Beyond Cuckoo

No longer in Limbo, I’ve moved all material possessions, dog and husband (not exactly in that order) to Las Cruces, New Mexico. The old California house is sold—new house is in escrow. Meanwhile we (me, dog, spouse) are camped above the Mesilla Valley—material possessions on their way.

Last night the weather changed abruptly. Darkened skies oozed from behind the mountains. Lightning, thunder, and swift direction-changing winds engulfed the area and blew out the power. Instead of dread, a sense of excitement electrified the air, now filled with the sweet smell of the storm. Blake, (the spouse) clicked on a music app—The Rolling Stones—Jumpin’ Jack Flash accompanied the next wind blast. Mick Jagger was once quoted as saying this about the song, “It’s about having a hard time and getting out. Just a metaphor for getting out of all the acid things.”

In his autobiography, Life (2010), Keith Richards wrote about the mysterious power of this song: “I love ‘Satisfaction’ dearly and everything, but those chords are pretty much a de rigueur course as far as songwriting goes. But ‘Flash’ is particularly interesting. It’s allllll right now. It’s almost Arabic or very old, archaic, classical, the chord setups you could only hear in Gregorian chants or something like that. And it’s that weird mixture of your actual rock and roll and at the same time this weird echo of very, very ancient music that you don’t even know. It’s much older than I am, and that’s unbelievable! It’s like a recall of something, and I don’t know where it came from.”

This morning, clouds gone, hot sun shining, I feel a connection. Like most Stones fans I’ve sung along since adolescence—only now it’s more than a pop song. As in most complicated relocations, people that normally wouldn’t meet, have conversations. Today it feels like the entire world is in motion. The people in the business of moving, i.e. realtors, title company employees, cargo van drivers, all agree—something is up. Where is everyone going? Someplace else. It’s not working, what we have; look around, or inside, or north, south, east west. A different continent? Live tiny, live huge. It ultimately won’t matter after the earth stops moving, shaking, rising, and falling. Something tells me that it has happened before—we are getting in position—another chance.

The high desert, the Colorado Plateau is roughly anchored by the Four Corners region of the southwestern United States. About 90% of the area is drained by mighty rivers: the Colorado, the Green, the San Juan, the Little Colorado and my favorite, the Rio Grande and its tributaries. Water seems to be everywhere, yet scarce. Indigenous people of the area pray for rain. The Hopi culture calls it the center of the universe. I guess that’s why I’m here. To be at the center when all hell breaks loose.