conveniently three minutes downhill from aging Libre’s entry cattle guard, has seen increasing usage of late.  Meanwhile we remained well, well inside Libre proper, with our own projects

[none of which had ever self-identified as “hippie”] while far out on the coast of California

daughter-in-law Christine was doing a lecture, exhibition and residency at the ICA in Encinitas.

Three minutes down the road on that same September weekend the large life of musician,

mentor, entrepreneur and builder of many things Brent Seawell was celebrated and commemorated by over a hundred people with tales and accolades…followed by more tales, accolades and a lavishly catered meal by Alys at Mountain Water adjacent but L and I, sore of feet, depleted by heat and expecting guests, stumbled back to the truck and up the hill

to await Corvas, whom we’d first met when installing “Making Places” and who’d eventually spent a month-long residency here which pretty much decided him to go back to just making paintings after, among other things, a brief sojourn in New York before what was expected to be the final show of his exuberant-but-ever-broke Santa Fe arts collective in New Orleans.  The New Orleans gig, however, altered the Plan and changed History. Somewhat anyway; for one thing that was where he Met the Girl [with whom he now has a daughter, a son on the way and a new Great [white] Pyrenees puppy] as well as where the group experienced the belated

possibility of Sustainability. As a result in the intervening not-so many years Meow Wolf went from a scruffy informal collective to, well, Meow Wolf, a phenomenon which not only [just barely] survived Covid but as of last week exists in three states and venues simultaneously.  So we had much to catch up on but, really, just lovely to see him and meet Meghan.  After which they went on to Santa Fe and we, as usual, went to the dogs and our usual rounds as things

got crisper…not crisp enough to change colors,

but crisp enough to bring back mostly clear skies.

After a couple of days uninterrupted there was the long-postponed trip to the Walsenburg dump, the disconcerting revelation that persons unknown had tried to break into our art

storage and, after a stop on the outskirts for frozen tamales,

home by way of Gardner in anticipation of an afternoon respite before four for dinner but

studio naps in the brief afternoon ended up derailed by the arrival of Raymond with an extremely sweet brown border collie [Sumi was enraptured] and a cord of wood to unload.

Soon after that we went into prep mode for dinner for Dean and Sibylla from Libre, Michael and Nancy from down the road just a little past the Cemetery and us…a good longish evening* followed by dishes, sleeps and another chill morning with these Wednesday words of wisdom from First Dog on the Moon; “Whatever you thought you would be doing at the end of the world you are doing it right now” – What we then did was to go brightly up Fossil Hill,

collecting kindling in anticipation of cooler weather…

cooler weather sure to come.

*With, among much else, detailed descriptions of Alys’ abundance and the hordes crammed in  Joan and Robert’s communal studios to noisily devour it on Saturday.