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Published: January 6th 2008
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Casita on the farm
Our first home away from home June - July 2007
We've been here since Tuesday, June 5. Our friends are starting an organic farm on fields that have not been plowed for probably 20 years. We are in their casita ( a small guest house) overlooking the fields.
Huge Cottonwood and Elm trees tower the edge of the fields, mosquitoes swarm in the early evening and mornings, the acequia (irrigation ditch) tumbles along outside our front door (hence the mosquitoes), the crickets chirp and the birds sing. Seti and Meggie, Djann and Lisa's two cats make a daily patrol to our house. Rain, our kitty cowers when they look in the door, but she is getting used to being in this house and so we confidently let her outside yesterday morning. She only wandered a few feet and came back inside. That's great news for us. She still flips out when we put the harness on her, so both of us are worried that she may not make the entire trip with us but will run away if she is startled. My feeling is that if she knows the van is her home, she will come back, but right now, she has not spent enough time in it to know that. Clearly we need to work on this and soon. I'll begin feeding her in the van and taking her out to explore it for short visits.
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In the weeks and months before we closed on our house (June 4th) we were working 7 days a week sorting, packing and throwing things away. We rented a storage unit not too far from our house and methodically filled it up trying to make things accessible. Allison quit her job May 15th and we had our yard sale the 25th and 26th with a preview for friends and neighbors on the 24th. The sale was a great success. Watching all that stuff go bye bye was thrilling, and what bargains. The next week saw two trips to the scrap yard (prices for copper and aluminum are at all time highs, time to look around those sheds).
Despite all my paranoia's, the closing went well. And then off into the unknown.
We closed on our house Monday, June 4 and spent one last night at 831. We started our trip early Tuesday, June 5 by going to FedEx to pick up a package that did not make it to 831 Fayette on Monday as scheduled. Although that snafu caused quite the upset, it was in the end beneficial because we spent about 2 hours getting tips about our van from the FedEx auto mechanic. One of the most useful tips being to go to FedEx if we have problems with the van since FedEx's fleet is comprised of Sprinters and all the locations have their own mechanics who specialize in fixing Sprinters and many of them moonlight. By the way, Sprinters are also sold under the name Freight liner and are all Mercedes parts, so we are hoping they are as sound as the Mercedes name implies. If we have any problems, Vince the Fed Ex mechanic put every file he owned about Sprinters on our flash drive, so if we take the time to study them, Ches can become a Sprinter mechanic too. I am more concerned with a quiet ride free of pots and pans rattling and feeling every bump in the road.
So we spent Tuesday shopping for last minute items and cursing Santa Fe traffic. What a relief when the errands were complete and to actually move at 60mph even if we only drove 40 miles. Medanales is a rural community in northern New Mexico not far from El Rito and Potrero Canyon where Ches lived 35 years ago. Djann lived in Potrero at the same time. Both of them moved away - Ches to Virginia, Djann to California and both came back. There is something about living in an area of the U.S. that is like a third world country with the ability to drive to town for a latte and high fat ice cream. It's an adventure with the security of known factors. Medanales is also only about ten minutes from Abiquiu the home of the late, overrated as great (Ches' opinion), Georgia O'Keeffe. It is a land of stunning mesas, canyons, and mountains layered in stratified colors of whites, reds, purples, and browns. It is also a home of assorted religious worship - a very old Penitente morada, Christ in the Desert Monastery located in a remote canyon along side the Chama River, and an adobe domed mosque, Dar al Islam, designed by the well known Egyptian architect Hasan Fathy. We both love New Mexico and are having trouble tearing away from it's dynamic landscape and the friends we have established here.
We haven't been laying around on this new adventure - in one day, Ches built a stone retaining/garden wall for Djann and Lisa along the walk to their house. I on the other hand, took a 3-day wedge weaving class at the El Rito College campus with Lisa. Although the technique was invented by the Navajo and is supposedly easier and faster then other ways to create zigzags,it proved quite complicated with counting warp threads and moving back and forth wrapping in new colors and starting the next cycle of zags and back to zigs. As testimony to that fact, no one in the class progressed farther along then 9 inches on their project. Until the third day when everyone started making progress I referred to my weaving as a large bookmark. At the end of class, seasoned weavers said they would not be incorporating the technique in their work, but it was fun to learn. I'll probably use my weaving as a kitty placemat or make a teeny pillow that hides the unruly edges. Ches and I are both now working on expanding the flagstone patio in front of the casita. Djann and Lisa will be renting the casita out by the week beginning in July. They invited us to stay here until that time. We will be heading to Colorado and Valley View Hot springs by July 4 and then northwest towards Seattle and Vancouver. In the meantime, we've been ordering things for our van and the trip on line and parring down our travel gear.
The first week here the weather was cool and cloudy, just perfect. Now it has turned more seasonable, as in hot and sunny. I don't even want to count the mosquito bites on my body. It's beginning to be painful! I'm sporting ankle bracelets, no wait, knee highs of red welts. We've been driving into El Rito in the evenings to visit and dine with friends. You'll see pictures of them on our travel page at Picasa. It's a welcome relief from the bugs and heat here. You need to get up another 1,000 feet to avoid the mosquitoes. Mental note: next home will not be near water or at too low an altitude. On the plus side, the nights are cool and sleeping is great when there's fresh cool air and a blanket on your bed - doing a little physical labor in the heat aids a good night's sleep too.
The flagstone patio is complete and Wednesday we head to town to shop and collect our bikes. The van ladder and bike rack came this week by UPS. On line shopping has been fun! It's also essential when you live in the country and hate to run from store to store looking for the perfect item. We did fall into the free shipping trap. Word of advice: pay for shipping, the free stuff is the slow boat from China. Tracking packages seems like they sit in one location for days, just so you learn that free shipping means “be patient”. All our online business seems to take forever - whether it is a learning curve for new websites or a painfully slow internet connection, which we are glad to have - who'd guess the entire day could go by with a feeling you haven't accomplished a thing except water and weed the garden?
So finally we are sending this off. Check out the pictures on these two links:
http://picasaweb.google.com/Ches.Alli/FirstStopMedanales http://picasaweb.google.com/Ches.Alli/831Fayette Take care and love,
Allison and Ches
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