Hilary and Theresa's Road to Nowhere: Once Upon A Time In New Mexico

Our first stop in New Mexico was Las Cruces, a town that sits in the shadow of the Organ Mountains, named for their resemblance to the spires and pipes of a large pipe organ. These mountains are an extension of the San Andres Mountains, and the fragmented southern most extension of the Rocky Mountains. They were as beautiful as their name was amusing. “Hey Beavis, which organ do you think is the biggest, heh, heh, heh?” “I don’t know, but is that an organ poking through the cloud or are you happy to see me, heh, heh, heh?” It seemed that the closer I got to my younger brother’s house, the more juvenile my humor became.

We drove through a snow storm in El Paso (that’s right, the El Paso that is right next to sunny Mexico) on the way to visit my brother and his wife in “The Land of Enchantment”. They have been living in the mountains above the Tularosa Basin for several years now and they still mourn the loss of the food and culture of San Francisco. We arrived on New Years Day and the opening of the new IHOP in Alamogordo was cause for celebration. When I asked a waitress what she did for fun in “Alamo”, as the locals call it, she paused for several seconds before answering “Well, there’s a Walmart down the way.”

But the lack of good food and culture was made up for in spades by the diverse and beautiful surroundings. This part of New Mexico is called “high desert”. As we drove through the valley that makes up the Tularosa Basin, the Organ Mountains were behind us and the Sacramento Mountains and Lincoln National Forest were ahead. To the left was White Sands National Monument, one of the world’s natural wonders, where great wave-like dunes made of glistening white gypsum span 275 miles square miles. We stopped to walk around later in the week and felt like we were on another planet. It was very still and serene until all of the kids with their plastic sleds showed up. But sliding down the dunes did look fun and we promised that next time we’d come more prepared.

As we drove through the basin, we saw Oryx roaming around the sage and cactus. My brother told me that these African Antelope were introduced by the Dept. of Fish and Game in 1969 and that they thrive in the high desert. Their prongs were so long that, at certain angles, they looked like unicorns. As we drove up into the mountains, bighorn sheep, recently re-introduced to the area, scaled the cliffs and ridges of the hills. These Sacramento Mountains are part of the Lincoln National Forest. If this sounds familiar, it might be because the world’s most famous ursine, Smokey Bear, was found there after a wildfire burned 17,000 acres in the Capitan Gap fire in 1950. Smokey climbed a tree to escape the blaze, but his little bear-cub paws and hind legs had been burned. After he was rescued, he became the mascot of the United States Forest Service’s campaign to prevent forest fires. We were reminded of his legacy every time we drove up the hill to the neighboring towns of Cloudcroft and Ruidoso.

Along with my humor, the rest of my behavior also reverted to that of a 10 year while I was visiting my brother. Apropos, I even bought a Nancy Drew book at the local used book store. However, the novelty wore off in about 20 minutes. This shit is awful, I thought. What? Were these books written for 10 year olds?

My brother and I came up with our best stupid idea while shopping at Walmart, the aforementioned “main event” in Alamogordo. I couldn’t help but notice all of the motorized wheel chairs and scooters. I’d never seen so many in one place. Some had oxygen attachments. Some were extra-wide. We had to turn our shopping-cart around on more than one occasion and maneuvering around them was difficult. And boy, what a sense of entitlement these operators had! It was understood that they had the right of way. “But you should see them once they get back to the parking lot”, said my brother, “they hop off those things like they were 22 years old and I've seen them practically skipping to their cars.”

That’s when it came to me. “OMG, you guys should start a Motorized-Chair Derby in this town.” I started to get excited. “It might really take off. With all the baby boomers hitting old age, it could be huge! Like WWF even!!” “That’s a great idea” said my brother, “maybe we could use the aisles of Walmart after they close. No, that won’t work, they stay open 24 hours; maybe the parking lot?” “Outdoors might be safer” I mused, “The audience will want to drink and smoke and with all of the oxygen tanks, well, it might be too dangerous indoors. And the older the better, right? The contestants should be at least 70”. “Should there be separate categories for wheelchairs and scooters?” one of us wondered. “Nah, it’ll be much funnier if both are in the same event.” We went back and forth, encouraging each other while we finished our shopping. And mark my words, if we don’t act on this brilliant idea, someone else will.

My brother is volunteer fireman and an EMT. This meant he could give us the grand tour of the fire station where Hilary took pictures of me in various poses on the biggest truck. I’m not sure what the universal fascination is with fire trucks, but the fire-station tour was definitely one of the highlights of our visit. Layla got to ride to the station in the back of one of the smaller trucks. I guess we shouldn’t have been surprised when she became very attached to my brother and didn’t want to leave his house.

We had a lot of laughs in New Mexico but the temperatures dropped down into the 20s at night. “Yeah, but its dry cold” my brother and his wife kept telling us. Fine, I thought, but my fingers are still turning blue. And this sun junky needed a fix before heading home to San Francisco. We’d promised our son a shot-glass from Tombstone, where Wyatt Earp used to hang out with Doc Holliday. It was decided; these cowpokes were headed for Arizona.