34 - Temps maussade, Exotisme, Coller au Monde

Il a neigé toute la nuit.Annulation de la balade avec Patrick vers Coyote Creek, de l'autre côté de la montagne.J'en profite pour voir avec Cedric l'histoire du blog. Trop compliqué de changer.Reste calfeutrée à l'abri à lire et trier les photos. La neige est épaisse, le temps maussade.Il reneige.Je relis de très anciennes notes. Ah! L'exotisme – Saba en est – ne s'attache pas, puisqu'aussitôt familier il a perdu son exotisme. Libres les pas de celui qui se nourrit d'exotisme. Fermer enfin ces dures années qu'on n'écrit plus. Ou alors pour poser des conditions. Puis plus du tout. La gorge trop serrée, l'étouffement guette. Alors s'échappe la plainte très triste du manque d'amour. Où sont les mots qui décrivaient la saveur du monde, les exaltations, qui disait l'amour, les promesses, l'ivresse? 

Il serait bon de retrouver les latences adolescentes quand le temps avait le temps.Le temps douloureux reprendrait des couleurs et de nos langueurs ennuyées naîtraient ces moments forts d'amour et de beauté. On collerait à nouveau au monde. Ne pas oublier avant même de l'avoir magnifié qu'on a aimé?Gris dehors. Chaud dedans. Arriverai-je à lier les différentes écritures celle du regarder en photographiant, celle du comprendre en écrivant ? Pas encore.

33- Cold wind, Soft pink towards the South.

Sunday.  The sky is blue. The sun slowly disappears.   A thick fog arrives pushed by a cold wind. Violent wind. I hear it rise up and then diminish. The fog continues to advance.Subsides.In the openings, the sun softens, while over there towards the south, it turns the ridgeline pink. No more than a minute it lasts.   Pink even softer, at ground level, so white the snow, so black the bushes. Sublime time of contemplative solitude.        While returning I think to myself that this evening I would like to stay quietly “at home”rather than dining with neighbors. But, I had not warned them. It is 6 o’clock and I had promised rice with sauted vegetables. So I arrived at 6:30 with the casserole. In the end, I had a good time and a delicious dinner. Staying in my mind, the spun pink of the morada.

32- Aztec dances, Maze, Sighing on the Grasslands

Quick meal and I'll take a walk around the plaza. Some Aztec dancers have finished dancing. The drums fall silent. They chat with the audience while packing up their instruments. A little boy is making big balls with silver paper which he brings to his parents, who are having a picnic nearby.I take the Morada Lane to go and "do" the Labyrinth. Apparently, if one follows in silence the spiraling road towards the center, one reaches a state similar to meditation: shifting continuously from the right brain to the left brain while approaching and then turning and moving away from the center. No meditation for me, too busy looking around probably. On the rock at the center I see a necklace, some coins, tickets, and papers bearing messages of peace, of love or poems, stuck under carefully chosen rocks it seems, often folded into 4 to protect them from the snow. While passing beside Mabel Luhan Lodge I realize that one can probably reach Indian lands that continue on for a long way. I go. Traverse a ditch.Yes, in the distance I see the cross painted by Georgia 0'Keefe.The wind rises, covering the blue sky with white clouds that thicken, growing more and more distant.I feel a storm coming. The mountains appear and disappear. A strange sighing swells over the land.I look all around, convinced that animals are spinning in front of me. Nothing. Sudddenly the wind drops, the storm has passed, now far from here.I return to the town in peace.Two little girls run along past the façade of the church. Time to get out my camera.  

31- Carolyn Gage, James Thomas Stevens

So today, I wake up late and continued the blog. It drives me crazy. As usual when I want to finish something quickly and the program doesn’t work well, it takes 3 times longer.

7 :00, evening readings, while waiting we talk. Robbie Steinbach, photographer came: she prepares an exhibition which begins on 13 March. She asks Carolyn, Pamela and me to go next Wednesday to Abiquiu, where she had lived for 5 years unless there’s deep snow! Also there tonight are Rena Rosequist, Bill and Teresa Ebie, the singer / painter Patty Sheehan...These lectures are always organized by SOMOS - Society Of the Muse Of the Southwest - I repeat the name as I adore its exuberance.Taos News did an article to introduce the evening, which takes place in the former home of Mabel Dodge Luhan.

I came here full of optimism because tonight they had invited :James Thomas Stevens begins, a Mohawk poet to read his poems andCarolyn to play a part from one of her plays.

As soon as James Thomas Stevens begins, it is astonishing. Among others, a set of poems written in Mohawk language which he reads tonight in three versions, Mohawk, English, and his own personal translation which unfolds with each telling and is never quite the same.His readings are superb and his use of the third version reminds us of his people’s dynamic oral tradition, as the stories, poems, myths evolved as people passed them on.Jacqueline, this is my first entry into "Indian territory".He lived in Canada and elsewhere and for a year near Santa Fe. His mother is Mohawk (he keeps the well known name "Mohawk" despite the fact that it was given by their enemies and is translated as "cannibal". But he told us that they call themselves "the people who knew flint").His Welsh father likes to say that it's from him and the people of Wales that he gets his gift! His decision to become a poet was certain on the day a teacher said in class: "Poetry is the orchestration of silence". When his father came home in the evening after work and his many children asked him questions, he would answer: "I have no more words."- "For Indians", he added, "silence is an integral part of the story as it is told. In poetry also, because it speaks in many fewer words than novels. That works for me."As in the jazz of Miles Davis?      It is Carolyn’s turn and it is lively, fast-paced. Everyone laughs and yet throughout we feel the pain of the two nineteenth century women "Fly Rod" Crosby and her Annie Oakley, both rejected, unloved, different.Pamela, Carolyn and I go to dinner at Doc Martins. Lively discussion among us America / Canada / France, married women / lesbians / single women, theater / painting / photography, etc ...And we return, in beauty. The labyrinth made of stones on the ground, right there in the car's headlights. Do we "walk" it tomorrow?. 

30- Kit Carson Forest, Dorothy Brett, Bobo, Ken Russell, Pascale Ferran

After lunch I go to get Carolyn who first reads me the beginning of her play about Dorothy Brett, another of those incredible women who came to settle in Taos.

We leave for Kit Carson Forest, we walk on the paths which are still a little muddy sometimes snowy, but the sun shines bright, we take off our jackets and sweaters. The view of Taos and, as usual, of the mountains around, is a great pleasure.Coming back, in front of a church, we meet a boy, Bobo, who asks me my name. Once I had told him, he was willing to pose for a picture in his wonderful black and white tee shirt, adorned with a large image of the Virgin Mary.

Later in the evening, I watch Women in Love, a film by Ken Russell, adapted from DH Lawrence's book, which I like less than my memory of it.I prefer amongst the various movies inspired by Lawrence’s novels, Pascale Ferran’s low budget film adapted from Lady Chatterley's Lover. It is more successful in making us appreciate our dear Lawrence, whom I'm interested in at the moment because he lived here and I am at last reading more of his work. To return to the movie, I very much liked that it takes its time to tell the story, which is completely in the spirit of Lawrence. As a critic for Le Monde wrote: "... the glorious rawness of the flesh which emerges from the images is quite splendid…"

29- Navajo Trader, Shopping, Blur

Reading an odd book "Navajo Trader" which chronicles the life of trading posts in Indian territory and where we see that finally between individuals, things can go well and friendships can be built. Gladwell Richardson (1903-1980) wrote lots of novels published under different names John R. Winslowe, Calico Jones, Cary James, Frank Warner, Don Teton, Buck Coleman, Grant Maxwell, Charles Mc Adam etc ... and also short stories which appeared in newspapers. His books were mostly published in England and translated into Spanish, German, Dutch, Swedish ...He supplemented his income as a merchant in the Navajo territory with his writings, nearly 300 novels.

Driving to Albertsons with Liz and Carolyn. Shopping time.Short walk at dusk in the streets of Taos.

I had harbored great hopes with this photo of a richly decorated interior which I pass quite often when I return home at night, at this hour “entre chien et loup” that I particularly like because of its light, often surreal. Yes the red and white object on the right is a superb Indian headdress, floating off the table, one can spot a bouquet of flowers and deep in the shadows, almost invisible, a painting. Finally quite a successful blur as all is left to your imagination.

28- Taos Morada, Georgia O’Keefe, Parchemene Belle

Long conversation with Jean-Pierre about the work on our house in Pierrefeu which has finally started. Obviously we cannot do everything at once, so we must decide what to do later. And then, a discussion with Kristof, to hear his opinions and this is an opportunity for us to talk.After a quick lunch, I print the photo of the strange footprints to show Michael. He has the same interpretation I had: a hare standing on its hind legs admiring the scenery or a little human lost in the cold. In Helen Wurlitzer’s garden I fill a bottle with the delicious spring water from the well.Clouds in the sky, but the light is promising.I leave on foot towards the Las Cruces Road where the cemetery is and then decide to continue along Penitentes Road up to a small church la Morada de Nuestra Senora de Guadalupe.    "Moradas are the sacred chapter houses of Los Hermanos Penitentes, a lay Catholic brotherhood that emerged in New Mexico at the end of the Colonial era. The Morada de Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe is the largest and least altered of its kind in the state and is highly significant to our understanding of the Hermandad. Not only was Taos a major stronghold for the brotherhood throughout the tumultuous 19th‐century but it also is one of three likely locations where it originated, the other two being Abiquiú and Santa Cruz de la Cañada (Chavez 1954).With the sun still hidden, I continue along a path through a sort of open moorland spread out all the way to the mountains.

Several trees, a hill, the sun, everything suddenly becomes splendid, theatrical.

 When I return, much later, what is left of the light will be on the church wall. Golden solitude.

  Is that black cross the one Georgia O'Keeffe painted in 1929 while she was here?   No one around, only smoke in the distance again tonight. And when I pass the houses, there is once more this woody smell I love.

I arrive at Kit Carson Rd just before nightfall.

There is a message from Carolyn asking me if I would like to help her find a fishing rod to use in her play. Ah yes, and she tells me that she has found a guide to take me fly-fishing. Now it's up to me ! Yes, let's go go fishing with THE fly.That one which can catch fish in any river in America, which doesn’t imitate any real insect, an absolute human creation, La Parmachene Belle.It is also the title of the play about Annie Oakley and Cornelia “Fly Rod” Crosby that Carolyn wrote and will perform on Friday night.

27- Stiff Neck, Taos Hum, Sushi, Truffaut and our Favorite Movies

​It continues: laziness and my stiff neck is only slightly improved. So I decide to stay home. Besides, it isn’t very nice out, and now my neighbor stops by and suggests a sushi dinner with George at my house. My room is larger.We are ready to go shopping, but as I still had a lot of things here, we decided to postpone it this evening and have a brownie dessert made by George instead. And so we spent the evening talking about crime fiction and cinema. George’s favorite film: Jules et Jim by Truffaut, Liz’s is Lawrence of Arabia. And me? I hesitated, Pierrot le Fou, Les 400 Coups, The Night of the Hunter are among those I have seen again and again. Monday blurs. ​​Now, while little else is happening, I will tell you about a very faint sound, a continuous sound that many people hear in Taos – the Hum of Taos which Pamela had told me about.http://strangesounds.org/2013/09/mysterious-hum-the-taos-hum.htmlShe could hear it well at night, she told me. 

26- Artist Co-op, Valentine's Day, Don Juan and Patty Sheehan

  As on previous Sundays, curiously, as if it had become the rule, I hang around the house. I promise myself to go for a walk a little later because the weather is beautiful. But I have a very stiff neck and have wrapped scarves around my neck and I am reading.At 10 past 4 George knocks. " So Marie, are you ready? " I totally forgot that I had promised to go to the Taos artist Co-op for a Valentine's Day celebratation with love songs.Give 10 dollars for UNICEF Haiti, and that makes me think of Martine in Ethiopia, and how she would have been very good in this musical afternoon. There we enjoy yourselves. Many singers came and nearly all sang well. Patty Sheehan, who has been painting for 40 years, decided to take up singing. She has been doing this for the last 2 years. She is currently finishing the recording of a second cd. Her first called Little Plastic Christmas Tree is there on the piano and she tells us :"By the way, I almost never sell them, take one if you want, or even better, put money in the Unicef box.”She sang us 4 great songs.Little stories of nothing, but her presence, her voice although a little worn, and her humor, were superb. We all had one desire, that it continue. Go back with George, we join the others for our Sunday dinner.

25- Names , Los Pandos , Taos, Alamos, SOMOS Evening

Yesterday evening reading organized by SOMOS, Society of the Muse of the Southwest.First, Sean read us a short story, without convincing me of his talent though the following is given on the web:"Sean Murphy – He has published three novels (The Finished Man, The Hope Valley Hubcap King, The Time of New Weather), a nonfiction book on Zen practice (One Bird, One Stone) and four plays. He teaches creative writing and literature at UNM - Taos and leads writing workshops around the country.He also co-taught with Natalie Goldberg (author of Writing Down the Bones) in her series of writing and meditation seminars. Sean’s latest novel, The Time of New Weather, (January, 2005) from which he read was awarded first place for best novel in the National Press Women Communications Awards." And Mirabai Starr who lived as a child, teenager and young woman in hippie communes then one day "turned to God." She translates the mystics, so she read fragments of her translations and then from her memoirs, more specifically, about how she went from her many hippie lovers to the life of nun which was not very satisfying, returned to the secular world. She finally found the love of her life, who was sitting in the front row and explained to us why it finally worked. One reason in her opinion was that he left her free to pray and to love God as she needed. Is this really convincing ?Then Jenny Bird, who is quite well known in the United States and has set to music the mystical translations of Mirabai Starr, sings some of these adaptations. Emotional.That’s it, as my neighbors say, it was very interesting to participate in an evening like this where everyone knows and congratulates one another.Anyway, we were part of the show. Some people had already met us. And as always, there was great enthusiasm expressed at the announcement of our specialties. Conversation with Bill Ebie and his wife Teresa, who had told me of their passion for coyotes, and I had then told them my story of the indistinct dog shape I had seen. They asked me if I had received the pictures of coyotes taken just outside their house the other night that they had sent to Michael to forward to me. Not yet!To return to the story of names, it's bizarre that I do not remember them. While the encyclopedic accuracy of Pierre Lieutaghi fascinates me; or that of the Indian writer Scott Momaday in his book: Names: A Memoir.Aptly, the other time Michael had told us about some names here:- Los Pandos means bend or hunchback. In this street with many turns there lived, it seems, a hunchback and his mother also a hunchback. - Taos means red willow– Alamos means poplars....Short walk on the path above the Rio Grande, very impressive. Then I decended down into the gorge where the Rio Pueblo flows into the Rio Grande. It was the beginning of the walk I intend to do with George and Carolyn and is part of the no man's land where I had met the woman with six dogs.Once more, as Rimbaud would say: "retour enluminé".Tonight an invitation with Carolyn to the place of a friend of her’s, full of people of all ages, each brought a dish, lots of good things, some wine ... I met Patrice, a musician and photographer who offers to help me discover other rivers less accessible than the Rio Grande or the Red River. We exchange email addresses. His wife talks about her research on learning language from birth.We talk, we snack, drink and little by little, the musicians begin to play, to improvise ... 

24- Lera Auerbach, Footprints, Canadian Geese

A few days ago a young woman arrived, born in Siberia, around 35, musician, pianist, and composer. Quite unremarkable in bearing, in spite of looking decidely Russian, it turns out, as I discovered through Pamela and Liz (who can find out everything about every one of us, thanks to Google), that she is known worldwide and that her works are performed everywhere. Her name is Lera Auerbach

"Russian-American composer and concert pianist Lera Auerbach is one of today’s most sought after and exciting creative voices. Auerbach’s intelligent and emotional style has connected her to audiences around the world and her work is championed by today’s leading performers, conductors, choreographers, choirs and opera houses.Auerbach was raised in the Russian city of Chelyabinsk on the border of Siberia. She graduated with bachelor’s and master’s degree in composition from the Juilliard School and a post-graduate degree in piano from Hanover University. Her work is published exclusively by the Internationale Musikverlage Hans Sikorski. Her music is available on Deutsche Grammophon, Nonesuch, BIS, Cedille and other labels." She came here to rest between concerts and composing, and she is very nice.

3:00, I head towards the Rio Grande from the south. At one point a branch of the river is frozen, footprints, slightly translucent traces. I descend to the snow covered edge. Beyond the red willows, I can see the Rio Grande running fast. Looking down right below me, the traces of two feet, quite strange, 10 cm long, are they footprints of the hind legs of a hare or of a short uncomplete human?The Pacific or red willow? Canadian geese or black and white ducks? Poplars, these tall golden trees? I don’t know.

My penchant for Nature seems elemental, without a desire for scholarly knowledge, a taste for landscape, either very close or very distant, to contemplate the details of water, to see the forest from the height of a child or the vast, ageless landscapes through a tiny hole in a wooden box. A space and a time without landmark or date, a kind of uninterrupted line between the past which lives within me and the consciousness that I have of myself in the present.Near rivers, near rocks, I lose the self-consciousness that pursues and bothers me. At last it dissolves in a very strong feeling of belonging to this world without existential questioning. I'm real. Full stop.There I live with an infinite pleasure of solitary contemplation.No one to contradict me, no doubts. The unlimited freedom to follow my own rhythm even if I'm off beat. It doesn't show and even if it did, who cares? I feel well.

23- The Rio Grande Seen Up Close, the Red Willows

While these landscapes are not the ones I prefer in the south west, I understand the people who have come to live in Taos. Here there are huge resource inequalities, a diversity of people who have mixed despite the massacres, but they all share a strong attachment to the place where they have chosen to live and a feeling of belonging in this landscape. It is a little like Pierrefeu.The tribal signs you spoke to me about, Jacqueline, it is going to be something else. Yesterday, Michael told me that if I wanted to photograph Taos Pueblo, I should tell him because he has some friends there, some Pueblo Indians are part of the board of the Foundation.Taos Pueblo is Indian Territory, the land around belongs to them and is sacred, therefore closed to us. This is what happened yesterday at the end of Las Cruces Road (though it starts near the plaza, the historic center of Taos) when I found myself facing a no trespassing sign, complete with the usual barbed wire.During the 1950s the Indians were part of the village. They do not come much any more. They tend to pass by. On the other hand, the outskirts where I have driven on certain late afternoons, is where they live. Stark beauty. Houses scattered on the ground. One might say temporary or waiting for something more permanent. Limited means, sometimes horses in huge fields, some cows, wood piles, and at the same time from their windows the most beautiful views, stretching to infinity. Far in the distance, pure lines of the mountains under an immense sky.When I leave the car to just look or take a photograph, as the night falls, a blue haze of smoke, that almost erases scrap iron and other recycled material and the carcasses of the cars flattened in the snow, gives off a familiar smell of pine, juniper or cedar. Yes, it reminds me of all the pine and oak smoke of our childhood fires.

This afternoon I go with Carolyn towards the gorges of the Rio Grande that we cross over on that very high bridge that shakes when a truck passes.

On the map I had seen a road across the river, quite straight at first with no view over the river, only a dark line along the mesa flat surface revealing the sides of a deep gorge.Suddenly the road descends steeply, asphalt becomes dirt. After a few curves, we find ourselves near the river.From below we are surprised, it is not as narrow as perceived from above. We continue on a fair distance, the sun level with the high cliffs, we stop near a bridge, I walk a little, we take the car again, we explore the surroundings, this is the beginning of my scouting out locations for my “Rivieres” project, finally. It is splendid and tranquil, many birds.The sun has disappeared, we return by the main road which joins Taos from the south.Pass with care. 

22- Helene Wurlitzer House with Michael Knight, la Morada, Los Penitentes

At 2:00, we meet Michael who gave us a tour of Helene Wurlitzer’s house.- "In short -as he told us- it is a lived-in house"and we could feel that she loved everything in it, the gifts that she had been given, the things she chose, from here and from her travels. The house is made of adobe and locally grown wood. It is stunning, the Spanish tapestries and the Navajo rugs, furniture, the placement of windows, chimneys in every room, the paintings of her artist friends, photographs.Michael tells us how much he thinks it's important to remain faithful to her philosophy : Discretion is a rule here, so that all will feel free to create, think, rest or open new ways.

After the visit, I left on foot to see the sunset. The mountains were still pink, becoming bluish as the sun sank lower and lower.When I looked back, the sky was a magnificent vermilion, mauve gray behind the curtain of trees.

Just before nightfall, I arrived at the Hispanic cemetery on Las Cruces Road, which we had talked about with Michael. All its tombs decorated with colorful flowers against the now darkened mountains.Further down the road, I came across a sign “No Trespassing, Taos Pueblo Tribal Land.” Another dead end.Right when I was leaving, Pamela appears in front of the cemetery, having had the same curiosity. We retrace our steps. We return convivially in the night.The stove hums, I draw the curtains, it has become my home here, in New Mexico, so far from home, far from all my family, in this country which remains wild with many places still undomesticated, so to speak.

21– Melody Gardot, Old State Road 570, Dead End, Rio Pueblo

It’s snowing.Pamela is here, with a package for me which had been delivered to her by mistake. We drink tea. She speaks about her painting.- “Before beginning to paint I go on bike rides or hiking, having a look around and picking up leaves, tree barks, stones… For example, here in Taos every evening I go to the same place along Kit Carson Road where I lose myself in nature and for 20 minutes I watch the sun setting. There, because of the mountains, the darkness rises; it disappears first from the fields, then the trees and finishes with a pale, golden yellow red line along the edge of the peaks.She reads a lot of history of Spain because as she tells me, they invaded New Mexico and she is interested in how it happened here.I tell her about Las Casas stories, cited by Howard Zinn in his American history. Then naturally we come to "natives". We talk about Plainsong by Nancy Huston (she is also Canadian), Dalva by Jim Harrison and the Border Trilogy by Cormac MC Carthy (the story takes place in New Mexico, he lives here).She will use all this for her painting.At 2:00 George arrives for his French conversation with an article in French about Melody Gardot whose songs he has discovered and adores. We take time to read it, to understand it plus a few digressions about expressions such as “j’en ai mare” (“I am fed up”) and “je n’y arrive pas” (I can’t) and the story of “shut your mouth.” He is, in fact, the third person since I have been here quoting me from a textbook in which there is a translation of “shut up” as “ferme ta bouche.” I explain that no one uses that phrase in French except to a child who is speaking with a full mouth. Then we speak in English and French (the hour is up) about American Beauty that he has just seen.Despite the gloomy weather, I go out into the area surrounding Taos and explore a little more each time. Today, I take a right and then a left and find myself in a landscape with endless views towards the south, with mountains in the distance, black bushes on the snow, Indian houses which seem to have been brought and placed there complete with clutter expanding all around, sometimes one or two horses, an old car. The road becomes a trail and emerges after several miles onto “old State Road 570” which I take to the right.Suddenly no more road. Boulders block the way. I stay for a quarter of an hour to watch, to photograph the nothingness, an icy cold afternoon without sun.Absolutely alone, I think, until I see improbable silhouettes appear (rub my eyes to be sure): a woman with six dogs and a cowboy hat over her ponytail, approaches, coming from far, far away. A car, equally improbable, arrives by the same route as I and heads down the track she is coming along. The woman waves to them. The dogs run ahead.– "What is the immense fault way off in the distance?" I call to her.– "Dead end", she answers, probably thinking that I am asking her about news of the road.There was wind and we were not close. I had thought: let's talk to her so that she holds back the dogs as I was afraid that they would jump on me. The dogs, perfectly well behaved, not at all aggressive or excited, obeyed her. I ask her again in a proximity augmented by the immense scale of the stark landscape around us. She explained that the fault continues for miles and the Rio Pueblo which we cannot see flows through it into the Rio Grande over there, and she points to the northwest.– "Can one go there?" I ask.– "On foot, yes, but it's quite far."– "How far?" "An hour and a half. You go down the road, and then take a path that runs along the river to the Rio Grande."– "Ah well, I will try when the weather gets better."Usual farewells.I take the old 570 to its junction with the highway that goes from Espanola to Taos. Familiar territory. The headlights come on, I pass the church in Ranchos de Taos, and take the side road that I like to come home along. 

20- In Maine Snow Is quite Another Story, Santa Fe, the Rental Car, Tippee

Get up early. I draw the curtains and the snow is falling, probably has been for several hours.Hushed silence.Of course today would be the day I have to go to Santa Fe to return the car and rent another, much cheaper. Too bad! It might not be today. Breakfast, check the Georgia O'Keefe museum hours, have I got any emails?. Go see Michael as the sink is clogged, and the gas water heater in the kitchen smells sometimes, anything to delay the decisive moment. Because the famous Carolyn, told me yesterday :- "Marie lets go, to me the snow in Maine is something else, here it's a joke. We are not going to put it off endlessly."Impossible for the daring adventurer I'm supposed to be, to chicken out! Unless I can’t get out of the field where I park.No problem. The roads have already been salted. With the snow covering everything the clear, unobstructed vistas are quite incredible.A superb moment with impressive climbs and descents, and over there, the Rio Grande is fast flowing. We have the impression that it has risen during the three weeks since we were there.Santa Fe is covered in snow. We find our new rental agency and there we get a price far lower than the one we had negotiated on the phone a few days earlier. The guy, quite nice, is very surprised that we have come from Taos. He asks us what we do there. What Carolyn tells him seems to please him, making him very proud of his state for offering residencies to artists:"Oh yes there is plenty for artists to do here and without a car for sure you will miss a lot."So, suddenly, he agrees to cancel the $ 75 fee for not returning the car to the same place. We ask him if it is possible to reduce the price a little more as I will be keeping the car more than two months and he drops the daily price some more. But he has no car for us because we had not told him ahead of time which day we would arrive. This turns out to be lucky because he is embarrassed to make us wait. - "Go have lunch. Behind the petrol station, there, you will find one of the best bars in Santa Fe." We go and when we return, we find the man washing a huge car, a type of "van". This is for us! Now we will even be able to arrange picnic outings when the weather gets better.We skip the museum and we drive back to Taos with the sun shining. The sky opaque, then becoming clear and finally turning orange by the time we arrive in Taos.Stop by Liz’s house; she invites us in for a coffee, it is six o’clock and she is having dinner, we gossip.

19- Robbie Steinbach and Lyn Bleiler, Caffe Tazza, New Orléans

Sunrise, dull gray sky, quite dark, snowy sky. Breakfast. Itbegins to snow. Suddenly, the sky is blue, bright. The snowfall had been like a short downpour.At noon, appointment with Robbie Steinbach, a Taos photographer. It was Lyn Bleiler, because of whom I am here, who told him that a photographer from Nice was at the Wurlitzer Foundation. He sent me an email, asking to get acquainted over drinks. He must have a website. Surprise, Robbie is a woman.The three of us finally meet in a café nearby, which is absolutelytypical Taos they tell me. Which is to say, today in any case, a diverse mix: old hippies including one who has hair down to the ground, some youths with lips, nose, ears pierced, they areout in the sun in sweaters and I am inside freezing with my big jacket on, a very normal looking couple with huge dog, 2, 3 cowboys, a group of girls dressed in "vintage" clothes laughing in the background, an Indian, a very young couple sitting in a corner coming for multiple refills at the counter. Once you have paid for a coffee, you can refill it as often as you want ... Enter two old guys quite good looking Clint Eastwood types, a tall woman in black looking rather depressed, who leaves again after a few distraught glances around, two other Indians who join the first at the bar ...Robbie's pictures show: Jomo, Wendy, Chiaro, Dwight, MelodyLyn who has just has returned from New Orleans tells us how she enjoyed the city. One cannot see, at least from the center of the city, any traces of the hurricane and flooding. She adds though, that in the lower part of the city, it is very different. She really likes the people there. She tells us they might casually arrive at an appointment arranged days before and say to you:- "Are you flexible? See you in a few hours, there is an impromptu party with lots of musicians and I would not miss it for the world. Even better! Come with us, it will be great ... "That, she has never seen even in Taos which is rather unconventional. We talk photos with Robbie. We leave and we promise to meetagain.While I prepare a lunch of sorts, Carolyn calls on "my" mobile (loan from my neighbor Liz), I invite her for lunch. And here we are, deep in one of our passionate discussions about human relations, life, our lives, photographs, writing, what happens when a piece she wrote is played. It is extraordinary also, she tells me, when I go on stage (she acts in some of her plays) it is like an act of love when suddenly I go out in public nearby. And I perform my life, that life which I have incorporated into my play and, she adds, it's so intense, like pleasure! In fact, perhaps that is why I have lived alone for 20 years. I find this a total commitment.I write emails, I read, it seems like a Sunday. After a quick dinner, near the stove in my big old pink armchair, I open the computer, select photos and begin to write.

18- Indian Encounter, Pamela the Painter, Carolyn and Love, Unreliable Buses in Taos

Drifting, skype to Vosves where Mother, Pascale and Anna are. I tell them about yesterday afternoon, the blue sky, the people, Taos ... go to get the printer that has arrived, plug it in, "surf" the internet, walk to the library, wrong street, get lost, find myself in the university library, enter, ask where is the municipal library. A charming student, smiling, Indian, rises, tall and very handsome, goes outside to show me the road, explaining as if he had all the time in the world. Nice moment. Arriving on the plaza we meet again, big smile and a small wave.Dinner with the other residents. Pamela tells us about her life between Canada and the United States and how in deciding, somewhat by chance, to change universities, she finds herself at age 20, not yet sure of her vocation, in one of the most distinguished universities in the United States taking a course by a painter from New York who tells her that if there is an artist there, it is she. Decisive words.Carolyn performs the beginning of one of her plays for us. It is about love, and she evokes the notion of "never enough”, which DH Lawrence speaks about in the book I am reading and how one should end what is no longer desire but only unfullfillable passion by facing it alone. Suffocating the other's desire, the best way to burn love to ashes.While talking of tragic destinies either of lesbians or of women who refused their status of woman, her plays are essentially about loving relationships. And in her plays they appear to be the same for all.How passion, love, friendship, affection evolve and endure and how integrity or lack of integrity, tolerance, jealousy, deceit, the possibility or impossibility of fidelity, betrayal, the power of one over the other or the desire for equality will affect the relationship. All this takes place against a background of intolerance that has excluded this group, in the same way as other minorities.Next George reads us the story of his wait at the bus stop in which a young girl arrives, sits next to him and launches into an endless monologue. It begins with:- "You should know that here the bus is very unreliable"- "Oh I've noticed" he said.- "Yes, I who lives only a quarter of an hour’s drive away, I plan at least one hour when I have an appointment."Then she plunges directly into the story of her running away at 3 years old, ... her disappearance again at 10 ... and her street life starting at 12 years, and ... yes ... now I am finishing my nursing course because " at 14 years old I was saved by a wonderful woman ... but I do not even know what I will do with this course. Nursing is not for me, my cell phone is ringing... “Oh, excuse me. Hello, where are you ? Yes okay ... etc ... "George hadn’t been able to get in a single word. The bus arrives.- "Goodbye."She does not answer.

17- Doc Martins, Country Music, DJ à Taos, Taosshort

Restaurant bar Doc Martins where the people meet between 4 and 6 o’clock, trendy and beautiful place, live music, mainly country. Today everyone was there to celebrate the rehiring of a DJ who had been fired without explanation on December 31 from a radio station where she hosted an early morning program. She invited the people of the region to speak about their projects, ideas, expositions, concerts, meetings, events, or ideas of any sort. She created connections. And so the listeners wrote, protesting and a month later, the 1st of February, another Taos radio station offered to take the program.Musicians, friends, fans, and because she was a lesbian, many lesbians have come. I wander around the two rooms which are packed, everyone kissing her and kissing each other, taking her in their arms, congratulating her, music, laughter, conversations. I find myself at a table with a large, hefty woman, very fit, at least fifty, fire chief, at Questa, an hour north of Taos. She is accompanied by a small girl dressed all in pink, who adores the ice cream, draws on small scraps of paper and who is the daughter of Melinda, very blond, standing by the bar. Two old women came and sat opposite us, dressed as one might have been 50 years ago. Liz, Pamela and George are there. We are quite astounded. The DJ, who has the same look as Higelin, Nancy, I think, and with whom Carolyn had immediately made an acquaintance, asked us where we come from, what we do. I find very surprising that being lesbian seems to make you belong to a group where everyone knows each other. All other people here absolutely as one would have imagined from afar without really believing, western Americans: the boots and the jeans, for sure, but also the embroidered waistcoats, woven, with fringes, cowboy jackets and hats, vests and skirts in suede.The ambiance grew hotter and hotter. I listen to the music and watch. I am astonished, this is like the movies.Out the window, a splendid sky. Immense, wispy clouds. It had been an hour and a half that we had been there. I suddenly feel like leaving this “film” and going home.Especially as at 7 o’clock I am going with George and Pamela to the festival of short films of Taos which is taking place this weekend. 11 short films which we found really quite good except for 2, 3 which were junk.

17- Doc Martins, Country Music, DJ à Taos, Taosshortz

Restaurant bar Doc Martins, bel endroit branché où les gens se retrouvent entre 16h et 18h, musique live, essentiellement country.Aujourd'hui on y est tous pour fêter la "réembauche" d'une DJ qui, le 31 décembre dernier, avait été virée sans aucune explication, d'une station de radio où elle animait une émission, le matin tôt. Elle invitait les gens de la région pour parler de leurs projets, idées, expositions, concerts, réunions évènements ou idées de toute sorte. Elle créait des liens entre les uns et les autres. Succès. Alors ils écrivent, protestent et un mois après, le 1 février, une autre radio de Taos lui propose de reprendre cette émission.D'où la fête avec plein de musiciens, des amis, des auditeurs, et parce qu'elle est lesbienne, plein de lesbiennes. Je me balade dans les 2 salles, bourrées à craquer, tout le monde l'embrassant, s'embrassant, la prenant dans les bras, la congratulant, et puis musique, rigolades, conversations. Je me retrouve à une table avec une femme grande et costaude, très en forme, au moins 50 ans, chef des pompiers à Questa, à une heure au nord de Taos, accompagnée d'une petite fille tout en rose qui adore les glaces, dessine sur des minuscules bouts de papier et qui est la fille de Melinda, toute blonde là-bas au bar, puis 2 vieilles dames s'installent en face de nous, habillées comme ça devait être il y a 50 ans. Liz, Pamela et George sont là. On est assez éberlué. La DJ, qui a la même tête que Higelin, Nancy je crois, avec qui Carolyn a immédiatement fait connaissance nous demande d'où on vient ce qu'on fait. Effarant, ces femmes vraiment masculines, qui ont l'air de toutes se connaître, quelques autres, sophistiquées, beaucoup plus ambigües, et ces gens absolument comme on les imagine, sans y croire: les bottes et les jeans, bien sûr, mais aussi les vestes brodées, tissées, à franges, les blousons et les chapeaux de cow-boy, gilets et jupes en daim. De plus en plus chaude, l'ambiance. Je vais écouter la musique et regarder. C'est comme au cinéma.Par la fenêtre, splendide ciel immenses nuages effilés. ça fait bien une heure et demi qu'on est là. J'ai envie de sortir du film et de rentrer.Surtout qu'à 19h, on va avec Pamela et George au festival du court-métrage de Taos qui a lieu ce week-end!11 courts métrages qu'on trouve vraiment pas mal à part 2, 3, on ne peut même pas dire navets tellement c'est rien du tout.

16- Snow Boots, Banjo, Jam Sessions, Eskes Pub

I often write quite late at night in the old pink armchair, my feet up against the wood-burning stove, super comfortable!Late one afternoon, I buy snow boots in a store at the other end of town. After having tried on an impressive numbers of boots, I find those that I currently have on with wool socks [are] keeping me very warm. The lady from the store is being helpful by showing me how to tighten them, and so on.… While the store is emptying out gradually, we find ourselves talking politics. First about Obama and as everybody usually says: "he is great, but he can’t do much against the Republican opposition”.She goes on and on about Bush and his horrific Republicans who drove America into the ground: “They are not only ultra-liberals desperate to hold on to more and more money, but also ultra religious conservatives thinking it wouldn't be bad if everything would really fall apart and finally put an end to this earthly world, hence their anti-eco-freak and warmongering policies, and so on.… They couldn't care less about our children or the world. They’ll take advantage of others as much as possible since they are the wealthiest, and that, literally, by the grace of God. Long live the Apocalypse!”Sitting here in my room next to the stove… I still can't get over it.Then she told me about herself who has always worked in the shoe business all over the world especially in Europe, when she worked at Doc Martens, which allowed her to indulge her passion for travel.- I'm guitarist; I was part of a rock band that was once successful in Germany.- And now?- Now I’ve started playing the banjo, and that lets me get in on jam sessions and I love it. I like playing at the Eskes pub.- Do you take walks? Do you know the area around Taos well?- Hiking?- Yes! Mainly along rivers.- Anyway, in winter you can't really hike but along the rivers, you’ll find beautiful spots along the Red River.And going toward Santa Fe, there are magnificent areas along the Rio Grande.She shows me some old snowshoes in the window; a real eye-opener.- So, that's what you need to do, rent a pair of snowshoes, it's cheap, and there is even training if you wish. There is an ad in the local newspaper, here, take it. I'm doing it, it’s fantastic! I go out and find wildlife tracks that I follow. These shoes you just bought are perfect for snowshoeing, however don't wear cotton socks, they are too warm and will make your feet sweat and then freeze.All this sounds very exciting and I envision running into elks and many other animals, and so on…Well, I can just see myself, all alone with my snowshoes, trudging through the snow surrounded by coyotes, elks and bears!Or maybe just a cautious quick walk around our favorite casitas… greeting neighbors…at the other end of the field… going to do laundry a quarter mile away.We swap email addresses, so she can let me know when she's playing next. Tells me how pleasant our conversation was and see you soon. I reply likewise.5:35pm, night is falling, without thinking about it, instead of driving back, I turn to south, then west at the large painted panel of Saint Francis of Assisi. Blurred vision! Illumination for a dashed off instant, colorful moments gently captured.  Just like last time, another world, a winding road, ruts, immaculate large fields where the snow has not melted, sheep with thick fleece, horses, their figures flattened by the night, houses with no frills, thus cheaper to build.   From time to time an estate… no… a ranch, slowing down… and taking a picture of its portal without leaving the car, but 10 meters further, a police car, 2 police men verifying the identity of a guy. So, I’m moving along…