Santa Fe: Homage to My High-Desert Home

The Obama girls were in Santa Fe this week. Their mother Michelle talked to military wives in town while her lucky daughters along with their Secret Service contingent traveled south along the Turquoise Trail to our area for a ride in the Cerrillos Hills on Harold’s horses and a stop for trinkets at Todd’s store.

To coin a cliché, the county of Santa Fe, located in the historic Galisteo Basin, has something for everyone, whether you’re rock stars like the Obamas or unknowns like the rest of us. If you’re looking for museums, art galleries, theaters, nightlife, shopping malls, big box stores and expensive hotels and restaurants, you’ll find it in “The City Different”. I live in the other Santa Fe south of the city, in a region replete with Indian pueblo and turquoise mining archaeological ruins, scenic hills and mountains, hiking trails, movie ranches, ghost towns, wildlife and domesticated animals of all kinds, and residents who range from strictly working class to unambiguously wealthy. In our particular mixed neighborhood, modular housing and trailers coexist with expensive Santa Fe-style adobe houses, and dirt or gravel roads are the norm.

According to profit-greedy oil companies who have lately been leasing mineral rights in our area, we sit atop untapped oil and natural gas resources. But many residents strongly disagree. To his great credit, Governor Bill Richardson has made it his business to take on the oil companies and impose moratoriums on drilling until a lot more research is done.

But even the mere possibility that oil wells may spring up in our backyards in the near future has driven housing prices down. Our realtor friends are despairing because their profits are way down these days. Fortunately, my husband and I have no plans to sell our house, but we share the deep concerns of all residents about the health and environmental consequences of allowing Big Oil in. Creating an ecological disaster in a very sensitive and beautiful area with great cultural value and limited water resources for what will likely amount to a very small return seems like a really dumb idea.

Still, even with that threat hanging over us, I wouldn’t trade living here for anywhere else. We have a “hippie house” from the 70s on eighteen acres inhabited by junipers, chollas and yuccas. A former pot farm, it boasts an almost 360-degree drop-dead gorgeous view of the surrounding mountains. Sunsets are spectacular near our high-elevation (6,200-plus feet) home—fiery orange-red that lights up the equally spectacular Northern New Mexico cloud formations. Another advantage of living so high and away from city lights is that we can clearly see the Milky Way, planets and constellations on most nights.

The weather is generally pleasant year-round—sunny and dry, albeit occasionally extremely windy, with lots of dust devils, the New Mexico version of tornadoes. Like Florida, New Mexico is famous for dangerous and dramatic thunder and lightning storms. When accompanied by rain (which it often isn’t), we appreciate the wetness but can’t help but comment smugly on how depressing it would be to live in perpetually soggy Seattle. Our winters are usually fairly dry and cold, with the occasional huge snowfall, like the delightful monster storm two winters ago that stranded us at home for almost a week.

The beauty of New Mexico in general and Santa Fe in particular has made it a haven for Hollywood filmmakers. There’s a sound stage at the College of Santa Fe in town, as well as a studio complex currently under construction south of the city limits. A constant stream of movie and TV shows is filmed here, easily located by signs along roads with the initials of the production and an arrow pointing to the set. In addition, three permanent movie ranches just up the road from our house have hosted film productions for decades. Movies from the classics “Oklahoma!” and “Silverado” to the ill-fated TV show “Kid Nation” have been filmed in this area. “Brothers”, “Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins” and “Legion” recently wrapped after shooting here, and the Jeff Bridges/Robert Duvall film “Crazy Heart” and the Bollywood movie “Kites” are still in production.

People from every walk of life have discovered that Santa Fe is utterly enchanting and unique. As for me, having spent most of my adulthood in rented apartments in urban areas, living in my own country home in the high desert of Northern New Mexico is paradise. As far as I’m concerned, nothing beats its luminous, crisp, stark splendor.