We’d just finished our Labor Day picnic dinner of ham sandwiches in the living room. The front door was open and the air was getting cool. I decided to change my clothes, since I was still wearing the same shorts and aloha shirt I’d put on to do a quick mile and a half walk earlier. As I stood there in my underwear, I realized I might as well just grab my fleece bathrobe instead. When I came out of the bedroom, I saw this amazing light at the top of the hill. A minute later I was two hundred yards from the house, in my bathrobe, taking this picture, and aren’t I glad I did.
If we find a house to buy in town, that’ll never happen again. On the other hand, if we don’t get the hell out of here soon, the next thing you know I’ll be jumping off the gorge bridge, and all the way down I’ll be thinking, geez, why didn’t we just rent a fucking condo? Meanwhile, just before our picnic in the living room, I found another dead pack rat in the trap behind the washing machine. That makes the fourth one in ten days. They steal cat food from the dish on the floor and stash it away wherever they can. This happens in broad daylight. I’ve found kibble in my pants, the washing machine, and glasses on the kitchen shelves. (Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.) At least we don’t have bears. We used to, but the pack rats scared them off.
John Hamilton Farr lives at 7,000 feet in Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico, U.S.A. As New York Times best-selling author James C. Moore tells it, John is “a man attuned to the world who sees it differently than you and I and writes about it with a language and a vision of life that is impossible to ignore.” This JHFARR.COM site is the master writing archive. To email John, please see CONTACT INFO on .png)
I don’t believe it will never happen again.
You have captured a stellar collection of Taos sky photographs — and your books and blogs tell that you have never been concerned about dressing for the occasion. A town house for you will just make it more interesting for the neighbors!
Thank you so much for the kind words! I realize, however, that my writing was imprecise. What I meant was that this kind of unobstructed sky view would be rare in town, not that I wouldn’t be taking pictures in my bathrobe. As you rightly infer, however, I would certainly run outside in my skivvies or anything else to take a picture like that, neighbors or no neighbors. 🙂
Just love this photo and I bet you’d run out even in your skivvies to get it, no bathrobe.
Nekkid as the proverbial jaybird when I rushed outside in single-digit cold to take this one!
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