By S. Derrickson Moore
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — I opened the garage door during high winds and was attacked by an eagle, a giant fish, a Navy jet and a ship with red and black sails.
It was my kite collection, jumping off their hooks, wagging their tails, raring to fly.
I can sympathize. This is the time of year when a young man’s fancy allegedly turns to spring thoughts of love. Many of us are just ready for winter to be over.
Even here in high desert country, where the February snow that finally frosted my backyard was bracketed between two 70 degree days and only lasted from about 2 to 3 a.m. If my ancient Michigan snow-alert genes had not activated and awoken me, I would have entirely missed the big blizzard of ’08.
I feel embarrassed even mentioning it to anyone but my Florida relatives.
Loved ones in the Midwest and the Pacific Northwest tell me sad tales of being snowed in for days, in an inaccessible Iowa cabin the snow plows can’t reach, or e-mail photos of a blue VW almost totally buried in the icy Idaho drifts.
Here, all we have to contend with are the blustery Doña Anas, but that’s enough. They may seem refreshing at first, especially since we know they are the dues we must pay for full-tilt spring. But it doesn’t take long to wear us down. We go from being delicately air-brushed to feeling brutally sand-blasted.
We go out to investigate the state of the yard and notice the peeling paint we should do something about, the cracks in the stucco and adobe.
Then there are the piles of debris, organic and manmade, all democratically windblown into my previously neat little courtyard. It’s mostly yucca and evergreens, red rock and bark mulch. There’s nothing much to shed or blow away.
Maybe it’s a matter of balance. I don’t know if it’s true that nature abhors a vacuum, but nature in my neighborhood seems inclined to vacuum up everybody else’s leaves, twigs, leftover Halloween candy, Styrofoam and plastic and airlift it into my yard.
I’ve already done one autumn run with the leaf blower and was saving the next blitz for the end of the worst siege of Doña Anas. But when will that be? Quién sabe? Who knows?
No, I should probably stay indoors, build bookcases to replace the ones that collapsed and organize the closets and throw things away. Then I would finally have room to stash away those holiday and birthday gifts and display the For the Love of Art Month purchases I swore I would not make this year.
But after watching dozens of happy ladies in red and purple doing the can-can and forming a conga line to dance through Hotel Encanto, I found I did not feel guilty at all about lingering with a friend over Sunday brunch and cool jazz at the wonderful new incarnation of Meson de Mesilla.
When I got home, I contemplated spring cleaning, but decided the eagle, fish, jet and ship have the right idea.
Maybe I should just go with the air flow. I think I’ll go fly some kites.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Top 5 Ways To Celebrate Valentine's Day
By S. Derrickson Moore
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — How will you celebrate Valentine’s Day this year?
Sometimes, the best things in life — like love —are conveyed in the simplest ways. Here ‘s a list of top five ways to brighten someone’s day, including your own, on Thursday, Feb. 14.
5. Start the day with a V-Day breakfast. Serve red foods: strawberries or raspberries, red juice (or mix a little cranberry juice with the kids’ milk to rosy things up), scrambled eggs with fiery red chile salsa, and toast or scones with red fruit preserves.
4. Leave anonymous Valentines for your colleagues at work. Make your own or get a kids’ school pack. If you have a mentor at work, honor him or her with a “thank you, teacher” Valentine.
3. Write little love notes and stick them in the kids’ lunch bags, or the pockets or purses of significant others.
2. Wear red, including at least one unexpected accessory: red socks, a red hat or a red rose or carnation in your lapel.
And the No. 1 way to celebrate Valentine’s Day: Say “I Love You” to at least one person.
+ + +
Need more ideas? Here are some romantic events coming up. For more, check For the Love of Art Month listings in this week’s Sun Life section or online at www.lcsun-news.com
• “Love Letters” at the Black Box Theatre: Eighth annual No Strings Theatre Company production, starring Toni Marie and Mike Cook. Performances on Valentine’s Day will be at 5 and 8 p.m. Tickets are $10 for regular admission, $9 for students and seniors over 65. Info: (575) 523-1223, nstcbbt@zianet.com or http://www.no-strings.org
• Treat your Valentine to tea. Las Cruces Friends of Chamber Music Tea at 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. Feb. 16 at the Victorian Tea Room, 1605 S. Main St. will feature music by Madera Wind Duo, scones, sandwiches and sweets plus a silent auction. Tickets are $30 and must be purchased in advance at the tea room or call (575) 523-7714.
• “Amour, a Multilingual Love Poetry Reading” at Border Book Festival: Multilingual love poetry readings and love songs will be at 7 p.m. Feb. 16 at the Cultural Center de Mesilla, 2231-A Calle de Parian in Mesilla. Sudeshua Sengupta reads and sings the poems of Nobel Laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore in Bengali. Others will read in French, German, Spanish and Urdu. Also featured are photos by Daniel Zolinsky from the Border Book Festival archives. The readings will be with emcee Claude Fouillade, French professor and poet from NMSU. Donations accepted. Info: Border Book Festival at (575) 523-3988.
• Wayne Crawford hosts a Valentine Day open Mic at the Bean Coffeehouse, Avenida de Mesilla. Sign in starts at 7:30 p.m. “ Love and love-lost poems are especially welcome on this holiday reading,” Crawford said.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — How will you celebrate Valentine’s Day this year?
Sometimes, the best things in life — like love —are conveyed in the simplest ways. Here ‘s a list of top five ways to brighten someone’s day, including your own, on Thursday, Feb. 14.
5. Start the day with a V-Day breakfast. Serve red foods: strawberries or raspberries, red juice (or mix a little cranberry juice with the kids’ milk to rosy things up), scrambled eggs with fiery red chile salsa, and toast or scones with red fruit preserves.
4. Leave anonymous Valentines for your colleagues at work. Make your own or get a kids’ school pack. If you have a mentor at work, honor him or her with a “thank you, teacher” Valentine.
3. Write little love notes and stick them in the kids’ lunch bags, or the pockets or purses of significant others.
2. Wear red, including at least one unexpected accessory: red socks, a red hat or a red rose or carnation in your lapel.
And the No. 1 way to celebrate Valentine’s Day: Say “I Love You” to at least one person.
+ + +
Need more ideas? Here are some romantic events coming up. For more, check For the Love of Art Month listings in this week’s Sun Life section or online at www.lcsun-news.com
• “Love Letters” at the Black Box Theatre: Eighth annual No Strings Theatre Company production, starring Toni Marie and Mike Cook. Performances on Valentine’s Day will be at 5 and 8 p.m. Tickets are $10 for regular admission, $9 for students and seniors over 65. Info: (575) 523-1223, nstcbbt@zianet.com or http://www.no-strings.org
• Treat your Valentine to tea. Las Cruces Friends of Chamber Music Tea at 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. Feb. 16 at the Victorian Tea Room, 1605 S. Main St. will feature music by Madera Wind Duo, scones, sandwiches and sweets plus a silent auction. Tickets are $30 and must be purchased in advance at the tea room or call (575) 523-7714.
• “Amour, a Multilingual Love Poetry Reading” at Border Book Festival: Multilingual love poetry readings and love songs will be at 7 p.m. Feb. 16 at the Cultural Center de Mesilla, 2231-A Calle de Parian in Mesilla. Sudeshua Sengupta reads and sings the poems of Nobel Laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore in Bengali. Others will read in French, German, Spanish and Urdu. Also featured are photos by Daniel Zolinsky from the Border Book Festival archives. The readings will be with emcee Claude Fouillade, French professor and poet from NMSU. Donations accepted. Info: Border Book Festival at (575) 523-3988.
• Wayne Crawford hosts a Valentine Day open Mic at the Bean Coffeehouse, Avenida de Mesilla. Sign in starts at 7:30 p.m. “ Love and love-lost poems are especially welcome on this holiday reading,” Crawford said.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Friday, January 25, 2008
Hot times & full-tilt February fiestas
LAS CRUCES — Why is February our most romantic and festive month?
Maybe after lackluster January, which is usually our coldest winter month, we can all use some extra warmth wherever we can find it, and there’s nothing like Valentines and declarations of love to encourage some extra cuddling.
Perhaps surprisingly for a snow-hating person who grew up in frigid Northern climes, February has always been a favorite time of year.
It may be a matter of comparison with January, a month full of my least favorite things. It started when I was a kid, when I first decided that as long as things were cold and miserable, I might as well get all the odious chores over and done with.
So January is the month when I get the tax stuff together, take stock of what went right or wrong in the previous year, schedule household repairs, clean up the yard, visit the doctor to renew prescriptions, weigh in and face the ravages of the holidays, get my teeth and carpets cleaned. Then it’s time to figure out how much home and personal physical repair and maintenance will cut into funds for vacations.
And maybe, research getaways to tropical climes. Because you have to have some fun, or at least some prospect of fun. Even in a month full of my least favorite things.
But then comes February. Red hot with romance and the promise of spring (especially if you’re smart enough to move south from Michigan).
February includes Valentine’s Day and my birthday and thus the start of a new year for me personally, and in 2008, for 1.3 billion Chinese, since Chinese New Year falls on my birthday this year.
February goes by in a flash because it’s filled with things to commemorate and celebrate, all packed into our shortest month.
It’s also the weirdest and wildest and, some might say, the most creative, spiritual and charmingly inventive and delightfully eccentric month, being the native territory of Aquarians. There are more of us in the hall of fame, it is said, than any other sign of the zodiac, and it’s the dawning of our age, as we’ve been reminding you since the harbinger 1960s.
And even in the shortest month there are some surprise bonuses, with a few days left over to welcome the birthdays of our ethereal neighbors, the Pisceans, who may be even more deeply weird and wonderful than Aquarians.
February is, after all, the only month that gets an extra day every four years, and it happens in Pisces season.
We are fortunate to live very close to the “Leap Year Capital of the World” in Anthony, which straddles the New Mexico-Texas border but has always seemed to have its true corazon in the Land of Enchantment. It’s all thanks to Mary Ann Brown, a Leap Year baby who had the delightfully wacky Piscean vision to create a full-tilt fiesta to celebrate those rarest of milagro birthday kids.
February has lots of other special treats and reasons to celebrate in addition to Valentines, Day, Presidents’ Day, Lincoln’s and Washington’s birthdays, Groundhog Day, Shrove Tuesday, Ash Wednesday, Mardi Gras and Mexico’s Dia de la Bandera (Flag Day) and Dia de la Candaleria.
It’s Black History Month in America, with traditional local observances that have included everything from lectures and films to art exhibitions and music and other cultural events and performances.
And, of course, it’s also For the Love of Art Month in Las Cruces and Mesilla, week after week devoted to enthusiastic celebrations of what too many of us may take for granted: life in one of the richest, most culturally diverse and artistically blessed communities our size in the world.
It’s a great month to look around and enjoy something new. Go to the symphony or one of our many theaters or museums. Catch an art exhibit at galleries or special art month venues all over town. Or consider putting together your own show at the office. Ask everyone to bring in a work of art or sing a song together during lunch hour. Make your own Valentines.
Imagine something artistic and make it happen.
Be creative. Go wild. It’s almost February, the shortest, richest, most action-packed full-tilt fiesta month!
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Maybe after lackluster January, which is usually our coldest winter month, we can all use some extra warmth wherever we can find it, and there’s nothing like Valentines and declarations of love to encourage some extra cuddling.
Perhaps surprisingly for a snow-hating person who grew up in frigid Northern climes, February has always been a favorite time of year.
It may be a matter of comparison with January, a month full of my least favorite things. It started when I was a kid, when I first decided that as long as things were cold and miserable, I might as well get all the odious chores over and done with.
So January is the month when I get the tax stuff together, take stock of what went right or wrong in the previous year, schedule household repairs, clean up the yard, visit the doctor to renew prescriptions, weigh in and face the ravages of the holidays, get my teeth and carpets cleaned. Then it’s time to figure out how much home and personal physical repair and maintenance will cut into funds for vacations.
And maybe, research getaways to tropical climes. Because you have to have some fun, or at least some prospect of fun. Even in a month full of my least favorite things.
But then comes February. Red hot with romance and the promise of spring (especially if you’re smart enough to move south from Michigan).
February includes Valentine’s Day and my birthday and thus the start of a new year for me personally, and in 2008, for 1.3 billion Chinese, since Chinese New Year falls on my birthday this year.
February goes by in a flash because it’s filled with things to commemorate and celebrate, all packed into our shortest month.
It’s also the weirdest and wildest and, some might say, the most creative, spiritual and charmingly inventive and delightfully eccentric month, being the native territory of Aquarians. There are more of us in the hall of fame, it is said, than any other sign of the zodiac, and it’s the dawning of our age, as we’ve been reminding you since the harbinger 1960s.
And even in the shortest month there are some surprise bonuses, with a few days left over to welcome the birthdays of our ethereal neighbors, the Pisceans, who may be even more deeply weird and wonderful than Aquarians.
February is, after all, the only month that gets an extra day every four years, and it happens in Pisces season.
We are fortunate to live very close to the “Leap Year Capital of the World” in Anthony, which straddles the New Mexico-Texas border but has always seemed to have its true corazon in the Land of Enchantment. It’s all thanks to Mary Ann Brown, a Leap Year baby who had the delightfully wacky Piscean vision to create a full-tilt fiesta to celebrate those rarest of milagro birthday kids.
February has lots of other special treats and reasons to celebrate in addition to Valentines, Day, Presidents’ Day, Lincoln’s and Washington’s birthdays, Groundhog Day, Shrove Tuesday, Ash Wednesday, Mardi Gras and Mexico’s Dia de la Bandera (Flag Day) and Dia de la Candaleria.
It’s Black History Month in America, with traditional local observances that have included everything from lectures and films to art exhibitions and music and other cultural events and performances.
And, of course, it’s also For the Love of Art Month in Las Cruces and Mesilla, week after week devoted to enthusiastic celebrations of what too many of us may take for granted: life in one of the richest, most culturally diverse and artistically blessed communities our size in the world.
It’s a great month to look around and enjoy something new. Go to the symphony or one of our many theaters or museums. Catch an art exhibit at galleries or special art month venues all over town. Or consider putting together your own show at the office. Ask everyone to bring in a work of art or sing a song together during lunch hour. Make your own Valentines.
Imagine something artistic and make it happen.
Be creative. Go wild. It’s almost February, the shortest, richest, most action-packed full-tilt fiesta month!
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Dancing with roadrunners
By S. Derrickson Moore
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — The forms of my world are fading away…or going full-tilt surreal. Almost every week, it seems, there is something new and strange in the ‘hood.
Nationwide recessions and housing crises are finally having their trickle-down effect on our rampant development, but now that the construction dust is settling, and the winter dust storms are blowing stuff up, up and away, and we’re packing up the last of the distracting holiday decorations, you, too, may look around and notice how much things are changing in your neighborhood.
And there are a few things that don’t seem to be changing enough, due to another force that transcends our fronteras and control: global warming.
It’s January and anything can happen, but by the middle of the month, things were still blooming in my yard that shouldn’t be.
Most of the verbena and lantana bushes have dropped their green leaves and colorful little flowers and gone into hibernation, but two stubborn desperado bushes, one in the front yard and one in the back, are still producing lacy bits of green and bright purple blooms.
And every now and again, I notice a confused looking housefly or butterfly making pseudo-spring rounds.
A lot of the jackrabbits have moved on to wilder desert climes, but I have a new paisano. I’ve christened him Errol Jr. because, like his first roadrunner namesake, he’s a dashing soul. Errol the First established his own cozy condo in the eaves of an isolated home on acreage in Picacho Peak where I lived a decade ago. He was an elegant, laid-back gentleman bird who would complain subtly if I disturbed him at his slumber too early in the morning, but was always in the mood for a fiesta if he smelled albondigas simmering through the kitchen window. He earned his keep snacking on rattlesnakes and sometimes joined me for walks down mountain trails.
Errol Jr. showed up a few months ago. Strangely enough, the first roadrunner to establish regular routes through my neighborhood, turned up after another recent wave of development and human traffic escalation. Not surprisingly, he’s more of a streetwise, hip urban guy than the courtly rural gentleman who was my first serious roadrunner amigo. E-Jay (Errol Jr.’s rap name) seems a lot more hyper, too. Maybe the neighborhood Starbucks is on his rounds and he’s running on a contact caffeine high.
He’ll look me in the eye, but doesn’t seem inclined to share a leisurely amble with me at this stage in our relationship. It’s true that I haven’t wooed him with albondigas. I’m not much into red meat these days and somehow, Boca Burger meatballs just don’t have the same allure. I’ve noticed that his route includes a rock fence that runs through my lot, and if I position a slice of toast there, before E-Jay’s morning rounds, he gratefully snaps it up.
Then he’s off, in a cloud of dust on the sandy trail behind my patio. Without a word. Those of us who have spent quality time with roadrunners know they are more likely to mutter something that sounds like a rachety Louis Armstrong riff, rather than the “beep-beep” of the famed cartoon character.
While I’m hanging with my peeps in the ‘hood, E-Jay may be off to rally with his posse of roadrunner beeps at some as-yet-undisclosed hideaway, maybe one of the last stands of mesquite on this side of the newest subdivision, or a highway underpass.
I just remembered that this is Mesilla Valley Balloon Rally weekend and the fates have been known to stage a landing or two nearby. This could be the perfect Sunday morning to head out to the patio with a camera. With a little luck, I might be able to get a shot that includes E-Jay munching on seven-grain toast in a rock garden full of enthusiastically flowering things that shouldn’t be blooming in the winter, with a few ethereal hot air balloons floating toward the Organ Mountains in the background.
It’s another surreal January in Las Cruces.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — The forms of my world are fading away…or going full-tilt surreal. Almost every week, it seems, there is something new and strange in the ‘hood.
Nationwide recessions and housing crises are finally having their trickle-down effect on our rampant development, but now that the construction dust is settling, and the winter dust storms are blowing stuff up, up and away, and we’re packing up the last of the distracting holiday decorations, you, too, may look around and notice how much things are changing in your neighborhood.
And there are a few things that don’t seem to be changing enough, due to another force that transcends our fronteras and control: global warming.
It’s January and anything can happen, but by the middle of the month, things were still blooming in my yard that shouldn’t be.
Most of the verbena and lantana bushes have dropped their green leaves and colorful little flowers and gone into hibernation, but two stubborn desperado bushes, one in the front yard and one in the back, are still producing lacy bits of green and bright purple blooms.
And every now and again, I notice a confused looking housefly or butterfly making pseudo-spring rounds.
A lot of the jackrabbits have moved on to wilder desert climes, but I have a new paisano. I’ve christened him Errol Jr. because, like his first roadrunner namesake, he’s a dashing soul. Errol the First established his own cozy condo in the eaves of an isolated home on acreage in Picacho Peak where I lived a decade ago. He was an elegant, laid-back gentleman bird who would complain subtly if I disturbed him at his slumber too early in the morning, but was always in the mood for a fiesta if he smelled albondigas simmering through the kitchen window. He earned his keep snacking on rattlesnakes and sometimes joined me for walks down mountain trails.
Errol Jr. showed up a few months ago. Strangely enough, the first roadrunner to establish regular routes through my neighborhood, turned up after another recent wave of development and human traffic escalation. Not surprisingly, he’s more of a streetwise, hip urban guy than the courtly rural gentleman who was my first serious roadrunner amigo. E-Jay (Errol Jr.’s rap name) seems a lot more hyper, too. Maybe the neighborhood Starbucks is on his rounds and he’s running on a contact caffeine high.
He’ll look me in the eye, but doesn’t seem inclined to share a leisurely amble with me at this stage in our relationship. It’s true that I haven’t wooed him with albondigas. I’m not much into red meat these days and somehow, Boca Burger meatballs just don’t have the same allure. I’ve noticed that his route includes a rock fence that runs through my lot, and if I position a slice of toast there, before E-Jay’s morning rounds, he gratefully snaps it up.
Then he’s off, in a cloud of dust on the sandy trail behind my patio. Without a word. Those of us who have spent quality time with roadrunners know they are more likely to mutter something that sounds like a rachety Louis Armstrong riff, rather than the “beep-beep” of the famed cartoon character.
While I’m hanging with my peeps in the ‘hood, E-Jay may be off to rally with his posse of roadrunner beeps at some as-yet-undisclosed hideaway, maybe one of the last stands of mesquite on this side of the newest subdivision, or a highway underpass.
I just remembered that this is Mesilla Valley Balloon Rally weekend and the fates have been known to stage a landing or two nearby. This could be the perfect Sunday morning to head out to the patio with a camera. With a little luck, I might be able to get a shot that includes E-Jay munching on seven-grain toast in a rock garden full of enthusiastically flowering things that shouldn’t be blooming in the winter, with a few ethereal hot air balloons floating toward the Organ Mountains in the background.
It’s another surreal January in Las Cruces.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Friday, December 28, 2007
2007 was a very good year
LAS CRUCES — Whatever the breaking news, the most vivid, standout moments of 2007 for me were spiritual and artistic, and often both.
There were talks with hundreds of artists, and, for our new collectors series, with discerning souls who collect everything from mice and military memorabilia to lutes, butterflies and dollhouses.
There was a spring trek through Tularosa, with former Las Cruces Jean McDonnell, who showed me a new cultural center, and how one of my favorite little communities is on track to become one of the world’s leading centers of Tibetan culture and healing traditions.
There was an afternoon at the new Temple Beth-El, seeing the just-installed Ark of the Covenant beautifully crafted by Melvin Kirschner and his son Bob and painted by Debbie Levy.
I discussed Geronimo’s life and legacy with his descendant, Harlyn Geronimo.
There was a bright fall day, wandering through what is reportedly North America’s oldest continuously inhabited community, Acoma Sky City, with my soulmate Dr. Roger and a friendly dog, and a friendly guide, Waya Gary Keene, who seemed familiar. It wasn’t until I got to the Acoma cultural center and saw his art that I remembered he’d been artist of the week years ago, after I met him at an NMSU powwow.
Doc Severinsen was another familiar face...we’d last met years ago in Palm Beach, when I was promoting his concert for a benefit for the Palm Beach County Arts Council. He was charming and fit as ever. He didn’t seem to miss a beat or a breath, bounding up and down the aisles at Pan Am, for high-energy numbers with Mariachi Cobre and the Las Cruces Symphony.
I keep telling amigos that if you stay in one special place long enough, much of the rest of the world will come by. Who would think Doc would choose Las Cruces for his farewell performance with a symphony, or that I would end the year hanging out on the Downtown Mall waiting for Charlese Theron, who, with fellow Oscar actress Kim Basinger, was in town to film a major motion picture?
Remarkable things seem almost routine in synchonicity city. When I peered into the pool blue, old soul eyes of “The Burning Plain” director-screenwriter Guillermo Arriago, and he told me he loves the Organ mountains and wants to buy a house here, I wasn’t surprised. He won’t, of course, be our first Oscar-nominated screenwriter: Mark Medoff settled in many decades ago and has gone on to make several films and take two plays born here to Broadway (his first won a Tony Award).
Another great moment in theater came with the premier of Bob Diven’s fun and moving dinosaur musical “Extinction.” It was nice to see what has happened in the decade I’ve been watching Isaac Quiroga and Jessie Medoff Bunchman. They’ve grown into amazing talents. So has Bob. I enjoyed a metaphysical morning with him, sitting on a bale of hay before RenFaire opened, discussing where we came from, why we’re here and where we’re going.
Later, we joined several other Las Crucens for NMSU’s Great Conversations dinner and benefit, which those who attended hope will be an annual event. I left feeling blessed, because I live in a city where people love great conversations, and my vocation allows me (in fact, requires me) to have hundreds and sometimes thousands of great conversations every year.
Still, sometimes, a dance or a meatball or a tamale is worth a thousand words. I love the Tortugas pilgrimage, and the day of dancing that follows and was happy to share it with dear amigos, newlywed Santa Fe childhood sweethearts reunited. Thanks to David Fierro, who snuck me “backstage,” I also finally managed to overcome deadlines and enjoy my first official Guadalupe fiesta albondigas, plucked from a pot of steaming meatballs...like the fiesta itself, a sagey, spicy, spiritual experience.
So was my first Tamalada. I planned to just dash in and cover the workshop at La Cocina Restaurant, but sponsors, members of Grijalva family and Denise Chavez of the Border Book Fest Foundation, insisted I get hands-on experience, and I built at least 60 veggie, chicken and green chile and desert tamales. I am now a licensed Tamalera and I have the certificate to prove it. Nice to know I have another career to fall back on, if journalism pales.
But events are popping there, too. Our Web site reached a monthly peak of 1,300,000 visits. I started a blog and embraced our future as mojos: mobile journalists transcending print media to download audio and video online.
And speaking of new generations, art and spirituality again combined for one of my most moving personal moment of ‘07, sitting on the back patio watching son Ry and grandson Alex composing and playing duets on their guitars as the sun rose over the mysterious Organs, mood ring of our querencia.
I thought of all the conversations I’ve had with newcomers who said they saw our Shangri-la mountains and knew this was the place, and remembered talks with spiritual, artistic souls before I decided to move here, who concluded that Las Cruces is the place where great souls of the planet have come to circle their wagons, pitch their tents and make their last American stand, to preserve and rekindle what is best and brightest of la raza cosmica in portentous times.
May you find creative adventures in our querencia in 2008.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
There were talks with hundreds of artists, and, for our new collectors series, with discerning souls who collect everything from mice and military memorabilia to lutes, butterflies and dollhouses.
There was a spring trek through Tularosa, with former Las Cruces Jean McDonnell, who showed me a new cultural center, and how one of my favorite little communities is on track to become one of the world’s leading centers of Tibetan culture and healing traditions.
There was an afternoon at the new Temple Beth-El, seeing the just-installed Ark of the Covenant beautifully crafted by Melvin Kirschner and his son Bob and painted by Debbie Levy.
I discussed Geronimo’s life and legacy with his descendant, Harlyn Geronimo.
There was a bright fall day, wandering through what is reportedly North America’s oldest continuously inhabited community, Acoma Sky City, with my soulmate Dr. Roger and a friendly dog, and a friendly guide, Waya Gary Keene, who seemed familiar. It wasn’t until I got to the Acoma cultural center and saw his art that I remembered he’d been artist of the week years ago, after I met him at an NMSU powwow.
Doc Severinsen was another familiar face...we’d last met years ago in Palm Beach, when I was promoting his concert for a benefit for the Palm Beach County Arts Council. He was charming and fit as ever. He didn’t seem to miss a beat or a breath, bounding up and down the aisles at Pan Am, for high-energy numbers with Mariachi Cobre and the Las Cruces Symphony.
I keep telling amigos that if you stay in one special place long enough, much of the rest of the world will come by. Who would think Doc would choose Las Cruces for his farewell performance with a symphony, or that I would end the year hanging out on the Downtown Mall waiting for Charlese Theron, who, with fellow Oscar actress Kim Basinger, was in town to film a major motion picture?
Remarkable things seem almost routine in synchonicity city. When I peered into the pool blue, old soul eyes of “The Burning Plain” director-screenwriter Guillermo Arriago, and he told me he loves the Organ mountains and wants to buy a house here, I wasn’t surprised. He won’t, of course, be our first Oscar-nominated screenwriter: Mark Medoff settled in many decades ago and has gone on to make several films and take two plays born here to Broadway (his first won a Tony Award).
Another great moment in theater came with the premier of Bob Diven’s fun and moving dinosaur musical “Extinction.” It was nice to see what has happened in the decade I’ve been watching Isaac Quiroga and Jessie Medoff Bunchman. They’ve grown into amazing talents. So has Bob. I enjoyed a metaphysical morning with him, sitting on a bale of hay before RenFaire opened, discussing where we came from, why we’re here and where we’re going.
Later, we joined several other Las Crucens for NMSU’s Great Conversations dinner and benefit, which those who attended hope will be an annual event. I left feeling blessed, because I live in a city where people love great conversations, and my vocation allows me (in fact, requires me) to have hundreds and sometimes thousands of great conversations every year.
Still, sometimes, a dance or a meatball or a tamale is worth a thousand words. I love the Tortugas pilgrimage, and the day of dancing that follows and was happy to share it with dear amigos, newlywed Santa Fe childhood sweethearts reunited. Thanks to David Fierro, who snuck me “backstage,” I also finally managed to overcome deadlines and enjoy my first official Guadalupe fiesta albondigas, plucked from a pot of steaming meatballs...like the fiesta itself, a sagey, spicy, spiritual experience.
So was my first Tamalada. I planned to just dash in and cover the workshop at La Cocina Restaurant, but sponsors, members of Grijalva family and Denise Chavez of the Border Book Fest Foundation, insisted I get hands-on experience, and I built at least 60 veggie, chicken and green chile and desert tamales. I am now a licensed Tamalera and I have the certificate to prove it. Nice to know I have another career to fall back on, if journalism pales.
But events are popping there, too. Our Web site reached a monthly peak of 1,300,000 visits. I started a blog and embraced our future as mojos: mobile journalists transcending print media to download audio and video online.
And speaking of new generations, art and spirituality again combined for one of my most moving personal moment of ‘07, sitting on the back patio watching son Ry and grandson Alex composing and playing duets on their guitars as the sun rose over the mysterious Organs, mood ring of our querencia.
I thought of all the conversations I’ve had with newcomers who said they saw our Shangri-la mountains and knew this was the place, and remembered talks with spiritual, artistic souls before I decided to move here, who concluded that Las Cruces is the place where great souls of the planet have come to circle their wagons, pitch their tents and make their last American stand, to preserve and rekindle what is best and brightest of la raza cosmica in portentous times.
May you find creative adventures in our querencia in 2008.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Sing-along today!
Handel’s Messiah Sing-a-long
St. Mark's United Methodist Church
5005 Love Road (off Country Club Road)
Saturday, December 22, 7:00pm
Handel’s Messiah in Performance
A last-minute Messiah Sing-along op
St. Mark's United Methodist Church
5005 Love Road (off Country Club Road)
Sunday, December 23, 10:00am
What is a Sing-a-long?
Audience members "sing-a-long" with the choir, while sitting in the audience
Audience members bring their own score of the Messiah or, use the music supplied at the door
Audience members are divided into sections - soprano, alto, tenor, bass
Director conducts audience and orchestra
Solo arias are performed by professional soloists
Audience members not wanting to sing, sit at the back of the sanctuary to listen
Everyone is invited to sing - come as you are
If you have never sung the Messiah, now is your chance
No entrance fee
***If you would like to rehearse with the choir and orchestra before the sing-a-long, the rehearsal with orchestra will be Saturday, December 22, at 2pm at St. Mark's UMC.
St. Mark's United Methodist Church
5005 Love Road (off Country Club Road)
Saturday, December 22, 7:00pm
Handel’s Messiah in Performance
A last-minute Messiah Sing-along op
St. Mark's United Methodist Church
5005 Love Road (off Country Club Road)
Sunday, December 23, 10:00am
What is a Sing-a-long?
Audience members "sing-a-long" with the choir, while sitting in the audience
Audience members bring their own score of the Messiah or, use the music supplied at the door
Audience members are divided into sections - soprano, alto, tenor, bass
Director conducts audience and orchestra
Solo arias are performed by professional soloists
Audience members not wanting to sing, sit at the back of the sanctuary to listen
Everyone is invited to sing - come as you are
If you have never sung the Messiah, now is your chance
No entrance fee
***If you would like to rehearse with the choir and orchestra before the sing-a-long, the rehearsal with orchestra will be Saturday, December 22, at 2pm at St. Mark's UMC.
Grinchiness is impossible in Las Cruces
By S. Derrickson Moore
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — It was a spot of color at the edge of the desert. Some anonymous merry soul had put three bright red velvet bows on a mesquite bush.
Every now and again, I’m almost daunted by some Scrooge or Grinch…usually from another part of the world, who starts trash talking about holiday excesses.
Then, when I’m heading to the wilderness to try to walk off the latest overload of commercial overkill and psychic projectile holiday depression, I come across a spontaneous manifestation of pure artistic cheer and goodwill toward men…and presumably roadrunners, quail, jackrabbits and other desert critters.
I’m continually surprised by creative expressions of holiday spirit in Las Cruces.
By now, I’m used to seeing chile pepper santas and angels on car antennas, and vintage trucks sporting wreaths and ribbons on their front grills.
But it can take more than a jolly jalapeño St. Nick to offset the impact of braving the malls to talk to people about Black Friday, and the other potentially grim holiday assignments that can further jade already cynical and less-than-merry newsroom staffs.
But here, too, are surprises. I reluctantly accost beleaguered parents, making lists and checking them twice while juggling a baby and a toddler hyped on sugarplums and unrealistic Santa expectations.
The overextended parents do not cut me dead, as they have been known to do in less kind, gentle — and sometimes downright mean — metropolises. No. They take time to chat with me and even wish me a Merry Christmas.
It’s hard to maintain Grinchiness in Las Cruces.
In fact, even my hardened colleagues exhibit softer sides during this magical time of year.
There’s usually a group collection of some kind for a family in need, and boxes of toys show up in a corner of the newsroom.
Our publisher David McClain ambles through the building, distributing seasonal posies. He gracefully contains his military vet’s appraisal of our less-than-orderly newsroom and cheerfully plops the bright red poinsettias on top of the paper piles, if he can’t find a clear square-foot on our cluttered desks.
New SunLife editor Richard Coltharp shows up with red and green Converse All-Star high-tops laced with bells that jingle jangle jingle, as he goes, roaming merrily along....
Snack alerts are e-mailed. Cookies and traditional favorites are baked and proffered, generating familiar memories for those of us who can’t get to our childhood homes, or the homes of our children and grandchildren, for the holidays.
Reporters occasionally even admit to being touched by stories of compassionate souls or the tragedies and accidents, the sudden deaths and mindless violence that seems, alas, to also have become too-familiar American holiday traditions at this time of year.
The weather gets colder and skins get thinner.
But the yuletide seems to bring out the deeply weird and wacky side of journalists, too.
A tiny stocking shows up, hung with care a few inches off the floor in an editor’s cubicle. It’s for the newsroom mouse.
My contribution is the newsroom Christmas tree, traditionally, for the last decade, a live potted specimen that exhibits Charlie Brown rustic form and spirit, and decorations to match. My colleagues contribute something from their desks, on loan to ornament the tree.
This year’s version, installed just after Thanksgiving, is already shedding: needles, sunglasses and a Barack Obama sticker came drifting down today. Otherwise, it’s a little more polished and artistic than usual. It is crowned with a Star of David ornament, fashioned from Norm Dettlaff’s page one photo of an adorable Hanukkah baby. Jason Gibbs created a paper clip garland. There are some actual Christmas tree ornaments and candy canes, unusually orthodox for our newsroom tree, but several repurposed desk collectibles add to the eclectic spirit. There’s a golden Homer Simpson who shouts “Yahoo” when he falls with another shedding of needles, and assorted frogs, a lizard, a tiny Lucha Libre action figure, a Candy Cane Magic Lottery ticket (prescratched, not a winner, or course) and a tattered cartoon that informs us that the leading cause of fear in society today is 24-hour news.
But there’s nothing to fear here. We’ve got the spirit.
We hope you do, too. Merry Christmas.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Sun-News reporter
LAS CRUCES — It was a spot of color at the edge of the desert. Some anonymous merry soul had put three bright red velvet bows on a mesquite bush.
Every now and again, I’m almost daunted by some Scrooge or Grinch…usually from another part of the world, who starts trash talking about holiday excesses.
Then, when I’m heading to the wilderness to try to walk off the latest overload of commercial overkill and psychic projectile holiday depression, I come across a spontaneous manifestation of pure artistic cheer and goodwill toward men…and presumably roadrunners, quail, jackrabbits and other desert critters.
I’m continually surprised by creative expressions of holiday spirit in Las Cruces.
By now, I’m used to seeing chile pepper santas and angels on car antennas, and vintage trucks sporting wreaths and ribbons on their front grills.
But it can take more than a jolly jalapeño St. Nick to offset the impact of braving the malls to talk to people about Black Friday, and the other potentially grim holiday assignments that can further jade already cynical and less-than-merry newsroom staffs.
But here, too, are surprises. I reluctantly accost beleaguered parents, making lists and checking them twice while juggling a baby and a toddler hyped on sugarplums and unrealistic Santa expectations.
The overextended parents do not cut me dead, as they have been known to do in less kind, gentle — and sometimes downright mean — metropolises. No. They take time to chat with me and even wish me a Merry Christmas.
It’s hard to maintain Grinchiness in Las Cruces.
In fact, even my hardened colleagues exhibit softer sides during this magical time of year.
There’s usually a group collection of some kind for a family in need, and boxes of toys show up in a corner of the newsroom.
Our publisher David McClain ambles through the building, distributing seasonal posies. He gracefully contains his military vet’s appraisal of our less-than-orderly newsroom and cheerfully plops the bright red poinsettias on top of the paper piles, if he can’t find a clear square-foot on our cluttered desks.
New SunLife editor Richard Coltharp shows up with red and green Converse All-Star high-tops laced with bells that jingle jangle jingle, as he goes, roaming merrily along....
Snack alerts are e-mailed. Cookies and traditional favorites are baked and proffered, generating familiar memories for those of us who can’t get to our childhood homes, or the homes of our children and grandchildren, for the holidays.
Reporters occasionally even admit to being touched by stories of compassionate souls or the tragedies and accidents, the sudden deaths and mindless violence that seems, alas, to also have become too-familiar American holiday traditions at this time of year.
The weather gets colder and skins get thinner.
But the yuletide seems to bring out the deeply weird and wacky side of journalists, too.
A tiny stocking shows up, hung with care a few inches off the floor in an editor’s cubicle. It’s for the newsroom mouse.
My contribution is the newsroom Christmas tree, traditionally, for the last decade, a live potted specimen that exhibits Charlie Brown rustic form and spirit, and decorations to match. My colleagues contribute something from their desks, on loan to ornament the tree.
This year’s version, installed just after Thanksgiving, is already shedding: needles, sunglasses and a Barack Obama sticker came drifting down today. Otherwise, it’s a little more polished and artistic than usual. It is crowned with a Star of David ornament, fashioned from Norm Dettlaff’s page one photo of an adorable Hanukkah baby. Jason Gibbs created a paper clip garland. There are some actual Christmas tree ornaments and candy canes, unusually orthodox for our newsroom tree, but several repurposed desk collectibles add to the eclectic spirit. There’s a golden Homer Simpson who shouts “Yahoo” when he falls with another shedding of needles, and assorted frogs, a lizard, a tiny Lucha Libre action figure, a Candy Cane Magic Lottery ticket (prescratched, not a winner, or course) and a tattered cartoon that informs us that the leading cause of fear in society today is 24-hour news.
But there’s nothing to fear here. We’ve got the spirit.
We hope you do, too. Merry Christmas.
S. Derrickson Moore can be reached at dmoore@lcsun-news.com
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
