Back some time in the l980s (do we speak in decades now?) I decided to plant some Arizona Cypress trees at my Vega house. Fast growing, drought resistant. The house sits in the middle of a prairie; I've always said no matter what I tried to do with the yard, I lived in the middle of a prairie. Daddy teased me about the trees. "They're not going to be tall enough to shade your grave," he jibed even as he helped me dig the holes. That was Daddy: he...
Texas Highways magazine has asked me to write an article ("IF there are museums, IF there are restaurants") about Highway 385. I'm talking about 385 from Vega to Boys' Ranch, or as I still like to call it, Old Tascosa. It's a travel magazine, right? So there needs to be something to see--several somethings. The guy sending the email requesting the article allowed there might not be enough to write about. I want to say, yes there is: this was an old bison road (bison being the proper term for...
My neighbor, Jim, here in Picacho Hills in Las Cruces, just hailed me over his wall. "Hey, saw your book reviewed in the Albuquerque Journal last Friday," he said. "Great," I called back. "Glad to know someone still reads the newspapers!" I was starting my midday walk, already sweating in the intense New Mexico sun. Apparently, someone else saw the article as well. All the seats were full at the local Albuquerque Bookworks store on Sunday, June 26th when I gave my scheduled talk and reading. It's humbling, to say the...
[caption id="attachment_840" align="alignnone" width="956"] Bob Armitage, South Place, 1929[/caption] He didn't have a jump hook. Far from it. And he often sliced the ball when we played golf. Still this didn't keep my dad from joyously trying. At 60, he learned to snow ski just because he wanted to take my friends and I skiing and to the mountains. "Seen Daddy?" (on the slope) I asked a friend. "Nope, but I saw something that looked suspiciously like his ski outfit sticking out of a drift up there." He put up a...
Out west of Vega, on one of the private ranches, there's a slight dip in a landscape, summer arid, red soil, scrub mesquite. You've meandered along in an almost hypnotic state, land and sky stretching interminably ahead, but your yellow note pad says it's here somewhere. The subtle incline, the modest sandstone formation. If you're alone, the stillness and space may inhabit you. With friends, voices echo a bit, then disappear. Either way, this seems an unlikely place for water and for the giant cisterns, likely water catchers, which...
Face it, Vega, Texas is just one big pasture, that is, the "city" (900 souls) is set in the middle of native grasslands. Hence the name "Vega" which means "meadow" in Spanish. The grasses are beautiful, even when fenced in. Buffalo, side-oats grama, sacaton, blue stem. If you want to be entertained in this small town, walk the pastures. Don't believe me? Just take the other day. I was walking the three acre lot that surrounds my house, eyeing the Angus cows--and one bull--that were making their way from...
Back home from Las Cruces to Vega, Texas in time to see the last iris in my front yard. I miss the cycle of flowers now that I live part of the year in New Mexico. Beginning with the first crocuses through the daffodils and tulips to iris, wild roses, day lilies, and varieties of roses and finally xeriscape plants, the old yard reveals its previous owners love who planted perennials, beginning in 1920 when the house was built. They’ve weathered all...
Thinking today about the original title for the memoir, “A Habit of Landscape.” The title was gently nudged aside by editors at University of Oklahoma Press for the more precise and seemingly rooted, “Walking the Llano.” I did walk the llano, at least a tiny bit of it, but as I write in the Superstitions memoir, it was in a effort to be more deeply rooted, to more deeply inhabit a place. Habit and habitat share a root themselves: “it dwells.” Maybe I’ll use that title for...
