome, Phil and Chris. Thank you, brothers, for being the primary reason women would come through the door. Even the crazy ones. Hell, especially the crazy ones.

  And here’s to the Las Vegas homeboys who eventually let me in. Here’s to you Bear and Goat, (Sirs!) Moose (even if you’re a Cowboys fan) and Horse. Que pasa, Caballo? All the spirited animals working on the Castaneda Hotel renovation for Mr. J. Grimm, a homeboy of mine born in the same small-town hospital in Shawano, Wisconsin. And to you Nich, who doesn’t have an animal name but has his own spark – Nichasso! And Toby and Martin (Mar-teen) and Pete, Marty and Lee. Todos los hombres.

  I think of the rustic, natural hot baths at Montezuma, and meeting Rico who came out of the rabbit hole after ten years of searching to find himself in a world he was no longer a part of. His writing discipline and humor is an inspiration to me. My apartment welcomes you anytime, my friend.

  And now I think of the young woman who stole my heart without trying. The single mother of three who works her ass off to care for them, as their fathers fail to do. The Navajo Princess with Spanish ancestry who swears like a sailor and could kick my ass. I call her Ms. Lucero, the Angel of Fire – Angelina Fuego! She tells me, “Don’t f*ckin call me Anhalena!” She speaks fluent Spanish. And doesn’t trust the Apache. Some day I’ll steal her away from Vegas, if she lets me. If Vegas lets me. Or I’ll go back there, and bounce her baby Bella on my knee. Look into those eyes and see a kindred fire to her mom’s.

  It is the Land of Enchantment, New Mexico. Aptly named. I was fortunate to spend time there. But there were times when it scared me cold to my bones, knowing I had no connection, no protection, just a pinche gringo from Colorado.

  Now I think of that place and long to return. I only touched the tip of the iceberg, but icebergs are melting I hear. New Mexico is often maligned, misunderstood by folks who haven’t gone there, folks who think it’s a different country or lesser state. Folks who are wrong. It has a history like no other place on this diminishing planet. They have a new governor who’s a sharp, driven woman not afraid to change the good ol’ boy oil and gas economy to one more sustainable and reaching, infinite wind and sun, not finite fossils – and they have a lot of wind and sun in New Mexico. They’ll probably even have legal weed pretty soon, so they can fix the roads and pay their teachers more. But the land, and the food, and the people. That won’t change. It better not.

  I long to return to that haunting, enchanting land, stake my old bones out on the blistering, windswept plains, and throw myself into the angel’s fire.