Ruidoso

It goes without saying that those of us with anything to do with southeastern New Mexico have broken hearts about what is happening in Ruidoso: fire, flood, loss of life, loss of houses, etc. It's a tragedy. We send them our prayers.

We wait by the news for more information about what happens when hard rains fall on ashen hillsides - I'm sure the result is not good. I would no longer dip my feet in the Rio Ruidoso or take a dip in Grindstone Lake - it'll be pretty bad for a while. Those who are sheltering in Roswell can do the UFO museums but really no other place is quite like Ruidoso and Ruidoso will never be the same.

From my house in Sixteen Springs I could walk straight back into a narrow strip of national forest, and from there straight over the mountains that you see on your right, as you are making a sharp turn right in the middle of the Mescalero Reservation, when the highway hits Elk Canyon Road. We never walked on reservation land, but I always wanted to, because it's beautiful back there and that road, 244, is about the prettiest I've ever seen. We used to go to Ruidoso a lot to swim, or wade in the river, or just get away from Cloudcroft. It was like our sister city in the mountains.

We are atually climate refugees. After an evacuation, we realized that we were surrounded by tens of thousands of very dry acres of national forest - so dry that a single cigarette could take out the whole region on a slightly windy day. And that's what happened in Ruidoso, though I have no idea if it was a cigarette. Could have been lightning even, not unheard of. But either way you live with that kind of enormous danger to your life and your sanity, and you have to get used to living with it every single day. My wife and I chose tornadoes in the end; it's easier.

We study the maps of Ruidoso and have memories associated with various places. We did a lot of things up on the western side of town, Upper Canyon, places that are now charred to ruins and being rained upon. It may be part of a natural cycle, to burn and start over, but it's painful to watch, and it's taken two lives already. Not like tornadoes, but in some ways worse. And definitely hotter.

Milepost 8

The falling of the mountain (see picture below) onto the road at Milepost 8, or thereabouts, really kind of moved me. I am here in Illinois now, safe from the prospect of living way out in Sixteen Springs and having to drive now seventy or eighty miles to get groceries, rather than the usual forty. Or maybe it could have been fifty or sixty, but it would be more, harder, more difficult. I'm not sure I could bear it.

I'm really surprised they fixed it as quickly as they did. Reports say, the road is open tonight; that means really traffic was disrupted for only a few days. I had given them a month, because I figured the road damage was so extensive they would have to rebuild the road. Apparently it was, and they did, but they're quite good at it. And they could fix the guardrail too, or at least mark it so traffic could get by knowing that hey, the guardrail is broken for a spell here. That's nothing new. I have to give them credit; my hat's off to them. They fixed the road.

I think a lot of people seek out that little mountain corner of New Mexico for its general remoteness and isolation. That is kind of what I liked about it. The majority of people up there weren't afraid of Laborcita Canyon or any of the rocky backroads that could have been taken instead of the highway. They though weren't like me, having kids that needed dentist appointments all the time, or, needing some x-ray myself down in the Gerald Champion. For most of what my life really is these days, I'm grateful to be up in Illinois where I can now go only a mile of flat plowed roads to fill all my needs. I really respect the people who live out there and that's what I'll remember: the ability of people to work together, converge on a spot of trouble, and make the trouble go away. So that life can go back to its usual.

A true mountain tale

I wrote this story about living here:
A true mountain tale

I am busy preparing to move, and I'm very sorry about that; I love Sixteen Springs and will miss it a lot.
More on that later. I'm sure I'll still write about this place. And I've promised, sincerely, to make it all good.

June

The cold hard wind has been blowing for days, at varying speeds and even varying directions. But always dry, dry as a bone, it comes through the mountains and sucks up whatever moisture might have been left from a tiny snow.

I'm grateful for the snow, because it actually put a little green in the grasses, a green that will have to last through the dry season.

In the north they sometimes say, "April is the cruelest month," because, though spring comes and everything is green, nothing is really edible until later in the spring. So, you can see all this life around you, but you can't eat any of it, because none of it's ready. And it's possible to starve even when everything is blossoming.

But I like to say, "June is the cruelest month," because, having waited so long for so little moisture, we in New Mexico have the same problem. There actually is a little rain in the spring, but not much; there is even sometimes a little rain in June, but again not much. Last year we had an unusual situation when the July rains actually came a little early. But generally, June is the cruelest month.

Except that this year, we're leaving in June. We will let someone have these beautiful mountains, just as the rains arrive.

Fire training

I walked into the fire house for a training session. not intending to stay. After all, I am leaving the valley, and therefore the fire department, probably in summer (what will happen to this blog?). But an odd thing happened. There happened to be a very comfortable chair parked right in front of the television, and I was ushered right into it. It felt good; I'd been working all day and I fit right into the chair with my sore back. The training had already started and the movie was going.

I was actually able to hear better than I often am able to, and that's partly because the chair was right there at the monitor. The guy giving the training had reasonnably clear speech. I learned a lot about fire crews. They start with communication. We often watched clips from forty, fifty years ago.

But then it occurred to me. Fire training is based on real life experience where lives are at stake. Unlike academics, there is abslolutely no reward for using big words or being obtuse. All of their systems are based on hard experience and on what saves lives and works best fire after fire.

Of course, being a grammarian and proofreader, I couldn't help but analyze the kind of speech they used. But I also felt a little sheepish as, being inexperienced, I've never actually been in anything like these guys, ever. And they, living in this area, have seen a lot.

The movies that went through time served to show how firefighting has been a mutual aid society - we are all out there helping each other, and, in the mountains, our time will surely come - and I came to appreciate all the more my neighborhood and the neighbors I will soon be leaving. Probably most of them know what the movie was telling them - I am the most rookie-est of rookies, but they are not - and most of them use clear direct communication all the time anyway. That's what I love about them. But when it comes time to learn more about firefighting and pay attention to the fire season at hand, they are there - all of them - and they are watching the same movie.

Yes I am leaving the valley, but not because I don't love it. I do love it, and love my neighbors. I'll spare you the details for now but will eventually tell all, before it happens. It's a hard place to live - roads that are so bumpy our fitbits give us credit for driving them - weather that makes the ridge a little icy - switchback roads with cliffs - but I've loved it out here. The fire training is a community event, and it was a joy to see a group of neighbors work together for a common goal - the protection of our valley.