A misanthrope's guide to fall.
Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns.
-George Eliot
We can only speculate what kind of liberal tippling in the midst of Victorian London Mary Anne Evans (aka George Eliot) got up to in order to spout off such hallucinatory praise of autumn, but even the teetotalers among us will sympathize with the fact that when leaves change color, they're damn pretty. Crisp air against ochre, orange and yellow in the fall draws us outdoors in bewilderment, and appreciation and what Robert Browning Hamilton called the season's "mute appeal to sympathy for its decay." Maybe it's because we can't go whale watching or fox hunting, maybe it's because only so many hours of the day can be consumed
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with football hype and congressional election hoopla, but getting out into the middle of that precious, golden decay will be a mandatory autumn exploration for many of us this year. There are few things honestly better than kneeling down on the cooling earth and gathering the rich scent of fallen leaves while a lowering sun filters through thinning branches. A drop of lithium or an ounce of absinthe at that point and I'd happily sprout wings and chase George Eliot across hemispheres.
The problem, of course, is people, other people, and how much they suck. Heading out of Santa Fe toward the ski basin, it's not just the actual Aspen Vista and every other official scenic overlook that's clogged with cars, kids and candy bars, it's every precarious dirt turnout and rocky shoulder. I'd like to feel a camaraderie at mass appreciation of nature, honestly I would. I'd like to look out across a valley of shimmering aspen trees and smile at the stranger next to me, knowing that we feel a bond in the face of the natural world, a kinship that might span partisan politics and rival NFL teams and the cold specter of nearly global war. But I don't. I look at them and think I'd like to kick them in the knee, stuff them in their Escalade and roll it off a precipice. This, I'm pretty
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sure, is antisocial behavior and is not a good way to enjoy the shifting seasons. What then is the best option for private celebration of something everyone else wants to enjoy as well? Obviously, it's to walk deep into the wilderness where only a few other people are brave, healthy or well-equipped enough to follow. But suppose you've been duped into tolerable company like your elderly granny or your best pal who happens to have a wooden leg? Suppose that, like me, brave, healthy and well-equipped people are the ones you most despise? The answer is to get the hell out of Dodge-to blow this short, brown, overpopulated adobe pin cushion and head for delightfully less populated parts of the state. Clearly, you'll want to stick to the mountains and, clearly, there are many options. The Sandia and Manzano mountains are good choices, but close to Albuquerque, and the goal, remember, is to move away from people. Looping through the Jemez via White Rock and on to Jemez Springs will take you past the Valles Caldera, but could leave you staring down the barrel of Bernalillo and, shudder, Rio Rancho. The high road to Taos is just plain predictable.
Besides, the most majestic, screech-to-a-halt-in-the-middle-of-the-road display of autumnal majesty I've ever seen was on Route 64 between Tres Piedras and Tierra Amarilla. The road arcs through beautiful tundra meadows along the Rio Tusas in the Carson National
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Forest. You'll pass the looming height of Broke Off Mountain, Jawbone Mountain, Burned Mountain and Quartzite Peak. You'll get to give the finger to the conservative hunting lodge that sometimes hangs an Arab effigy from their ranch gate. And, after you've calmed down and realized that unreasonable losers have just as much of a right to own private property as you and me and colonies of Buddhists, you'll move past the stunning Brazos Cliffs and descend toward Tierra Amarilla amidst a mind-numbing explosion of color and texture. If you're alone, you will stop the car and hump a tree. If you're with your granny or your best pal, well, use your own judgment but consider exercising restraint. Perhaps one of the more sociable options along the way would be better, like stopping for a morning soak at Ojo Caliente when heading from Santa Fe to Tres Piedras or cruising the Los Ojos Handweavers shop in the Chama Valley or watching Pedernal fade into the sunset from Abiquiu Lake on the way home.
If you're like me, you'll take a motorcycle. Not just for 50 mpg or the easy way to ditch your wooden-legged friend and your granny, but because all alone on the road, sealed in my helmet, it's just me and the turning, decaying earth. It's the closest I'll ever get to sprouting wings and following successive autumns. And I don't have to share it with you.
