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Santa Feans reveal the ins and outs of what they do to get by.
New Order called theirs Blue. The Bangles called theirs Manic. The dude from
Office Space
contracted a particularly debilitating case of them. Garfield just plain hates them. In fact, anyone who has ever sucker-punched an alarm clock is familiar with a simple universal truth.
Mondays are a bitch.
You know it. I know it. And Grover Cleveland knew it. Which is why we can thank the Grovenator for both our lingering hangovers and the extended weekend that created them. That's because the Cleveland Steamer wasn't just the 22nd and 24th president of the United States. He didn't just own one of the best porn star names in Oval Office history. And the legacy he left behind isn't merely the gnarly 100-year-old tumor removed from his mouth circa 1893 that sits in the
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Mütter Museum in Philadelphia.
The old coot also gave us Labor Day.
Granted, he signed off on the national holiday in 1894 to appease the labor unions whose strikes he routinely broke up with steel-toed boots. But hell, we'll take a chance to forsake a Monday whenever we can, even if the day that was originally intended to celebrate and mobilize the American worker has since transformed into the last chance to kick summer in the sack with one final three-day bacchanal before the drab realities of school, work and winter set in.
Which is (sigh) precisely where we find ourselves. Labor Day has passed. Summer is all but over. We have to let Monday back into our lives for another year. But going back to work in Santa Fe poses its own set of challenges and triumphs beyond a common case of the Mondays for every cog in the local economic machine. Area workers are all too familiar with indigenous buzz phrases like "affordable housing" and "living wage" which perpetually hover above the city like the charred remnants of Zozobra.
Old Man Gloom has plenty of fodder to play with here: exorbitant housing costs, soaring gasoline prices, a constant struggle to eke out a living. The pretty view and funky atmosphere don't come cheap-which explains why thousands of different residents get up every Monday and head to thousands of different jobs in order to pay for the privilege of calling this weird little city of ours home.
Most do it anonymously. Nondescript worker bees fixing cars, bussing tables and pushing paperwork in an effort to carve out a piece of honeycomb they can call their own. In their honor, we offer the following glimpses inside the working lives of a handful of our comrades.
Chris Montoya is conflicted.
The 27-year-old has seized a social trend by its short hairs like a true entrepreneur. His fledgling business boasts a roster of 300 clients. Most are regulars, guaranteed to utilize his services for up to 12 months at a time while filtering at least $22,500 into the business every 30 days.
There is only one caveat. His livelihood depends on drunk drivers.
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"It's bittersweet," Montoya says. "DWI has been a big problem in New Mexico for a long time and they're finally starting to crack down on it. From a business standpoint, that's good for us. We like to think that we make the streets safer, that we make a difference in the community. But it can be tough to see the same clients coming back a second time. We'll take their business but we prefer-for their sake-that we don't see them in the shop a second time."
Montoya's business is Adobe Interlock, his product is the Draeger XT and both are in high demand. Not that most of his clients have a choice in the matter; most have the interlock ignition device installed by court mandate, although Montoya refuses to let the accompanying social stigma set foot inside his business.
"We have a good relationship with our clients," Montoya says. "We don't treat anyone as a criminal. Everybody who walks through the door we treat as a friend."
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His clients are friends and his employees are family. Montoya bought Adobe Interlock from his former employer last September. His wife Dara manages the office. His brother-in-law Jared Cordova helps him install and maintain interlock devices for as many as 15 clients every week.
The Draeger XT rests inside the steering column and registers every sneeze a vehicle makes. It can operate in sub-zero temperatures. It's covered with temper seals to prevent tampering. The hand-held breathalyzer attached to the device even tracks the temperature and air-speed of a client's breath, lest they try to circumvent the system with an air compressor or a stand-in exhale.
"A lot of people ask if they can get their children to blow for them," Dara says. "Most children under the age of 12 don't have the lung capacity to even register on the machine."
Each client is required to return to Adobe Interlock every 30 days for a checkup. Dara downloads readings from the interlock device-which can produced a 100-page report every month-and notifies the court if there are any anomalies.
Most clients pay $75 out-of-pocket, in addition to a monthly $75 rent, to have the device installed. Despite the consistent cash flow, Adobe Interlock is still trying to keep its head above water. That's because a client will occasionally skip town with a $1,500 Draeger XT-which Montoya leases from a Texas company-still in their possession.
"Honestly, we haven't turned a profit yet, but we're close," Dara says. "The reason we haven't yet is people who are not compliant. That kind of kills us."
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Adobe Interlock received a breath of life when it relocated from its original location off of Siler Road to the Santa Fe Business Incubator-a communal business offshoot of the city's Tierra Contenta project-which has given the business twice as much space for half the rent while providing a setting intended to nurture burgeoning businesses.
"We've been blessed to be a part of the incubator," Dara says. "Without it, this would be a lot harder."
Not that it's particularly easy. Aside from clients who abscond with their equipment, Adobe Interlock competes with three other companies that have sprouted in the wake of tough DWI legislation requiring first-time offenders to install an interlock device in their vehicles for up to 12 months. Not that the Montoyas have any fear of the supply overwhelming the demand.
"Unfortunately," Dara says, "there's more than enough DWIs in Santa Fe to go around."
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Your shop teacher was right.
All it takes is one mistake, one lapse in concentration, and you're missing a finger.
John Prosser is lucky he still has his; an unfortunate mishap with a bandsaw last year causes his right pinky finger to jut out at an awkward angle. But it's a relatively minor inconvenience for someone who has spent his life as a farrier and blacksmith.
"If you hurt yourself shoeing a
horse you can blame the horse if you get hurt," Prosser laughs. "As a blacksmith, if you get hurt you can pretty much blame yourself."
The owner of Prosser Forge can also blame himself for transforming a small smithy business that began in a tiny shed into one of the most sought-after custom ironwork operations in Santa Fe.
Prosser dropped out of high school at age 16 to become a farrier. He spent years wrangling and shoeing horses on dude ranches all over the west before he landed a job at Bishop's Lodge in Santa Fe where he met Patty, his wife of 18 years, and was introduced to the world of forgery.
Tired of ornery equines, Prosser enrolled in a course at the Turley Forge and Blacksmithing School in Santa Fe more than a decade ago. Soon after completing his first official job as a blacksmith-making a fireplace screen for a local car dealer-Prosser found unexpected rewards in his new profession.
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"In horseshoeing no matter how good a job you do it goes to hell in six weeks," Prosser says. "If you do beautiful ironwork it lasts a lifetime. To have a legacy of work that I created with my own hands is very satisfying."
Prosser's small, cluttered office is flanked with photos documenting his work. His biggest client is a Chicago furniture dealer who commissions Prosser to make everything from table and chair frames to light fixtures and fireplace screens. Most of his local work is exhibited in things like gates, railings and doors that adorn some of Santa Fe's most spectacular homes. One photo depicts a custom black entryway gate that took a few weeks to construct and sold for $15,000.
"Most of my clients tend to be affluent," Prosser says. "Santa Fe is a good place for a business like this. I don't spend a lot of time comparing my prices to other businesses. Some may charge less and some may charge more. We try to let the product speak for itself."
He credits his products-and the congenial town they're made in-for never being forced to do a job pro bono.
"I've never been stiffed," Prosser says. "Nobody has ever skipped out on a check. I don't know if that's a function of the work we do or the town we live in. Probably both."
Everything at Prosser Forge is made in-house, molded in two handmade forges (reaching temperatures of up to 2,400 degrees) and shaped by the vast array of tools that fills his cavernous shop on Trades West Road. There are modern conveniences. Bandsaws. Drill presses. Air hammers. But Prosser tempers the technology with old-fashioned anvil smacking characteristic of a centuries-old profession he says is steeped in camaraderie.
"I would consider most of the blacksmiths in Santa Fe friends and none of them enemies," Prosser says. "There is a sense of community among the blacksmiths that you don't see in other professions. The roofers in Santa Fe, for instance, are not friendly at all with each other. That's not the case with us."
The allegiance is welded together with a common affinity for sweat and grease. Prosser says he hasn't taken a real vacation since his honeymoon. But the diligent work ethic required of a blacksmith has allowed him to hammer out a life in Santa Fe.
"I don't have a large retirement set up or anything but we're able to make a fairly comfortable living," Prosser says. "I came from humble beginnings and now we run a business where our work is displayed in $8 million homes. That's very gratifying."
The Cook doesn't want to reveal her name. She doesn't care to
divulge her age. And she sure as hell doesn't want her picture taken. A wise man would grant her latter request, considering she's wielding a razor-sharp paring knife. Besides, it isn't smart to try the patience of anyone who handles hundreds of voracious teenagers every day as a cafeteria worker at Santa Fe High School.
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"It's murder," she says, describing the daily feeding frenzy. "It can be scary seeing 1,000 kids coming at you at once."
The Cook graduated from Santa Fe High 33 years ago. Her memories of lunch hour wilt in comparison to the relatively opulent setting in which the teenagers dine.
"These kids eat
good
," she says, plunging a basket of fries into a gurgling cauldron of oil for emphasis. "We didn't have anything like the kids these days. The cafeteria was in a portable [building] and it served one meal. Imagine the wages then?"
Wages are a sore subject in school cafeterias. The city's Living Wage ordinance does not apply to cafeteria workers and other support staff employed by Santa Fe Public Schools, though lobbying for better wages has been a focal point of the ongoing contract negotiations between the district and the National Education Association union.
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After three years in the cafeteria, the Cook earns $7.56 an hour, though she expects to be bumped up to the Living Wage mark of $8.50 on her next paycheck. Nonetheless, the volatility of the wage situation has spurred the Cook's request to remain nameless, ageless and fearful of cameras.
At least one of her coworkers isn't afraid to talk about the subject however. That's because 40-year-old Patricia Arana is leaving the cafeteria (in which she's paid less than $200 a week) for a job that adheres to the Living Wage.
"It's hard work," Arana says in broken English. "They not pay very good."
When asked what her job duties in the cafeteria entail, Arana says, "Everything." When asked what she will miss about the cafeteria after she leaves, she says, "Nothing." According to SFHS Cafeteria Manager Janet Romero, consternation over wages consistently bubbles over in the kitchen.
"There are some employees who feel they work harder than what they're getting paid," Romero says. "They're good workers and they work hard but it is hard work. Nothing is slow in here."
Romero should know. She started working for the district as a cook 20 years ago. She has spent the last 17 years managing nine of the district's 27 cafeterias. This is her third year at SFHS, one of the largest and most hectic operations in town.
"The hardest part is to feed all these kids in less than 40 minutes," Romero says. "They all come in at once. We really need to hustle and push to feed them all before the bell rings."
The school's cafeteria looks more like a mall food court or college dining hall than the mystery meat dens you remember. Students have a buffet of options. Pizza. Salad bar. Hamburgers. Chicken sandwiches. Chicken wings. Chimichangas. And a meal that rotates daily. There is also a "Campus Cuisine" à la carte…uh…cart outside the cafeteria and the student-run Alarm Clock Café down the hall.
Roughly a third of the school's 2,000 students flock to the cafeteria, the Campus Cuisine cart and the Alarm Clock Café every day. The main cafeteria alone serves up more than 500 lunches a day. The workers buzz with activity in the stainless-steel kitchen, frying…uh…fries, cutting up pizzas and stocking the salad bar. They retrieve the food from two large pantries where the shelves are lined with 6-lb. cans of pinto beans, huge jars of "Extra Heavy Duty" mayonnaise and cardboard boxes with ominous labels like "Calzone Pack Kit." (Some assembly required.)
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Workers are still scrambling to place foil-wrapped burgers beneath the heat lamps and rush cash drawers to the registers when the bell rings. The chatter and patter of not-so-little feet slowly escalates until it drowns out Jo Dee Messina, singing "My Give a Damn's Busted" from a small stereo in a suddenly forgotten corner of the sprawling kitchen. The workers hunker behind the lunch counters and brace for the Blitzkrieg.
The Cook-who has since become a Cashier-glances out the large windows at the advancing army as it descends on the cafeteria. She smiles.
"Here they come!" she shouts. It's both a warning and an excited exclamation.
Mark Vigil has unfinished business and his name is Jerry
Marquez.
Marquez is a human canvas. A breathing mural. A living work of art that Vigil-the owner of Four Star Tattoo-has been drawing for more than 10 years. After 800 painful hours, the interactive collage is nearly complete. Marquez's body is intricately wallpapered with individual tattoos that have long since morphed into one tailored body suit.
"Pieces are a reflection of your life," Marquez says. "You get tattoos that mean something to you."
Something like kites. Marquez loves flying kites, which is why he has Japanese fighting kites sailing on his right leg. An American flag adorns his right foot and a New Mexico flag adorns his left. Dragons, serpents and pagodas currently under construction encircle ***image14***his arms and legs. Flames lick the right side of his torso-his "fire" side-which is also filled with imagery representing his Chinese Zodiac sign (the Rat). The left side of his torso-his "water" side-is an homage to his wife, whose Zodiac reveals itself as a snarling tiger prowling around his rib cage.
This is what you call dedication. And both the artist and the canvas have heavy investments-emotional, creative and otherwise-at stake. Vigil has been inking skin professionally for about 13 years, the last six as owner of Four Star. Business is a little slow today. Actually, it's been slow most days since Vigil was forced to relocate from a primo spot on Guadalupe to an obscure nook behind Whole Foods when his landlord decided to transform the previous building into vacation condos.
"[Business] is okay," Vigil says. "But this isn't exactly a main drag. It's not like it was when we were on Guadalupe. We have a pretty good client base but it's still tough to get enough business walking through the door."
Vigil relies on clients like Marquez to put food on the table. During a hectic week, Vigil-who charges $150 an hour for his expertise-and his three employees-who charge $100 an hour-can pull in around $4,000. During slow periods, they're lucky to get a fraction of that. But while Vigil occasionally wonders if he would have been better off as a house painter, it's customers like Marquez who keep him coming back for more.
"It can be tough," Vigil admits. "Sometimes you ask yourself what the hell you're doing this for…but most of the time it's exciting to be here. The clients recharge you. I'm energized by stuff that's a challenge. I want a person to like what I've done 30 years from now. I want to it to stand the test of time."
It's that dedicated client base-personified by Marquez-that has kept Four Star standing in an industry based on "flash" (i.e., walk-in) customers. Vigil first delved into the tattoo business as a teenager obsessed with skateboard culture and the straightedge punk scene. He taught himself the trade by hand-poking tattoos on himself and his friends.
"I wasn't very good," Vigil says. "It was very primitive."
It also spawned the evolution of those sloppy portraits by the artist as a young man into the works of a seasoned professional capable of covering up his own mistakes.
"A lot of the pieces I have are designed to cover up older work," Vigil says. "I liked them at the time and I don't regret getting them but I just outgrew them."
One mistake spawned the name of his store. As a teen, Vigil had inscribed "STR8" on the knuckles of his left hand before eventually doctoring the letters into four green stars. The constellation on his digits serves as a reminder to Vigil to counsel his clients about the dangers of acting on fleeting passions, such as etching a boyfriend's name for all of eternity.
"You have to be able to adapt to whatever walks in the door," Vigil says. "At the same time, you want to steer them in the right direction. You need to make sure they're certain about what they want to do. This is something that is going to be with them for the rest of their lives."
Not that Vigil considers tattoo removal to be a sacrilege of the trade. In fact, he admits he's considering lightening up a spot on his right arm that has been layered over so many times it's become a dark, amorphous blob.
"That's when you know you're addicted," Marquez laughs. "When you get laser removal just so you can get another tattoo."
Most of Vigil's customers shy away from anything as extensive as that displayed on Marquez. Religious imagery is popular, as are Asian characters. "Santa Fe is pretty tame," Vigil says. "There aren't really any strange requests…other than tattoos on private parts."
Ouch. But you don't have to tattoo a smiley face on your penis to feel the searing agony of Vigil's needle. Even seasoned professionals like Vigil-who meditates and listens to music when under the needle-and Marquez still cringe at the suffering they endure for their art.
"The pain is killer," Marquez says. "But the finished product is worth it. If you want something bad enough than you can handle the pain."
Elissa Heyman knows what you're thinking.
Which is kind of the point. But the 55-year-old psychic doesn't need clairvoyance to sense the skepticism that weighs like so many lead-filled crystal balls on her profession. So, you don't buy that she had premonitions of the war in Iraq, the tsunami in Asia and the hurricane in New Orleans. That's fine. You probably couldn't afford her anyway.
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"Nobody pays $135 an hour unless they have a reason to be here," Heyman says. "Occasionally there will be someone who has money and is just killing time but usually they have a very good reason."
Financial questions, relationship troubles, deceased relatives, lost pets, grief, sorrow, confusion-Heyman has seen (in more ways than one) it all. And her expertise doesn't come cheap. A mere 15 minutes will set you back $45. But clients all over the world regularly pay that and much more for someone who is as busy in this world as she is in any others she may frequent. Heyman fields calls from all over the globe. She conducts in-person sessions all over the country. She writes a newsletter. She conducts workshops. But one thing she doesn't do-anymore at least-is bust out her "Oh" cards at a dinner party.
Heyman learned that lesson the hard way after she brought out the cards-used for divination in her psychic readings-at a party when one of her subjects unwittingly unearthed something not intended for public revelation.
"What it spelled out was that she was a closet homosexual," Heyman says. "[The cards] are not good for parties apparently."
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Oh. But the cards are hardly the only psychic tools in her arsenal. A small back room of her spacious apartment on Palace Avenue-her office, as it were-is filled with the ultrasensory utensils. There are the "speaking stones" from South America. Drums. Wind chimes. Candles. Herbs. Feathers. Anything and everything has an energy force. The book of matches on the table. The Winnie-the-Pooh rattle on the shelf. Hell, even the cinnamon Tic-Tacs Heyman nibbles on as she talks.
But it's the client's energy force that Heyman focuses on. She may start a session by burning an herbal mixture and wafting the smoke around the room with a large, black condor feather. Then she takes a little clairvoyant look-see before using her tools-primarily the stones and tarot cards-to search for a response to a client's inquiry. Though not everyone is comfortable with the answers.
"I preface any inquiry that has a 'where is' or a 'what happened to' in it by telling the person I can only say what I get," Heyman says. "If I don't, I won't get anymore. I've had people ask 'What happened to my dog? He's a toy poodle that was lost out in Madrid.' Um, I see him in a coyote's mouth."
She counsels those who seek a salve for their torment to first search within.
"If anything, it's a matter of me showing them the questions that they need to ask themselves," Heyman says. "You give people back the power that they're trying to give to you."
Heyman has, on occasion, harnessed her own power for practical means in order to test the boundaries of her abilities. For instance, instead of scouring portfolios and poring over the Wall Street Journal, she has toyed with the stock market using her divination stones and tarot cards.
"I could have been a day-trader," Heyman laughs. "I can see when a stock is about to pop. But it's just a game for me. I wanted to see if I could do it and I could. [Besides] I really felt it was the wrong use of what I can do for people."
Heyman says her primary purpose is to help people-a desire borne from her years working at the college health center at UC-Santa Barbara, where she had experience counseling mental patients.
"I was interested in people who heard voices because I also heard voices," Heyman says. "[But where] mine have supported me my whole life theirs drive them crazy and make them tired."
"I was not willing to give this up and do anything else," Heyman says. "There were times when I would make do without much but I never considered getting a regular job."
Her dedication was further fostered by her location. Heyman found life in Santa Fe to be far less congested and chaotic than her native California. She had had a premonition about a place with big skies long before setting foot in New Mexico. When she did, she found an ideal place to heal and be healed.
"There are very few places in the country where I could support myself doing this," Heyman says. "You can feel the difference here. There is beauty in the air."
Who Makes What
A selection of Santa Fe wages
- Barista, Ohori's: $8.50 per hour, plus tips
- Installationist, Meyer-Munson Gallery: $8-$10 per hour
- Busser, Santa Café: $4.50 per hour, plus tips
- Teller, First State Bank of New Mexico: $9 per hour
- Home Health Aide, Presbyterian Medical Services: $8.50 per hour
- Custodian, St. John's College: $9.03-$10.86 per hour
- Teacher, SFPS: $40,000 per year base pay
- Receptionist, Roller Printer: $10-$12 per hour
- Program Director, Santa Fe Civic Housing Authority: $43,000-$54,000 per year
- Security Guard, Southwest Asset Management, Inc.: $8.25 per hour
- Mayor Larry Delgado: $17,264 per year
- City Manager Mike Lujan: $99,970 per year
- Police Chief Bev Lennen: $89,998 per year
- New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson: $110,000 per year
(Compiled by Farren Stanley)
