A Talk with My Valley about Life As It Is

The last few months have made me take a hard look at where I am in life, especially physically. Yesterday morning, driving to Alamosa for groceries, I looked all around this valley, the ring of white-capped mountains, the immense (almost Montana immense!) sky, a kestrel hunting, some Ravens doing their raven thing, a solitary woman in a green reflective jacket picking up trash on a US highway. I got to the store. I was listening to The Doors “Break on Through”. A knock at my window. A young woman had brought out my groceries. I did my version of jumping out of my car. “Beautiful morning!” I said.

“Isn’t it!” she said, “I even like the breeze.”

“Well, in a lot of places, that wouldn’t be a breeze.” I laugh, “but I love it!”

“I guess people who don’t like it better not live in Colorado!” A 30 mph gust hit us.

“Here we go,” I said, laughing. 

“You saved $23!”

“That’s a bag of dog food!” 

“Yeah!”

I drove home, looking at DIFFERENT mountains with snow on them, looking for the one Bear was originally named after, Silver. It’s not the most visible from places I usually go.

Some guy was driving slow in front of me and I was glad. I was looking at the valley thinking of how much I love it. I thought, “You make everything possible for me so I don’t have to notice that I don’t walk well or breathe well. You hold me up, gently, on the flat surface of your ancient lake and show me things I’ve never seen before because I wasn’t here, and I was moving too fast. You gave me two dogs I’d never have known anywhere else. You have given me a little of the rural life I wasn’t raised for but have always loved.” I was thinking of the three calves I saw being born as I drove to the Refuge. I thought of the two ravens who more or less recognize me and Bear. I thought of the beauty I get to see, be in, even though I walk with a cane. 

There are “fixes” out there — I could have nasal surgery but with the cause of my respiratory problem, the obstructions would grow back within a few months. They are the result of a chronic inflammation. There’s no cure for that, only mitigating treatments. OK, I mitigate as instructed and all is mostly OK. My legs? OK I could get new knees, but I don’t hurt, the cane works, and I’ve had all the joint surgery I can stand (haha). So, OK.

Life is booby-trapped. We keep going and somewhere down the road we’re going to intersect something. My “issues” are pretty minor (knocking frantically on my table). I believe now that every moment of life probably has its loss and its reward. I think of my dad who didn’t get this part of life. I’m just fucking lucky, even if some options in life are closed to me. I availed myself of those options when I could. I don’t think we can do better than that.

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I’ve stepped back (carefully and slowly) from the workshop in Wyoming. I looked again at the road — it’s far. I imagined stopping halfway and did the math. Yikes! In our minds the lines on maps are inches and maybe feet, but in real life? I wouldn’t be walking at the end of that drive. Trains would be ideal, but those days are gone — though once upon a time I could have taken a train from HERE to Rawlins. I looked for flights. Yeah right. My destination would be even more remote than where I live. I thought of my breathing problems, how they’re exacerbated by stress and how poorly I sleep. I thought of how I’ve created a life for myself where I walk freely and breathe OK so none of the problems is central to my life, yet it’s all accommodated.

I’ve offered a remote workshop, and/or a video, and I would very happily give the museum all of the materials I’ve prepared, but to go up there? Not practical for me. I just wish it had been an opportunity 15 years ago. ❤️

I also thought about the trajectory of uh, ok, old age? I watched it with my grandma and aunts and mom and uncle and now friends and acquaintances. It’s hazardous. I think if there’s any time to evaluate priorities and carpe the diem, this is the time. Of course, we should probably have been doing that all along, but I’m not sure at a young age it’s possible. Not for me without having had all the experience that led me here to this place as this person. And more: the place in which we all live at any moment of our lives is NOW.

RDP Sunday: dementia

Back in the Day…

The featured photo is at the cathedral in Milan. It is the probable location where St. Augustine was baptized by Sant Ambrogio. I think that’s pretty cool. I was there in 2004. The Duomo was closed and covered with scaffolding to protect it. It was the happy times of the War on Terra. The only part that was open to the public was this — essentially the sub-basement now, but in real life it is the ancient church from the 300s. It is so strange to think that we all live atop a vast concretion (in this case literally) of human dwellings. When I see the term “new world” that’s what I think of, but really, not new, either.

This is my favorite photo of Venice, taken with a real camera, but a point-and-shoot, a Canon PowerShot (film!) which was probably my favorite camera. I took this photo in 2000.

It’s true you can’t take the same level of photo with a phone (yet) but the mere fact that you can take a photo with a phone is pretty amazing to me. It probably always will be. Here’s my favorite photo of Il Duomo, Milan, taken in 2000.

RDP SATURDAY: CAMERA

Bearadise, Even with No Snow

Bear and I had a beautiful walk yesterday an hour or two before the wind hit hard. It had only barely (Bearly?) HIT when we set out. The wonderful part of the walk was there were no people out there. It truly changes everything. I got to watch the Northern Harrier couple swoop low in front of me. “My” ravens hung around, the meadowlarks sang. It was sweet, cold March in the San Luis Valley. Bear and I haven’t cut a break like that in a month.

The clouds over the Sangres were doing the best they could to figure out what was going on and predict the future, but I don’t think they have any better idea than I do. A lenticular cloud had emerged fairly high up. Cirrus clouds appeared and dissipated. The standard little cumulus fluffy “What do you see in the clouds?” clouds were lingering over the cold mountain tops. Who knows what they foretold beyond confusion. Any sagacious paleoindian looking at that sky would be as lost as I was, but maybe he/she would have seen the beauty. I like to think so.

On our return I looked south of our walk and saw that a ploughed field was attempting an eastward migration.

In other news, without especially wanting to, feeling I’d been abducted by alien forces, I found myself putting fancy soil in little pots and then putting seeds in the soil and then — gasp! — talking to them, saying things like, “Wow, tomatoes! Your seeds are tiny! I hope you do OK,” and “Well, squash, I know you’d like to go directly into the ground first, but here that’s impractical. I hope you understand.” I had to explain to the sunflowers that planting them in the little pots was probably absurd, but I had bigger pots and we could talk about that later when I plant the beans. Have I ever mentioned that I don’t especially even LIKE to garden???? I like home grown veggies, though, and my Scarlet Emperor Beans are on a different plane altogether. Anyway, they like living with sunflowers and squash. The bees who live under my house like the sunflowers AND the sunflowers help the bees find the beans. AND migrating hummingbirds, on their way north, stop here and eat nectar from the red flowers on m beans. Basil and tomatoes make Caprese, and the basil keeps mosquitos at bay. Who am I to mess with such an intricate system when all I have to do is plant seeds and harvest veggies for me to eat?

Maybe I carry some plant-nurturing trait in my DNA. Speaking of DNA, I got this surprising news the other day… I hope you’re sitting down.

A friend shared this video and I wanted to share it with you.

Pretty Walk in the Bark of Beyond

Still fighting the crud — which I now believe is Covid. According to updated CDC dates and stuff, my Covid tests have REALLY expired but better them than me (haha). Still, I feel better. Just some chest congestion and mild fever.

Teddy and I wandered out to the Bark of Beyond to try our luck. It was a beautiful day. No wind, just a bit chilly, white mountains and friendly crane tourists. Not that lucky for them, though there were cranes. One car stopped to chat and then asked me where I thought there might be cranes. I gave them directions to a barley field east of the drive loop. I am pretty sure there were cranes there because I heard them in that direction, a LOT of them.

“I hope you see some! They’re…” I didn’t have words at that moment to describe the cranes.

“I hope so too,” said the woman.

“We’re coming back in fall,” said the man.

“Oh, yes,” I said, “Fall is wonderful.”

It’s not that the cranes are whimsical or mercurial; the opposite. Their calendar is pretty fixed. Usually by the first week of April, they’ve gone to points north to nest. Some of “my” cranes fly all the way to Siberia. Looking for huskies, I imagine… 😉

Another car stopped in a spot where I was holding Teddy away from the road. I was telling Teddy to wait and he was doing very well. A woman got out of the car to look at an interpretive sign, and the man, who was driving, said “Hi!” to me. I explained that Teddy was being educated. The man said, “He’s a good dog.” Then the man got out of the car. He was wobbly and pretty old, wearing a cap that proclaimed he’d been in the army. As we chatted and he told me something about his life, I did some math. He had to have been a Korean War vet. Teddy went to meet him and the man didn’t mind that Teddy jumped up on him.

The man was great. He expressed wonder and enthusiasm for everything around us — the Sangres, the Sand Dunes which are white with snow, the fact that we could see the North-eastern most point of the Navajo (Dine) nation — Mt. Blanca. There are not many things I love more than being out in “my” Refuge and hearing humans express wonderment over it. I love it so much I don’t even want to leave the valley for fear I’ll miss something. Then the man and his wife took off. Teddy and I went on our way, waving and smiling when appropriate.

On our return, I saw something swimming in the large pond. I stopped to study it. It was a muskrat. It was close enough that I could see its eyes, its snout and the tail that serves as a rudder. I was really happy to see him! Then I watched “my” pair of northern harriers hunting — or playing it was hard to tell.

While sometimes the crane tourists are a problem for me and the dogs, mostly they’re just a wonderful addition to our lives.

I came home and worked on the little painting. I learned a lot, mostly how much I need to learn. One thing I learned is that I should have used more acrylic medium, basically why binder is called binder. No worries. The painting is fine. My way of learning is NOT the most efficient way of learning, but it’s never boring though it involves a lot of failure and “Damn, I wish I’d…” I’m not even completely conscious of the reasons behind my choices. When I finished and had time to think about it I realized that what I did was “OK let’s see how these colors do painting the stuff I paint.”

The scene I chose is one of the most “ordinary” scenes in the wetlands here. It’s a spot on the little nature trail the dogs like, but one that can be found anywhere across the meadows of this ancient lake, cattails, greasewood, Chamisa and grass. The day and the painting were the best way I could have observed the beauty of this garden in which I am lucky to live.

RDP Friday! Mercurial!

Finished