Essentially, the present town of Taos is a dark and murderous blight upon the beauty of el Norte. While there are beautiful old adobe buildings to be seen and hippie funk of most astonishing degree—some would say art—of that, there is no doubt. Our charlatans are pros. There’s nothing you can do but find your own way, live on daddy’s money, or beat your brains out on a rock. As I’ve explained many times before, this is indeed a feature, not a bug. If you somehow make it work, you can breathe clean air and tell the world to go to hell.
This has attracted creative misanthropes of every sort, ever since Comanche raiders started snatching people off the streets for slaves to sell in Mexico. If I had any sense, I’d have given up years ago and decamped to some stupid boring place where people go to church and get fat and give doctors all their money. As it is, I wake up every morning wondering a) why not? and b), my God, we need to buy a house. Then I read the local paper and think, hey, not trapped yet, either!
On the other hand:
This morning I held my lover’s face between my hands, looked deep into her eyes, and told her something silly that didn’t matter because words fail me when it comes to what she means to me. “Here’s to us!” is her most favorite toast when we sit down to wipe away the day…
The Taos fog has lifted, mostly. Some of us are lucky, in our own peculiar way.
John Hamilton Farr lives at 7,000 feet in Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico, U.S.A. As New York Times best-selling author James C. Moore tells it, John is “a man attuned to the world who sees it differently than you and I and writes about it with a language and a vision of life that is impossible to ignore.” This JHFARR.COM site is the master writing archive. To email John, please see CONTACT INFO on .png)
I moved to Taos in 2000, yet, I have never seen this. I saw “frozen fog” at a distance in 2001 but never this. This photo is breathtaking!!!! Thanks!!!!
It’s a rare thing, that’s for sure. Glad you like the photo!