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New Mexico 99: The Move | Old Friends | At Play
Our Trip to New Mexico, Summer 1999 -- The Move
Before we left home, the argument was over whether to pack things for the cross-country trip in bags (Shirley) or boxes (Susan). With our car full of bags and boxes, we drove to Dulles airport in DC, where we left our car and Naomi picked us up and took us to Charlottesville.
Naomi loaded her Trooper with her beloved plants and cats.
Naomi's roommate Dave was a big help in loading the truck (and reducing her desk to its smallest component parts!)

With walkie-talkies for communication, tranquilizers for the cats, and enough tofu and apples (in a box) to survive a famine, we set off on Tuesday evening, and spent the night in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. The cats immediately discovered that they could hide in the box springs of the motel room bed.

Barbara Kingsolver's essays, High Tide in Tucson, were the perfect book on tape for this trip, with sage observations on the Appalachian Mountains and the desert, on people and politics, on life and how to live it.

We enjoyed the scenery, and imagined the day when we could get off the interstates and explore. We noted that there is a system to the signage: green for towns and highways, blue for conveniences, and brown for natural and cultural attractions. Oh, how we wished we could follow those brown signs.

Favorite place names:

  • Hungry Woman Campground, Virginia
  • Butt Hollow, Tennessee
  • Buck Snort, Arkansas
  • Toad Suck Park, Oklahoma

The deep green mountains gave way to the Great Plains. Speeding across the Texas panhandle after sundown, we thrilled to lightning storms that stretched for hundreds of miles across the horizon. Friday afternoon took us over mountains again via the scenic route to Taos. Naomi and Shirley had conspired to prevent Susan from driving this part, so that they wouldn't have to bite their tongues as she "wowed" over the view. So Shirley found herself driving and praying that the U-Haul would keep going up and over, and not start rolling back, while Susan wowed over the view. In just three days, we arrived at Naomi's new home.

We spent most of the next day unloading her stuff. "Spent" was the word, as far as Susan was concerned. Whether it was the 7000-foot altitude, or four days of driving and packing, she found that after every couple of boxes, she had to take another nap. Mercifully, it did not occur to Shirley to get a picture.
Once the unloading was done, Naomi's first priority was to make the desert bloom. It's a challenge. She's up to it.
During the following week, Naomi made her house a home. When we weren't off being tourists, we helped to hang things and offered advice only when asked, mostly.

The townhouse has a two-story great room with four skylights.

Naomi is looking for a roommate to share expenses and keep her social. She's gotten good at screening and selecting roommates.

There's a separate entrance with two rooms and a bath for the roommate.
Her cats are used to going outside, and she hasn't yet decided whether she'll let them out. There's a field full of prairie dogs beyond her back fence. We saw a notice that says prairie dogs (with their fleas) are carriers of hantavirus.
The three of us made a great team in figuring out how to put her desk back together. (Did we mention Dave had reduced it to its component parts?) It's in her big bedroom, which has an inspiring view of Taos Mountain.
Naomi is earning her Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Virginia. She moved to Taos to do the field work for her dissertation, which is on the relationship of the three cultures (Native American, Hispanic, and Anglo) there.

She works for the Rocky Mountain Youth Corps. We're not sure just what she does; they keep discovering more of her skills and increasing her responsibilities.