You can’t see the summit, but it’s up there under the highest cloud that still shows a touch of morning pink. At 10,801 feet it’s not the tallest mountain in these parts, but it’s the closest. I’ve hiked up there, not all the way to the top, but almost, on the back side you can’t see here. There’s a stretch of jumbled rocky cliffs that give a very different impression of this place, much more lonely, wild, and dangerous.
Shot with Pentax K-x on auto w/ 55-300 telephoto lens 50 yards from my front door
The pun is not too subtle, is it?
Something strange happens almost every time I’m out here. The energy on this particular stretch is rather strong, in fact. This is more or less where I once “fell” twice on successive days, going each way. The first time was a surprise. The second time, I was actually trying not to fall down, aware of the danger as I walked uphill, and still I crashed into the dirt! To me it felt like being swatted by a giant hand.
Today I experienced an auditory hallucination about fifty yards up the hill from here. That happens a lot anyway, what with my hearing loss—it’s not just that you don’t hear things, you hear things that just aren’t there at all. Little noises end up amplified against the stillness. Buzzing horseflies sound like human voices. There may be rattles, scraping, knocking on the rocks behind me as I walk, like animals or people on the trail. Maybe it’s the sound of bighorns clattering over the rocks just out of sight below the ridge, I tell myself. If the sun’s gone down, I think of spaceships, strange forbidden rituals, warps of time and space.
This morning it was a single human voice, a woman, as loud and clear as anything. I thought for certain she’d be with a group of bikers coming up the path. “Where’s the hand?” it said. I was so sure this was real, I stood off the trail to wait for them to pass, but no one came. Where’s the hand? Are you kidding me? [Go see the first paragraph again.] The next thing was, I thought I’d better find the goddamned thing, if there was one that wanted finding. I scanned the hillside on the other side of the arroyo. Nothing. I gazed into the brush with unfocused eyes. Nothing. No bony fingers reaching from the dust. Probably a good thing.
Anyway, looky where I get to hike! Earth boy does good.
This is your brain on puckey fruit
FOR BEHOLD, something completely different. This is an excerpt from a “rock & roll science fiction” novel I haven’t touched in over a year. What follows is part of what Anne Lamott calls the all-important “shitty first draft,” posted here temporarily to get my juices flowing one way or the other. The main character drives a wretched ’57 Mercury, a wisecracking genetically-altered Rhamphorhynchus pops up at the end, and everybody must get stoned. Enjoy until I take it down! – JHF
Chapter Three: Eternal Dawn (First Contact)
Above the darkened land they flew, almost silently, their long gray-white wings moving in slow cadence. A tall volcano in the distance spewed glowing ash above a thin layer of clouds that flickered pink and orange from the blasts. Down below a ribbon of water flowed through dense green forests on the way to a vast grassy plain. Between the fliers and the ground at lower altitudes, smaller nocturnal airborne creatures criss-crossed singly and in groups as stars glittered above them in the heavens. The night sky was full of life of all kinds, as was the daytime blue.
The great beasts with crested heads and long pointed beaks turned slowly south and glided lower as they approached a coastline glistening in reflected moonlight. Drawing closer together in formation, the dozen reptiles aimed for a circular patch of sky that shimmered faintly golden over an ocean where no ships sailed. Shifting into single file, they flew through the portal with a crackle and a flash and disappeared, leaving only the hissing sound of distant surf behind.
The other creatures went about their business, on their way to daytime roosts in caves and canyons in faraway mountains, or in tall trees along the margins of the open spaces, where they fed on lesser prey in shrieking flocks throughout the night. In the daylight, others took their places in the air or running on the ground. Some moved slowly in the ancient forests or plodded in the marshes by the river and the coast. Day or night, everywhere was gnashing, bawling life and death in an undulating carpet from horizon to horizon, shaken constantly by surging Nature and migrating predators.
In an certain corner of the blue-black night, a tiny spot of light glowed brighter than surrounding stars. A thousand miles away, other gray-white fliers with folded wings stood erect atop a flattened mountain peak and watched with eyes betraying no emotion. For some time now they had gathered and observed the growing speck. No aftermath escaped their recognition, as they’d already lived it. One hundred million years into the future, another mountain glistened in the morning sun and pebbles shifted underfoot. They noted this the way they noted everything that came and went, including the small black car that followed Jaxon Bat.
For them the world was ever just beginning. They moved through time like water and lived everywhere at once, acting purely out of instinct. They were capable of thought but had transcended that dull need and rarely used it. Once upon a time they’d forced their will onto another species for a purpose long extinct and moved on. The subjects of this accidental evolution carried on the best they could under blue Southwestern skies, tethered to the single mind that flickered through the eons and gave sight beyond the veil…
All you gotta do is wear the telephoto lens there on your nose
This here is an immature female rufous hummingbird. (At least I think so.) I love close-ups that show the detail of the feathers; they’re always more spectacular than I could imagine. Who in the world designs these things? Oh, right.
While we’re on the topic, here’s an old FarrFeed video from 2009 you need to see. This five-second clip is slowed down to forty seconds. The resulting sounds you hear, all hummingbird calls and chirps, are one hundred percent natural! I didn’t know there was any audio at all until I slowed the video down.
Amazing, isn’t it? Like a freaking jungle!
Every mountain in this view is an extinct volcano (we hope)
Yes, it’s that view again. Why not? It’s different every time, and yesterday was perfect. I don’t have much to say right now, just look at this. That’s the gorge of the Rio Pueblo in the foreground, with the larger and deeper Rio Grande Gorge behind it. The tectonic plate on the other side thinks it’s going to Colorado, the one on this side is happy where it is.
.png)