As it turns out, Mabel loaned Georgia a little house situated on her vast property for three months, or longer if wanted. This pivotal summer is how Georgia first discovered New Mexico, ultimately leading her to Abiquiú, which became her permanent home.
Southwest Living
We Thought We Knew
Both Mabel Dodge Luhan and I arrived in New Mexico with similar cavalier assumptions and an absence of prior research before buying land and building homes. There was a great deal neither of us considered or understood about the place. But the thing is, we thought we knew.
On the Road in New Mexico: Valles Caldera National Preserve
Human connection to this landscape runs incredibly deep. Artifacts found within the caldera have been carbon-dated to 11,000 years ago, proving its use dates back to prehistoric times. Oral histories record that the area drew the ancestors of the Jemez, Zia, Santa Clara, and San Ildefonso pueblos.
Day Trip
The trip was filled with ghosts and they or the land, or both, gripped my soul on this sunny New Mexico day when Kim and I journeyed back in time and experienced the conceived utopia of another era and a sense of the lives lived within it, in old houses and on ancient land.
Dennis Hopper in Taos
“In the late 1960s at the height of his career, Dennis Hopper left Hollywood for artistic bohemia in New Mexico. His daughter looks back on a man in search of free expression and a more contemplative way of life.” This from the NYT tmagazine blog.
Georgia O’Keeffe’s White Place
I did not set out seeking Georgia as so many seem to do. I just went on a hike with friends. It didn’t occur to me until days later that we were in Georgia O’Keeffe’s White Place.
Retreat!
… turn that long, painful look inside to the feelings generated within us by what we see–because those feelings we can do something about. Those we can heal. But we don’t get to heal things that are outside of us.