Believe it or not, that moldering bones post two steps below gave me a big lift going into the morning. The writing of it too, especially (that I allowed it). Part of me is always down in the hold, oiling the anchor chains and wiping them shiny in the dim, damp dark. Why deny it? It grounds me to the unconscious. The passageway is always open.
It was a clear blue morning, just over freezing by 10:00 a.m.
I had a couple of clients to meet, a pair of older ladies I was to tutor in the joys of OS X. Taos women in jeans and vests, mind you, one of them fresh off the plane from Oaxaca with a laptop full of photos from the fighting in the streets. They showed up right on time, opened up their MacBooks, and connected to with my wireless network. Soon they had a dozen questions about an email application that I didn’t use, so I showed them how to Google for answers just like a real expert. The next two hours flew by, and I enjoyed it immensely.
With cash money in my pocket, I took my sweetie on a date to the storage unit, where she wanted to get some winter clothes, and on the way we stopped for lunch at the Taos Diner. The meal was absolutely perfect, and we sat down to visit with friends briefly on the way out. Once we were in the car, the pretty one reminded me we had to go to the vet first to buy a big bag of hairball-control cat food for Kali, the studio cat. That made sense, and I always like driving out north of town where the clinic is. The highway swings closer to the mountains that rise up steeply, just over there. They’re such an undeniable presence. In that way, it’s like living next to the sea. A monumental tsunami of stone, perhaps, and it always rattles those chains.
We got the cat food and the winter clothes and headed back. I took a little side trip to a second-hand store where my sweetie bought a “hand-painted” ceramic lamp from a another planet. The thing is beyond kitsch and deeply fascinating, and the cord is 18 inches long. That’s compelling, too.
After we got home, I remembered I had to plant a bush for my landlord (yes, it’s late for that), but the dirt was like concrete. I hauled out my pick axe and chopped down maybe half a foot, then poured water into the hole so the ground would soften. An hour later, the water had gone down about a quarter of an inch.
Later that evening while pouring another shot of tequila at the actual six-foot-long mahogany bar the landlord thoughtfully provided with our old adobe dwelling, I experienced a startling sensation. Dylan was pounding out my favorite fast numbers from his latest CD from a TiBook plugged into the Twin Reverb (high-volume mono rocks inside these solid mud walls). While I was riding with the music, I suddenly had a thought that was so happy, I thought I would burn up on the spot, just spontaneously combust. In the process of contemplating this, I realized I could do whatever I wanted. Okay, all the cool people figured that out long ago, big deal — the only thing that counts is when it happens to you, and who can help their age? But I saw it, I tell you. I saw that the things I wanted to have happen weren’t happening because I wasn’t making them happen.
I mean, I could taste it. The other reality was as clear as a bell.
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