Taos Rents & Other Wonders

There’s a certain place — very modest, actually — I’ve followed for the last four months on Craigslist. The owner has called me from out of state three times, but we’re not biting:

November, advertised for $1,200/mo.
December, $1,100.
January, $1000.
February, $995.

Today: $925…

Remember, this is famous “end destination” Taos, New Mexico, but you can find all kinds of desperate landlord situations now. (Too bad their houses are such dumps!) We’re still looking, by the way, but I’ve taken down all my “housing wanted” ads at Craigslist because they made me feel like a victim. The whole economy is in such flux, I’m hesitant to do anything, to tell you the truth. Pensions could be cut. Housing prices and rents are still in free-fall. Nothing has changed regarding the banking system, and on and on.

There are a lot of formerly middle-class types living on the edge here, too, and some retirees who think everything is dandy, but I’d look for some emptying-out before too long. One of my best friends is probably going to leave and never come back, just because he’s tired of living like a peon. The only thing is, he’s headed into teaching… and with his skills, he deserves a life of honor and ease, but he ain’t gonna get it. None of us are, it looks like.

Yes, on anxiety-filled Saturday mornings, my thoughts turn once more toward more bucolic settings. I can’t help it, really, these escapist fantasies. And yet, we’re probably too old to do the relocation thing again. It’s taken 10 years to feel half-way comfortable in the bosom of the mountains, and another 10 years in a different place would put us at the bitter end of the actuarial tables. (DEATH, chilluns!) I ripped us out of our old life with little consideration for what might follow, and to move again would probably mean a slow extinguishing of the light…

Not finding a viable, long-term home after 10 YEARS of moving around is quite exhausting, but I think we just have to stick it out and adjust our emotional stance. Sometimes I think I just need to find a comfortable place to die, and I don’t mean that in a maudlin way — I just mean a place that says, “this is IT, bub!” The mountains make a person feel like nothing any mortal does has any permanence, which is the basic lesson of el Norte. The reality is that it’s just like that, everywhere you go, except that various props and practices in more settled, gentler regions give the impression of a cultural continuity and lastingness that soothes but isn’t true at all.

We’re all just visitors in these bodies. Time is an illusion, and nothing counts but clear awareness of the breath, moving in and out. Beyond that, we know nothing, and nothing can be known.

[pause]

All right, maybe now I can do my work. And maybe we can find a place to live that feels like a real home!

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