Journal:
Groggy all day. Talked w V till 1am, fell asleep on couch, awake at 3am, couldn't get back to sleep, alarm at 7.50am. Talked w MBH (no skype). Michael & Yana around to pick up Barbara for day of riding (horses then motorbikes). Guadelupe Str blocked off and people lining the streets in anticipation of a parade (Fiesta continues).
Drove up 284 to Santa Clara Pueblo (and down 30 to the wrong entrance, then Nora met us at the Danby Burger and guided us a short way to her bare-bones studio). 10.15-12.30 visit w Nora Naranjo-Morse, Native American sculptor (& activist) -- interested in identity, loss and reclamation of culture, false consciousness (esp of Native Americans who have been through the Boarding Schools), connection to the land, feminism/role of women, health (obesity, nutrition, diabetes, alcoholism), the sacred (connection to the land came up again). Interesting topics, but she seemed to be lacking (or holding back) a certain 'energy'...Wren suggested she seemed 'resigned'...in Emaho-speak (not in the sense that she's stopped fighting the good fight, coz she's still very 'engaged' politically)... Maybe her mind was simply elsewhere -- she had a deadline looming for pulling quotes for her 1hr film 'Breaking Ground', so it was very generous of her to 'shoot the breeze' with us at all... Or maybe she was just trying to figure out 'why we were there' and wasn't quite seeing the connection with her work...She did warm as the conversation progressed... I found myself struggling to keep my eyes open, was on the precipice of sleep, horrible feeling...
As we left she pointed us to El Parasol for their chicken tacos, at the turn-off to Chimayo -- then we continued to the chapel with the sacred earth in that town. Cited as 'the Lourdes of the US.' Not quite, but people were rubbing the earth on their joints, and the chapel was full of discarded crutches.
Wren drove us back (I napped) and we (re)visited SITE and watched some of the videos we'd not gotten to yesterday. Shopped at Wholefoods across the street from the Railyard Park, then returned home 6-ish. Met Rose, an (elderly) friend of Barbara's who was in the area for Vision Quest training (sounded like a type of software to me, but Wren explained it's where people fast in the wilderness for 2 weeks and, well, start seeing things). Rose's friend (and chauffeur for the day) Dave is from Malibu and is building a house in Boulder CO. I finally booked my flight Albuquerque-San Francisco for Sat, Sept 18th after having struggled with the website for the past day or so.
Bells tinkling in Hillside Park, snippets of Xmas-carol-y music, quite odd. When darkness fell we spotted a river of candles snaking its way up the hill, and went out to see what it was all about. Caught the tail end remarks of a cleric praising Santa Fe's multi-culturalism & multi-churchness, and citizens ability to live together harmoniously, carrying on the promise of 1692 (apparently Fiesta has been going on for 318 years).
Wren made some baba ganoush to go with our minestrone soup out of a can, and we watched A River Runs Through It (Brad Pitt as the bad boy / golden boy younger fly-fishing brother, directed by Robert Redford).
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