Birthday Weekend Noted

Sometimes it takes a goddamn buffalo. In this case, buffalo tenderloin. That was my birthday dinner Saturday night in an open patio setting that was pure old Taos. It really was disgustingly nice. We walked there from several blocks away along a route we knew from living in a condo once upon a time. There’s a passageway at the back of a patio beside a gallery that takes you through a little parking lot, across an alley, and into the next street. Only locals know it’s there. The quick damp chill inside the dark adobe walls felt old world European to me. This was also less than terrible, as I noted at the time, and I had a vision of living in walking distance of wonderful restaurants where we could spend lots of money without having to drive all the way to Santa Fe first. This was almost cunning in its brilliance. The corollary was a secret sacred studio in a fine insane location, and lo, I did rejoice.

We were going to go to Pagosa Springs, Colorado for an overnighter as a birthday trip. I have a cyber-buddy there who had me psyched to check it out. The day before, something told me not to go, and being me, I cancelled. That resulted in the tenderloin, you see, and and any benefit deriving therefrom. While this switch was underway, that very afternoon in fact, the guy in Pagosa had a heart attack! On my birthday, in the town where I was going, and he’s only forty-three! Doing fine now, and I’m glad.

This afternoon I hiked again at Taos Valley Overlook. I could see for ninety miles and no one else was on the trail. Seventy-five degrees and a stiff cool breeze. Sometimes I spontaneously pray out there. I did today and hit a thing that made me cry a little in the open air with white clouds etched into a perfect blue. I don’t know what to make of that except that something must be true. A collared lizard looked at me and froze until I passed.