My wife’s dead watch batteries (both of ‘em!) presented a curious opportunity.

Since the Radio Shack store was just a couple of blocks from Rick Smith’s Brodsky Bookshop, I could fulfill my manly obligation to buy replacement watch batteries and also redeem last year’s $35 Christmas gift certificate from Brodsky’s, which I’d only recently belatedly unearthed and rediscovered. Rick has lots of new and used books, all of them either esoteric in some way or specialty New Mexico items (local writers, histories, reference books, etc.). He also sells CDs and unusual LPs, so you never know just what you’ll find.

What I found was a vintage Rip Off Press reprint of Gilbert Shelton’s Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers comics. I’d actually looked through it on an earlier visit. The book brought back my past, all right, but I didn’t exactly want to “go there” then — as I stood turning the pages again this afternoon, I still wasn’t sure. And then I found a familiar story with one of Shelton’s impossibly funny drawings and laughed out loud! A few pages later: oh my God, Fat Freddie’s cat! I laughed again and again. Okay, I told myself, if this edition has the lyrics to “When I Set My Chickens Free,” I’m buyin’.

On page 39, it did…

Glorious, glorious stuff. The hyper-exaggeration, the cinematic story-boarding, the insane energy. It comes across now like the Marx Brothers and Charlie Chaplin on acid with their hair on fire! How I loved these comics when they first came out. My friends and I would incorporate Freak Brothers’ sayings into our conversation like we did with Dylan lyrics… (or was it just the one, by Freewheelin’ Franklin?) Some of these strips are so funny. I never realized Gilbert Shelton’s appreciation for great movie comedy before, but I see it all now. What a difference 40 years makes!

I even met Gilbert Shelton in Austin once, way WAY back when, before he moved to San Francisco, before the Freak Brothers. He and a friend of mine had just opened “Oat Willie’s,” an eventually-to-become-locally-famous head shop and comic store branded with a character Shelton had invented for his “Wonder Wart-Hog” comics. I happened to be in there when my friend walked in with Señor Shelton and introduced us. I got to shake his hand, and that was that, but I never forgot. During this same period of my life, I once held a door open for Linda Bird, and I haven’t forgotten that, either. Heh. Someone’s probably saying now, “Who the hell is ‘Linda Bird’?” Just never you mind. But if you have to ask, “Who the hell is Wonder Wart-Hog?!” — or Fat Freddie, or his cat — well, that’s another matter. I’m looking at my culture here, at least a part of it. I doubt it really translates outside the generation, though. Too bad!

The watches run now, of course, and so do I.

It’s called “John’s Afternoon in Town,” and it starts here (Monday), although there are a couple of other new shots before that. It was so warm and nice downtown, I just decided to walk around and see if anything interesting popped up.

And then there’s this, which I almost missed:

Southwestern ingenuity

What, you don’t prop up your satellite TV dish with rocks?! Oh. Well, maybe this isn’t a standard installation.

Yep, I’ll be updating FotoFeed soon. In the meantime, here’s a mountain for you:

Taos Mountain yesterday evening, from the back “yard”

Supposed to be 63 degrees today, well above normal. Yee-haw!

At some point over the weekend, I fell into a horrific funk. The astonishing thing is how quickly I came out of it.

The details of the destructive thoughts leading to an avalanche of sudden depression aren’t important, but I’m sure you can imagine: the kinds of of things you worry over in the middle of the night that keep you from sleeping, plus every self-belittling notion in the arsenal, all cascading down like Niagara Falls. The dynamics were familiar, as was my taking out my lack of love on the world.

The culmination was my berating myself for not having a physical exam in over 10 years. Of all things! Yeah, I thought to myself, and I’ve never had a colonoscopy, either, so (guilt, guilt) my bowels are probably RIDDLED WITH CANCER, yow!!! Simultaneously, I realized that I was focusing on my abdomen, doing a quick internal scan. A second later, I knew the fear was stupid, because I didn’t feel anything wrong. And then,

WHAM!!!

Suddenly I was back in my body! In my body, aware of the present moment, no longer living in my head. POOF! Danger instantly averted, depression gone.

It was like stepping into another room.

An old friend of mine from Maryland emailed to say:

Now I have a huge decision to make. Do I trash all my political blog bookmarks and TRY to give up the obsessive behavior that I have nurtured lo these many (8+) years? The constant digging and digging for dirt and damnation? I’m a damned junkie and I know it. I feel as if giving them up would be a great symbolic gesture of love and trust for Obama. Can I do it?

I certainly understand where she’s coming from and told her I thought her dilemma would probably resolve itself “organically.” That’s how it looks from this end: this morning I went to all the places I usually go, and there wasn’t anything to read! Well, not really, but I think you know what I mean: after years of watching mutant flag-waving carnivorous rats from Hell decide what America is all about, the triumph of Constitutional democracy is fairly stupefying. Things have been so horrible and tense for so long, it’s like, “Hey, what do we do NOW?!”

Personally, I need a little rest. Not that I’ll be catching up on sleep, but turning to areas of my life that need attention. I feel like it’s safe, you know? All of which will make me a better person and a better citizen. Suddenly, I’m glad I am one of the latter.

I honestly don’t know what to make of this, except that I probably shouldn’t operate any heavy machinery for a while.

When have people been dancing in the streets after a national election in this country?

Not in my lifetime, that’s for sure — at least as far as I can remember — and I was born on the day we bombed Nagasaki. I still can’t believe it. I can’t believe I get to be proud of America again — it’s been so long! We took our country back. The nightmare is over. And now can people please shut up about right vs. left, liberal vs. conservative, and just do the right thing?

Wow. I mean, just wow. I’m still overwhelmed.

For reasons too silly to enumerate, my wife and I are living without TV now. That means I had to follow this on the Internet, and it turned out that worked just fine. I was getting all the news from various blogs, and then I found myself yearning for the electricity of live video, which I found on an MSNBC feed. Aside from being really tiny, that worked fine, and there weren’t any commercials. After the West coast states came in and Obama shot past 270, I grew tired of the yackety-yack on MSNBC and just wanted to join in the celebration. That’s when I got lucky, hitting a live feed from Grant Park in Chicago on CNN.com.

That. was. incredible…

Nothing but the actual event, no voiceovers, no interruptions, just 200,000 joyful, cheering people in Chicago. Jesus Christ. I heard Obama give his speech, which seemed to go a little flat right at the end, as if he suddenly realized what had happened to him and suddenly got VERY serious. (He’s sane, all right.) No matter: I was simply blown away by all the happy, dancing citizens, and I’m a sucker for the music, all of it. They even played “Sweet Home Chicago”! This was an outrageously good thing, all around.

I was so proud, seeing that crowd and knowing that the whole world was watching. That’s the America I want other countries to know. I’m still in shock. Over the last eight years, I’d come to feel the country was utterly unredeemable, with a fatal sickness in its soul, but now I think I’ll join the human race and just get on with life. MY GOD, WE’RE NOT EVIL, at least not all of us! Oh, I knew that already, sure, but I wasn’t the only one hungry for proof. This is just amazing to me. I think what has happened is so stupendous, we don’t have a clear idea of just how big it is, and maybe we shouldn’t even try to figure it out. In fact, I know we shouldn’t. Just dig in, be happy, and get to work. Have serious fun, FIX THINGS, and move out on another level.

Unbounded joy is what I saw on the faces in the crowd in Chicago. This is a whole new America.

Geez, is it that time of year again?! The snow line is at 9,500 feet until dark, and then we get a tiny bit, maybe an inch by morning. My honey drives to Alamosa bright and early, however, and will NOT be pleased.

Adventure! Danger! Chop wood! Lows in the teens, then back up to 50 degrees. Hang on, kids.

This one comes from not too far from where I used to live. I found it at TPM Election Central. The Internet is full of these anecdotes today. Break out the Kleenex and read on:

My polling place is at the fairgrounds in Southern Maryland, about 40 minutes from Washington, D.C. This used to be tobacco country, but is slowly being developed, or other crops are grown. We waited until 10:00 to vote, to avoid the lines. When we got there a 97-year-old black man was being wheeled out of the polls in his wheelchair. It was the first time he had ever voted in his life. When he came outside he asked if anyone could give him an Obama button. There were none left at the Democrats’ booth so I gave him mine. He was so proud and I started crying. He looked at me and said, “Why are you crying? This is a day for glory.” I am still crying.

Later someone took an Obama bumper sticker to the senior center where the old man lives, so he could put it on his wheelchair. Yee-haw!

I just had to drive by the local Obama headquarters on my way to Cafe Loka. What a scene… there must have been 50 cars in the lot, with people coming and going. All the way into town, there were Obama volunteers on almost every street corner waving big “Vote Now” signs and exchanging waves with honking drivers. And you do know this is a small town, right?

Says it all

It’s a beautiful fall day here in Taos, New Mexico, about 60 degrees F. and windy, leaves blowing everywhere. The clouds are moving in now — tomorrow’s much colder weather! — but Cafe Loka’s front doors are both wide open. (Get it while you can…) I had to wait a while to place my order for a double latte and a hunk of pumpkin nut bread because there was a phalanx of Young Mothers Who Walk in front of me: tough, healthy 20-something women with strollers and very fresh babies, I might add.

Cafe Loka… nice place!

Damn. Got me to thinking again about being born too late (almost). It just wasn’t the same for mothers and their kids back when I was born and cars had fenders.