I have to confess that, as someone who was born in New York and raised on the East Coast and in Ohio, the idea of visiting or living in New Mexico had never even crossed my mind until recently. It was, literally, a “flyover” state for me, although I hasten to note that I don’t believe in the concept of flyover states nor do I approve of the popular coastal mentality that belittles ninety percent of America while yearning for a Europe that it doesn’t truly understand.
How odd, therefore, to be sitting on the edge of a mountain, one thousand, nine hundred, and ninety-eight miles away, and to wish I’d lived here my entire life. Sing it with me: “He was born in the summer / of his forty-second year…”