another day, another party

Ho Hum... another fabulous party with fabulous friends and fabulous food and drink... how much of this can a girl take?

Just kidding! We had yet another blast last night, thanks to Karena's birthday hospitality, and the willing spontaneity of this fine group of friends. It was a spur of the moment gathering, pulled together gracefully with almost no planning at all. Even the semi-plan to spend the evening outside by the fire had to be flexible, since the recent dry spell has been broken, and the New Mexico Rain has returned...



Click the link above and listen to the song. It always makes me cry, and lately, makes me feel like I might be missing something, might have made a mistake... This visit to Taos has been so... idyllic. I feel like something of a failure for failing to love the place enough to let it keep me. But even though we've not been on vacation away from Taos all these weeks, this trip back here is a vacation. And vacations are seductive. They make us think we want to stay forever in Taos, or Hawaii, or You-Name-The-Place, when the truth is, vacations aren't real life, and vacation places need to be left where they are, so we can go back to them when we need to refuel and revive ourselves. Driving home last night, I wondered if our Taos experience these past eight years might have been different if we'd simply lived at the north side of town instead of the south. It might have made all the difference between loving and merely tolerating the place. But that's looking back, which takes me nowhere and makes me carsick. Looking forward, I know I don't want to be old in this town, and I don't want these harsh winters even when I'm not old. I don't want the corrupt little politics or the local acceptance of endless trash thrown from car windows, in an odd disrespect for the land that so many old families claim as their birthright. I don't get it here, and I know now that for me, it's better to skim the surface, visit from time to time, and wish I could take all my friends with me when we leave. These friends we have here are some of our favorite people in the world, and lucky for them, they do get Taos, and Taos gets them.

So we'll stay for another day or two. Maybe three. We want to see everyone because we don't know when we'll be back. And when we do come back, I expect we'll love it here all over again, and wonder why we ever left. I suppose it's possible that we could make a great big circle, and find ourselves back in Taos, calling it home again, but you know... I really don't think so.