Category: Las Cruces

Perhaps a Sunlamp Is Required

On this post-holiday rainy day, I reserve the right to be melancholy.

Holiday blues, weeping gray clouds, and general lethargy. Sure. It’s my prerogative.

I am loath to say the next seven words I’m about to say but…

I heard this great story on NPR.

You may not realize how pompous I think the people are who quote NPR. Now here I am committing the crime I rail against.

The story was of a musician named Shawn Camp who had a record set for release back in the year 1994.

Through a series of events, the record was shelved until recently. Camp met the new studio head at Reprise who gave Camp’s record a fresh listen and it was finally released in September of this year.

What’s got me going here, got me writing a whole blog post about this story, is one of Camp’s songs that they played on the air.

It was a beautifully written song about being at the funeral of his grandfather. For some reason, the words reminded me of the incredibly sad funeral I attended back in August.

Despite the passing of four months, I find I still grieve for my friend. I guess there’s still something left to grieve, because lately he’s been showing up in my dreams.

Listening to Shawn Camp’s song reminded me of a dream I had just last night.

It was me, and my friend, and we were dancing. Just a simple two-step, nothing fancy, but we danced and he was whole and healthy and grinning from ear to ear.

My best friend was there too, and before I was even done, she got the next dance with him. The three of us laughed like it was, well, 1994, and it was good.

Now, this dream was particularly odd because in real life, my friend wasn’t much of a dancer. Oh, he was long legged and tall, a perfect partner. But he had a farmer’s sensibilities and didn’t dance that much. He could, and did, but it wasn’t something he did a lot.

But there in my dream we danced. When I woke up, I remembered seeing my friend’s body laid out there in a casket inside the El Paso First Baptist Church.

The old Southern saying is “now, don’t he look natural?”

No, he didn’t look natural. In my dream smiling and laughing and giving me seventeen kinds of heck…that was natural.

I’ve always been pretty glad that at the end of the line for my dad, one afternoon when my mom had run into town for errands, my dad and I had a talk. It was uncomfortable and weird, but in that talk, a lot of things were said that needed to be said. I can happily say I have no unresolved issues there.

But with my dear friend, I have something unresolved. It niggles at the corners of my mind and sits on my chest when I have another dream in which he plays a cameo. I owed him an apology. I’d planned to deliver that apology when he came home from the surgery from which he never returned.

Perhaps in dreams I can find the way to lay my issues to rest, to lay down the burden I carry around, to feel at peace with the loss of my friend.

Or maybe we can just dance and forget about I’m sorries.

After my best friend is done (which may take awhile), I got the next waltz.

Cuz these Fat Babies were made for dancing

Photo by Karen Fayeth

This Woman is a Saint

“Las Cruces resident Karla Barela, 38, places red chile pork on the corn husks containing masa to make tamales Saturday at El Indio Tortilla Shop. Barela started making tamales at 4 a.m. and continued to make them at 12:30 p.m. (Photos by Richard Davis / For the Las Cruces Sun-News)”

At the end of the article, Karla sums it all up:

“Without tamales…it wouldn’t be Christmas.”

Amen

I’ve Become That Grownup

Last month when I visited New Mexico and stayed with my best friend, I made it a point to spend time visiting one-on-one with each of my two goddaughters.

They are ten and eight now, fully formed people, and their challenges go well beyond walking and eating and sleeping. The so-called “real world” has decided to come roost in their lives, and it is extraordinarily hard for me to adapt as quickly as they have.

My oldest goddaughter is incredibly intelligent and incredibly obstinate too (*coff*herfather*coff*). Her problem is that she is so smart and world savvy that she’s knows when someone is pulling a fast one or isn’t acting in the smartest way.

But she’s only ten going on eleven, so her powers to right the wrongs of this world are slim. So far, anyway.

She told me about how her new teacher this year is teaching the students a new approach to spelling. “I know how to spell, this is so dumb!”

And her teacher is making the students learn long division. By last year she had long division down cold. “Why do I have to do this all again!? It’s such a waste of time!”

You know what? She’s right. She’s absolutely right.

So what do I do as the adult she’s looking to for advice?

Do I do the usual grown up thing and tell her that the grown ups are right and she should just mind what they say?

Because I can’t do that.

Do I tell her fight?! Fight to the end for justice!

No, that’s not good guidance either.

So I dug deep into my own experiences and came up with just this:

“Pick your battles.”

It was advice that was handed to me in my first year of work. Like my goddaughter, I was willing to take on every challenge, rail against the inefficiencies of the bureaucracy, fight the good fight for every injustice.

The mentor assigned to me, a very easy-going sort of fellow who was revered by the leadership of that company was the first to sit me down and tell me this lesson.

Pick your battles.

Figure out the fights that one, you think you can win and two are worth putting all the energy into. If it meets both criteria, then go for it.

And fight for the ones you can’t win if it really, really matters. But remember you can’t fight them all if you want to win any.

So I found myself sitting in the cooling evening breeze in the backyard of a Las Cruces home, imparting this same knowledge to a ten year old.

“Do you honestly expect the teacher is going to look at you and say, ‘wow, you are right, I was teaching it wrong. Let’s do it your way!'”

Her eyes went wide and she shook her head.

“So what are you trying to get to? What do you expect?”

She wants to be challenged. Ah, ok. There’s something we can work with.

I told my girl that life is going to be pretty tough if every day is spent digging in her heels.

And so all of that best answers the question posed by the idea generator today:

“If you could pass on a piece of advice that meant a lot to you when you received it, what would it be?”

Pick your battles.

I might be qualified to impart that wisdom from my position in the long and deep trenches I carry behind me, heels worn down to the nub.

Customer Service Has Not Died

Despite all appearances to the contrary, customer service has not died.

Nope, there is still a small patch of wonderful service to be found in Southern New Mexico.

You’ll recall a week ago, I wrote of my joy and my subsequent despair regarding buying actual New Mexico grown chiles here in Northern California.

In that blog post last week, I mentioned that I wrote a rather terse letter to the New Mexico Department of Agriculture, complete with photographs, about my sorrow.

In fact, I’ll let you in on the text of my actual letter, sent to Mr. David Lucero at the NMDA:

_____

Dear Mr. Lucero – I found your email address from the www.nmda.nmsu.edu
webpage, though I’m unsure if you are the right person to contact.

I am a native New Mexican now living in Northern California and while on
a Southwest Airlines flight, I was happy to see an ad in their inflight
magazine for Hatch Green Chile coming to a long list of supermarkets in
my area.

My husband and I plan to buy a lot as we enjoy our green chile
throughout the year by finding kind friends back home to bring us the
good stuff.

While at Whole Foods recently in (town name redacted), California, I saw a sign for “Hatch peppers” and I was very happy (Whole Foods was on the list of stores that would carry the product).

As I picked a few from the pile, I looked closer at the sign and I
noticed it said “grown in California.” (see photo attached)

Now, I’m confused. Is this the “real thing” as advertised by the NMDA
and just mislabeled? Or has someone appropriated the Hatch name for
not-Hatch peppers?

I chose not to buy any that day as I’m unsure.

Hence why I’m coming to you for advice and guidance.

Are Hatch chiles going to be available in the Northern California Bay
Area? Also, is someone perpetrating a terrible fraud by selling
California grown peppers under the branded Hatch name?

On behalf of my family, we thank you and appreciate any guidance you
would provide.

All my best,

Karen Fayeth

_____

Honestly…I expected no reply.

Imagine my surprise when not only did I receive a VERY nice email from Mr. Lucero thanking me for providing this information, he also told me that he’s taken up the issue with his national Whole Foods buyer (who was cc’d on the email) and also with his shipper, Seco Spice (also cc’d on the email).

Then, and here’s where my mind gets blown, Mr. Lucero indicated that a Mr. Ogaz from Seco Spice would be happy to send me along a box of roasted and peeled chile if I’d be willing to pay shipping.

Holy jumping jehoshaphat!

So I’m currently getting shipping costs from the very kind Mr. Ogaz.

That’s amazing.

I want to publicly thank both Mr. Lucero and Mr. Ogaz for helping a poor New Mexico expat find her way home via the ol’ dinner plate.

By the by, I checked with my friends down in the greater Las Cruces and Anthony metropolitan areas and they know the Ogaz family and Seco Spice and can vouch that they are top notch people and growers.

So here’s a HUGE public thank you and a plug for the good people over at Seco Spice and the NMDA.

: sniffle : It makes me very proud to be a New Mexican.