August 3-4, 2019

I’ve never been to New Mexico.

The most I’ve (technically) driven through “The West” is Colorado, and one of my recent life goals is to see every state in the grand ol’ United States.

So of course that had to mean a cross-country trip to the Grand Canyon (what else?!).

Let me tell you, long road trips are not for the faint of heart. Total the drive is over sixteen hours over the stretch of I-40, crossing through two other states in the process. My car was messy, hot at times, and our boredom resulted from hearing the radio play the same songs on repeat (which we eventually switched over to podcasts).

As we traveled over the Texan border to meet the desert shubbery and (eventual) mountains of the base of the Sandies, the sky opened up in from of us. Farther than any Oklahoman landscape I could recall.

Farther than anything I’d seen in a long time. It was a ardent mix of arid grasslands and desert than seemed to have no end and no beginning.

We arrived that evening, and the air was surprisingly less oppressive with the heat of summer than back in Oklahoma. It even rained–small, short showers that came just as quickly as they went. We stayed in a small suburb outside of Albuquerque instead of Sanata Fe just for the proximity to the freeway, in an airbnb home to quite a few cats (and their leader, Macadoodle).

We did plan to wander the area the next day, which is exactly what we did.

Meow Wolf

One of our main goals in visiting Santa Fe was visiting the oddly charming Meow Wolf interactive museum. Oklahoma City has its own little art collective called Factory Obscura (more on that later), and since visiting that first odd little otherworld I’ve been intrigued by nonconventional art museums.

Meow Wolf’s permanent exhibit, The House of Eternal Return, is based around the story of a family who comes into contact with a rip in the fabric of reality that allows some of them into these other worlds that the exhibit took me through. This means the first section of the exhibit, the house, is built to scale, the first rooms near unimpressive as notes and diaries took the two of us through the story.

But finding the nooks and crannies turned out to be the fun part.

There were portals through closet doors, the refrigerator, a bookcase, the washing machine. All of which transported us to a

completely different space connected through other doorways (an ice machine is the one that really stands out to me). It was surreal walking through it after being transported into another reality. Treehouses sprouted out of the floor, a coral forest painted neon lined the last corridor, windows led into caverns full of brightly lit skeletons. This place inspired our own OKC’s art collective, and I can now see why.

It was crowded, mostly because of the weekend and the scurry to cram as much summer into the weeks before the start of the school year. But even so, it was still an experience I likely won’t forget anytime soon.

The Plaza

I’ll be honest: I got so distracted being in the moment (the best kind of distraction, really!) that I forgot to even take many pictures that afternoon.

We ended up in downtown Santa Fe, where the famous Plaza Square sat in the center of the city, surrounded by local artists and shops. An art show took place that afternoon, and the plaza became home to their artistry and the pleasant conversation exchanged between them and their visitors.

We wandered, but ultimately ended up at Desert Dogs Brewery down one of the side streets adjacent, where we sat on the balcony and watched as a parade of cars passed by below. I was exhausted after a day of exploration and excitement, as you can probably tell (ha!).

I reflected on the differences between this community and my own back home–instead of the prairie and farmland carved out of it, I traded them for the towns congregated at the base of mountains towering like giants behind them. Instead of farmhouse and craftsman-styled townhomes, Santa Fe-styled homes begun a revival of Pueblo architecture. I forget sometimes that the United States is beautiful in its extensive diversity even amongst its different regions nestled into the nooks and crannies of its communities.

And even though I want to see more of the world outside of my own, I also want to know more about my own homeland, the country I was born into. Even though I criticize and scrutinize on a regular basis, I love this land and the people within it deeply. Traveling through the heart of New Mexico (Santa Fe, Albuquerque, the untouched landscape of the Western part of the state) reminded me of the beauty this country is capable of.

Sam