my new routine includes a lot of driving, and i try to get my work done on my books, in the late hours or when i can squeeze some time in. my wife can't drive yet - she has a two-week prohibition - but she told me today she was considering cheating on it. this is partly because she sees how hard it is for me to do all the driving - but partly because she doesn't like my driving, since she doesn't like being a kibbitzing passenger - and she'd really rather just be doing some of it herself. today, for example, i had to take her to ruidoso, which is a long way, and definitely a trip she could have done by herself, if her legs and feet were up to it. i'm against her driving. i say really what she needs to do is get completely healed.
the things she doesn't like are minor - i drift into the center of the road, or even the left, if the holes are too big - and i go too fast in places she would go more slowly. i have become more like her over the years - kept to my side of the road, not driven over double yellow lines when i'm turning left, that kind of thing - yet i still drive with a kind of lazy midwestern disregard for the fine points of the law, and she, being a californian, has an encyclopedic memory of those fine points. what does it matter if no one's around? the law is the law.
the drive to ruidoso takes us through the mescalero reservation, probably the most beautiful road i've ever seen. it's beautiful in a kind of back-country, mountain way - wild horses graze on the side of the road, there are very few houses, and most traffic ignores the 45-mile speed limit. trying to please her, i keep it down to 45 as much as i can, and actually enjoy it, even though, since it is winter, the fields are brown, and leaf trees are all barren. the horses are beautiful and there's no telling what they're actually eating, since the grasses have been frozen for about a week. maybe they can eat and digest grasses that are frosted on both sides, but in any case, they don't look like they're starving. there are no elk or deer today, but a family of fifteen wild turkeys crosses the road.
my fascination with the reservation is partly that as we drive through it on the national highway, we come to a point where the road takes a sharp maybe 80 degree turn - it's a little sharper than a straight ninety - and at that point, which i call the elbow, according to my google-map, we're only a couple of mountain ranges away from our house. right out our window is a large rounded mountain, but straight north, a couple of ranges; the reservation itself is only five or ten miles, not more than a fifteen-minute walk. that google map image shows it to be indian joe canyon, a part of the reservation where the one road there is leads right into that elbow. i have no idea how many people live out this way, and, out of respect, we white folks pretty much stay out of the reservation. i drive on that national highway, and cast a glance as i go through that elbow, but i don't take the gravel roads or go past the fence which i imagine is about five miles north of our house. in fact i have not been to that fence, but if i were to go, i would leave it alone, and not cross it.
our basketball team played mescalero the other night. they were a lot like the other kids we've played - they all had phones, and some had dyed hair or other things that middle-school kids have. they were nice and respectful. i thought, at one point, that i heard them speaking apache. that's what i'd be really interested in: do they speak it a lot? what's it like? what kinds of features does it have? but, i don't go around eavesdropping. i won't even know this stuff until i get to know them better.
but i will say this: that is one beautiful road. they take better care of their forests than we do ours, from what i can tell, and i know that rankles the locals as well as makes us feel like we're not quite taking care of our own yard; it's a fire hazard. people get mad at them for not eradicating the wild thistle a little more aggressively, but they have their own priorities, and they have autonomy over how their land is managed.
we have a new garmin - a little device, like the fireman's radio, that will ensure that we don't get stranded way out in the wild as we go exploring. it reaches a satellite, it talks to it, and it allows us to communicate if we're stranded or in trouble, way out in the middle of nowhere. my wife frequently takes this rugged gravel road to get over to the horses - once we left a car out there for a few days while we rounded up the proper jack and spare to get it out - and she decided that she would feel better if she were never stranded, or in fact never even stuck, or out of communication - again. on that occasion the local sheriff happened by and gave her and the girls a ride home, which was really not that far away, and this occasion led me to believe that we are not really as isolated as we always imagine ourselves. i sometimes wonder about breaking down on these wild mountain roads, because i'm frequently out of cell range, but, on the road i drive on most, there is traffic. at night, or in the early morning, you might have to wait, twenty minutes, half hour, or hour, but somebody will come by.
on the road to her horses, though, maybe not. out there, where the sheriff was, the sheriff is one of several people who might have happened by, but also just might not. it's a rugged road, and way back there in a kind of nowhere-type, ranching valley. mountains are everywhere, and quite a few elk and deer too. people love hunting out here. the animals are plentiful, and one valley just turns into another.
people ask me if i'm tired of the driving yet. the fact is, i drove on so many pothole-filled, grimy, slushy, icy city streets, that it will take a few years before i'm tired of these. yes, they get icy and treacherous. steep grades fall on each side, and when they are ice-covered, you are coming down a windy mountain road with not much room for error. but when it snows, the snow stays white, and when it freezes, it doesn't happen without warning. and the new mexico sun, relentless as it is, works on the ice, and a long day turns into a changing surface situation where what snow and ice is on the road, quickly gets broken up and dissipates under the weight of all these trucks with four-wheel drive. i don't have four-wheel drive, most of the time, and don't even have snow tires. but i can still take advantage of the kinds of conditions that they have left me.
and, at the top of the ridge, the view is stunning. the trees on the nearby valleys sit in the sun, with snow around them, untouched except by occasional animal tracks. the sun is a little slower to melt that snow, especially on the shady sides of the mountains, and they are majestic in the changing colors of the day. at night, you have to watch for the animals, though. they can come out on the road, or just be there, at any time. and they often forget there even is a road.
the things she doesn't like are minor - i drift into the center of the road, or even the left, if the holes are too big - and i go too fast in places she would go more slowly. i have become more like her over the years - kept to my side of the road, not driven over double yellow lines when i'm turning left, that kind of thing - yet i still drive with a kind of lazy midwestern disregard for the fine points of the law, and she, being a californian, has an encyclopedic memory of those fine points. what does it matter if no one's around? the law is the law.
the drive to ruidoso takes us through the mescalero reservation, probably the most beautiful road i've ever seen. it's beautiful in a kind of back-country, mountain way - wild horses graze on the side of the road, there are very few houses, and most traffic ignores the 45-mile speed limit. trying to please her, i keep it down to 45 as much as i can, and actually enjoy it, even though, since it is winter, the fields are brown, and leaf trees are all barren. the horses are beautiful and there's no telling what they're actually eating, since the grasses have been frozen for about a week. maybe they can eat and digest grasses that are frosted on both sides, but in any case, they don't look like they're starving. there are no elk or deer today, but a family of fifteen wild turkeys crosses the road.
my fascination with the reservation is partly that as we drive through it on the national highway, we come to a point where the road takes a sharp maybe 80 degree turn - it's a little sharper than a straight ninety - and at that point, which i call the elbow, according to my google-map, we're only a couple of mountain ranges away from our house. right out our window is a large rounded mountain, but straight north, a couple of ranges; the reservation itself is only five or ten miles, not more than a fifteen-minute walk. that google map image shows it to be indian joe canyon, a part of the reservation where the one road there is leads right into that elbow. i have no idea how many people live out this way, and, out of respect, we white folks pretty much stay out of the reservation. i drive on that national highway, and cast a glance as i go through that elbow, but i don't take the gravel roads or go past the fence which i imagine is about five miles north of our house. in fact i have not been to that fence, but if i were to go, i would leave it alone, and not cross it.
our basketball team played mescalero the other night. they were a lot like the other kids we've played - they all had phones, and some had dyed hair or other things that middle-school kids have. they were nice and respectful. i thought, at one point, that i heard them speaking apache. that's what i'd be really interested in: do they speak it a lot? what's it like? what kinds of features does it have? but, i don't go around eavesdropping. i won't even know this stuff until i get to know them better.
but i will say this: that is one beautiful road. they take better care of their forests than we do ours, from what i can tell, and i know that rankles the locals as well as makes us feel like we're not quite taking care of our own yard; it's a fire hazard. people get mad at them for not eradicating the wild thistle a little more aggressively, but they have their own priorities, and they have autonomy over how their land is managed.
we have a new garmin - a little device, like the fireman's radio, that will ensure that we don't get stranded way out in the wild as we go exploring. it reaches a satellite, it talks to it, and it allows us to communicate if we're stranded or in trouble, way out in the middle of nowhere. my wife frequently takes this rugged gravel road to get over to the horses - once we left a car out there for a few days while we rounded up the proper jack and spare to get it out - and she decided that she would feel better if she were never stranded, or in fact never even stuck, or out of communication - again. on that occasion the local sheriff happened by and gave her and the girls a ride home, which was really not that far away, and this occasion led me to believe that we are not really as isolated as we always imagine ourselves. i sometimes wonder about breaking down on these wild mountain roads, because i'm frequently out of cell range, but, on the road i drive on most, there is traffic. at night, or in the early morning, you might have to wait, twenty minutes, half hour, or hour, but somebody will come by.
on the road to her horses, though, maybe not. out there, where the sheriff was, the sheriff is one of several people who might have happened by, but also just might not. it's a rugged road, and way back there in a kind of nowhere-type, ranching valley. mountains are everywhere, and quite a few elk and deer too. people love hunting out here. the animals are plentiful, and one valley just turns into another.
people ask me if i'm tired of the driving yet. the fact is, i drove on so many pothole-filled, grimy, slushy, icy city streets, that it will take a few years before i'm tired of these. yes, they get icy and treacherous. steep grades fall on each side, and when they are ice-covered, you are coming down a windy mountain road with not much room for error. but when it snows, the snow stays white, and when it freezes, it doesn't happen without warning. and the new mexico sun, relentless as it is, works on the ice, and a long day turns into a changing surface situation where what snow and ice is on the road, quickly gets broken up and dissipates under the weight of all these trucks with four-wheel drive. i don't have four-wheel drive, most of the time, and don't even have snow tires. but i can still take advantage of the kinds of conditions that they have left me.
and, at the top of the ridge, the view is stunning. the trees on the nearby valleys sit in the sun, with snow around them, untouched except by occasional animal tracks. the sun is a little slower to melt that snow, especially on the shady sides of the mountains, and they are majestic in the changing colors of the day. at night, you have to watch for the animals, though. they can come out on the road, or just be there, at any time. and they often forget there even is a road.
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