After last night’s downpour, Bob suggested
it might be too slick to get to the house on the bike. Although a little
disappointing, with a few muddy roads in my past, it was a clear pick to take
the car. Driving in, I notice plenty of dry dirt between gaping mud craters,
enough that I could have navigated the road on two wheels. Darn. But fully
across the two track to Vic and Bob’s house, a soupy mud wallow about twenty
feet long lays in wait, one which could have easily tipped me over and sucked
me in, never to be seen again. I will save The High Road on das motorrad for another day.
It’s beautiful, clear weather. The sky
shimmers fathomless, the same heartbreaking blue as alpine forget-me-nots. To
the east, aspen in the mountains are turning, brilliant patches of yellow spot
nearly black slopes of spruce and fir. From last night’s storm, peaks are
capped pure white. The first snow has come. I am reminded of climbing Wheeler
in the snow just about a year ago. (Click here for a full account.) This
majestic landscape, this time of year, the waning light and colder temperatures
bring out so much. Once free of the car I stand and look and breathe deep.
. . .
Bob and I go to the Bent Street Café for
lunch. We take a table on the outdoor patio in the shade, we wish for sweaters.
The chicken tamales with red are so good I consider licking the plate. What is
more important: respecting my fellow diners with at least a few shreds of good
manners, or getting that last micro layer of chili? It’s a tough call. I split
the difference and do my best to gather what’s there with the edge of my fork.
Someday, somewhere, in a restaurant I’m going to actually lick my plate, if for
no other reason than just to see if anyone objects.
As luck has it, today is the San Geronimo
Feast Day at the Taos Pueblo, and so we head in that direction. With the car
parked in a field, we along with hundreds of other people start walking. A relatively
new, but well-mudded pickup truck pulls up beside us and the man driving asks
if we’d like a ride. Sure, we’re game. We clamber in, Bob’s a big guy, it’s a
tight fit. The man is part of the pueblo, his face, beautifully ruined by the
years, is set with sparkling jet eyes. His short-cropped hair is silver and
black. He lives in the old part of the pueblo and tells us the younger members
of the tribe have mostly succumbed to desire for the modern conveniences of new
housing. “Older folks prefer the simple ways,” he says. Mostly. He is after all
driving a new Toyota 4x4. We all make concessions to modernity, while a few of
us, the romantics at least, never like admitting it.
At the pueblo we thank the man and hop out
and make our way into the crowds. The rambling four story structure, of
gold-brown adobe sits against a long piedmont of piñon forest leading to the
steep slopes of Pueblo Peak and surrounding summits. The place has spirit. Looking through the crowd I
squint my eyes against full sun, all the dots of color, it is as though we are
in a Prendergast painting. The Koshare or Sacred Clowns, with bodies painted in
broad stripes of black and white, faces smudged with soot, and heads dressed in
straw, wander around causing trouble. They hoot and caw. They pick on people,
they grab young children to throw in the creek, worried mothers run in tow. This
is all in good humor, they do not actually throw children in the icy water, but
they certainly put on a good act.
No one is safe and we know it. When the Koshare
come around everyone shies away, casting furtive, curious glances. We don’t want
to miss the action but at the same time attract too much attention. And so the
clowns move through the crowds, hilarious trouble makers.
In the center of the plaza a pole is
erected, perhaps forty or fifty feet tall. Strung on cross sticks at the top hang
a slaughtered sheep, a net full of bread and squashes and brilliant fabric
sacks stuffed with goodies. Long yellow, orange and red streamers shift against
the sky. The clowns continue their antics, a few New Mexico State Police
officers walk about, and the clowns hassle them. It’s funny to watch. The
officers, usually so composed and self-assured, don’t know quite how to take a
ribbing.
Things happen here in mysterious ways, and
so we stand and wait for the climbing of the pole. More people congregate
around the plaza, we stand and wait for at least an hour.
I feel a slight, warm pressure rest against
one of my feet. Perhaps it is a child… no… I look and see a dog has decided to
lay himself down and use my foot as a pillow. I’ve been chosen and feel
honored. Even surrounded by the crowd, the dog is completely at ease. I look up
and there’s Cat, surveying the scene, smiling. Not an animal of the cat type,
but a woman of the Cat name. It will be later that we introduce ourselves, but
I’d rather refer to her as Cat than “the woman.”
“Looks like you have a buddy,” she says.
I nod and smile. “Looks like I do.” The dog
stays put and so do I. The little place of warmth against me feels good. I bend
down and with my thumb give him a rub from the point of his brow to the furrow
between his eyes. He stares blankly as animals do, into the sea of legs, as
though lost in thought.
Bob decides to wander around a bit. Cat and
I start up a conversation. We talk about how we happened to land here and share
laughs over the clown’s antics. We talk about the Taos Pueblo’s generosity
having us as guests, and I mention the Deer Dance will likely be performed this
Christmas. I’ve attended this one a number of times over the years and every
time, it gets right into me.
A clown saunters by and grabs a woman’s hat.
“Rut-rho,” says Cat.
“Did you just say rut-rho?” I ask. I haven’t heard anyone else say this in years.
“Yes,” says Cat.
“I say that all the time!” I tell her, and
go on about my neighbor, mystified by what I was saying asked me to explain. It
was one of those funny wake-up calls, like I must be using this quirky
expression regularly, all the while oblivious to the fact most people have no
idea what I’m talking about. Having searched my memory, I can think of only one
other person who says “rut-rho.” Might be time to start the Astro Club.
Membership: 3. But I digress.
The clowns gather around the pole. With tiny
toy bows they shoot tiny twig arrows at the booty high above. The arrows rise
all of eight feet into the air, the parody is hilarious. Their first few
blundering attempts climbing the pole are in vain, but finally, with the crowd
cheering him on, one of the leaner ones succeeds. He straddles a cross stick, methodically
pulls his knife from its sheath and cuts down the goodies. Working with ropes
to those on the ground, first he lowers the squash and bread, then the sheep,
then the sacks. Fooling around as they do, they manage to make laugh-out-loud
fun of it all.
The clown up top then stands on the cross
stick and calls out a lilting chant. People in the crowd continue to chatter
and giggle, a woman turns around, I’m guessing she is part of the pueblo. Of
imposing stature and face she glares and shushes them. What we have been
witnessing has sacred meaning which is kept secret, and it is now serious. Typically,
the clown climbs and stands on the very top of the pole. We wonder if he’s
going to do it, he stands on the stick, hugging the pole for a long moment. Tension
fills the air… but he does not. I later learn this was due to the wind. He
shimmies down, the crowd erupts into hoots and applause.
Everyone begins to disperse and Bob reappears.
Cat says, “Maybe I’ll see you at the Deer Dance.”
“That would be great,” I say, and we
introduce ourselves.
After an ice cream at the Taos Cow in Arroyo
Seco, Bob and I take narrow back roads to the mesa. Pitched roof adobe homes of
modest scale, parcels of farm land between old fence lines, flowing acequias…
timelessness lives here.
At the casa we each get a beer and head for
the back portal. Ice cream with a beer chaser. We know how to live. Late
afternoon sun floods the portal, the breeze has a chill to it, the soaking warmth
feels good. We settle in and recount our adventures, we look out across a vast
rolling plain of sagebrush to distant summits. Maybe a hundred miles away, the peaks
float on the horizon, only slightly darker blue than the sky above. Iridescent
pink and green sun dogs glow in high icy clouds.
Gordon Bunker
Illustration:
Southwest Postcard, c.1950
