Two Months in the Land of Enchantment

We have been living in the “Land of Enchantment” for two months now, and I’m ready to venture out into the wilderness. Living in Rio Rancho has allowed me to acclimate to the landscape and it has also afforded me the opportunity to get lost in the wilderness last Saturday.

I have always stayed on major roads, but for some reason I was a little adventurous, and throwing caution to the wind, I thought I would be able to make it back home fairly quickly. I dropped Shoshie off at the library to finish up a project that she had to do for school, and because it was just a ten minute drive, I didn’t bother to pack a diaper bag or supplies. What was supposed to be just a twenty minute drive all together, turned into an hour and ten minute odyssey adventure into the one place I feared to tread. I traveled down a major road and instead of making a left as usual to get home, I reasoned to myself that since the road ran parallel to the one I usually take, I could just drive a bit further and make a left, finding a quicker way to reach my house and bypassing all the traffic of town. Simmi is in her seat, happy as a clam with her pink sunglasses on, jabbering away to music playing on the radio and I am wondering why as I drive, all the sudden the paved road turns to DIRT! We are now traveling on a bumpy dirt road and Simmi’s squeals and laughter from the back seat are making me crack up laughing. The dirt road is graded roughly so every bump can be felt and Simmi thinks she is on some sort of magic ride. She just continues to laugh and laugh, and I join in until I realize that there is no homes, no street signs and no one around for miles! My laughter turns to the sober reality that this isn’t a magic ride and it has the potential to be the ride from hell! Remember I had no diaper bag, no supplies, formula or bottle with me. At that moment I check my cell phone…SHIT! No signal either. Part of me was in a little bit of a panic hoping that the rough terrain I was now on wouldn’t cause a flat tire and strand me out in the middle of the desert. The directional I have in my truck said I was going west and at some point I would need to make a left and travel south for a while. But what road do I take? There were lots of other dirt roads out there but those roads looked so small and treacherous. I decided to just stay on the major dirt road I was on and it felt like I was traveling forever. Then the novelty of the bumpies wore off and that precious little thing in the back seat started to whine. Now I’m even more freaked out, hoping she isn’t going to have a full blown scream fest since it was her nap time and no bottle was available for her. Finally I see a large dirt road and I decide to make a left and travel down that one for what seemed like an eternity. Looking around at the landscape and the location of the Sandia Mountains, I knew that I couldn’t be too far from my intended destination. Sure enough I make another left and now I am sure that I will be ok. Simmi takes a whack at singing and notices that her voice reverberates as she sings. Amused by her new found ability to manipulate the tones of her shaking voice, she giggles and with eyes rolling, she is lulling herself to sleep. Then all the sudden I see the road and realize that we are gonna make it! Five minutes after hitting the paved road we came upon our street…AH! I was so relieved that we made it out of there without breaking down or having a melt down.

The adventure really forced me out of my comfort zone and into a place that is truly Enchanted. Although I was worried about breaking down and also about Simmi having a melt down, I was able to glimpse the beauty of soft hills, evergreens and the wide open sky. It was eerie being out in the middle of nowhere knowing that there was a possibility that we could get stranded. It made my adrenaline rush and my heart race. I kind of liked it! I saw some wildlife out there as well; a road runner and a coyote…GO FIGURE!

Over all, things are going well. The children are adjusting to school and have made friends and Simmi is just her cute adorable self. I am healthy but somewhat depressed without Dom here. We had hoped to have a nice little chunk of money from our tax returns to finish up what needs to be repaired in the house, but we will just break even. My plans for finishing the painting, the floors and other things that need to be redone will now have to wait. That is depressing too! I want to finish the kids rooms and restore to them the things I promised, and now it is going to take that much longer. They are truly fantastic children and even though they don’t like that they have very little in their rooms (not even curtains yet!) they are being very patient. I am such a visual person, and I find that I get depressed having to live in a place that can not even be finished the way that will make this house a home. I know that in time we will accomplish our tasks and fill this home with art, furniture and the things that the kids have lost, but reality sucks sometimes. Other than that, I really can’t complain. We have a roof over our heads, a semi-hypoallergenic home, beds to sleep in, some clothes on our backs and my husband still has his job. I would say with the state of the economy and the hard times that this country is facing, we are doing better than most…and for that I am very grateful!

Bald Beauty of the day:

New Mexico is My Lover in Disguise!

We arrived in New Mexico on December 12th and I had this overwhelming feeling that I was going to hate living here. I have seen the pictures, done the research, checked out the different cultures online and spoken to many people who have seen and experienced New Mexico first hand. There wasn’t a single person I spoke to who said “I hate New Mexico, and I wouldn’t go back there if you paid me all the money in the world!” I couldn’t understand what was so captivating to these people while listening to their words and stories…I pondered the word pictures they painted for me and tried to imagine the beauty they were explaining.

After leaving the Albuquerque Airport, I didn’t want to look around too much for fear of being even more disappointed than I had already set myself up to be and looking at the reaction from my children, my heart began to sink. We took a shuttle bus to pick up our rental car, and my eyes began to wander a little, taking little glances here and there at the landscape. I thought to myself, “Yup! That’s what I thought…dirt, flat plains, no life.” My heart was breaking in those moments and I did all I could to keep myself from crying. But something happened as we traveled north towards the city! We made a left turn and there staring us in the face was this huge imposing mountain! I saw pictures of the Sandia Mountains but nothing could have prepared me for seeing them in all their glory. I was speechless, awestruck and totally captivated by what I was witnessing. My son gasped with his jaw dropped wide, picked up his cell phone to call his friend in Maryland to tell him all about this enormous mountain. I still lack the proper words to describe this magnificent mountain.

I still wasn’t convinced this was a place I would fall in love with, but seeing the mountains gave me a glimmer of hope that I could enjoy my new state. I wasn’t ready to venture out and see the land yet, so we stuck with the major roads and checked out all the different neighborhoods. There was comfort in traveling the streets because the buildings and houses blocked my view of seeing flat desert land. As we drove north west towards our new home, we noticed that if we looked to our left on Route 40 all we saw was the desert BUT if we looked to the right we saw the mountains…of course I only looked to the right!

Today I decided that it was time to take the bull by the horns and just get out there and drive north to Santa Fe. Most of the early morning I was procrastinating and finding excuses of why we couldn’t take our first trip up to Santa Fe, but the kids were getting antsy so we jumped in the car and made our way north. My daughter Shoshie who is 13 years old kept making this same comment from the time we left the airport through today…she said “Mom, why is it so peaceful here? Do you feel it?” When she first made that statement, I did feel it amidst my inner turmoil, but she kept saying it everyday and as we left Albuquerque heading north, I let go of my fear and felt that peace, embracing it fully.

I’m sure that going south is a completely different experience, but what I noticed as we left Albuquerque traveling north, were all the hills and valleys. It wasn’t lifeless or barren, it was beautiful rich terrain with what looked like perfectly placed evergreen bushes that peppered the hills. Everywhere we looked we saw these lovely hills that dipped down and converged with other hills. It was simply surreal. I loved the way the light hit the hills, casting shadows and creating depth and movement. I loved the hues of browns and reds and how the light created purples and blues off in the distance. At times I could barely catch my breath and I was speechless…beside myself with wonderment.

I find myself becoming captivated and I am beginning to understand what so many tried to explain to me. Pictures can never do New Mexico justice…it is a place that must be experienced to be appreciated.

I never knew that the desert could produce such beauty. Delicate flowers growing wild and entertaining my senses.

New Mexico is also NOT all desert! The more north you go, the more trees there are. I think I’m falling in love!

So now that I have experienced one week in my new land, I have to say that my heart has softened. I do see beauty and life here. Have you ever met a person that at first “wasn’t your type” but as you got to know them you opened your heart and let them in to your world? It’s the person that you never expected to be the man/woman of your dreams and yet for some reason you are drawn to them? As you get to know the person and they open up and show you their world, they begin to ignite passion and feelings that you never felt before…well that is how I feel about this place! New Mexico is not what I expected, and although it is definitely not my type of land to live in, I feel a sense of peace and passion. It’s strange but true. I am discovering that New Mexico is erotic as well. I never thought a land could be sexy, but here I am strangely aroused. I think New Mexico is my Lover in disguise.