I disagreed with him. When I lived there, the place was bright with gardens and well-kept lawns, and it was vibrant and alive. Or maybe my memories of it are misty and water-colored. Now, it's a goddamned hole.
Yesterday I saw that even more houses have been boarded up since I was there a year ago, and the Methodist church has since burned down. The general store is limping along. A house across the street from the school had been abandoned for years, and at Christmastime, some kids were partying inside, left a fire burning, and burned it out. The house next to the lot P and I used to live on is collapsing, and the place where we last lived is abandoned. Last year I opened the side door and peered in, and it was obvious from the musky smell that critters have taken it over.
Jean said that the school is declining and that no one is particularly interested in saving it. Only one person filed for the three vacant seats on the school board, so they won't have an election. No one wants to teach in a rural school or administer one. Only 45 kids are in the junior high and high school; when we were there, we had about 80 kids. History teaches us that as the school goes, so goes the town. Gladstone, Folsom, Capulin, Kiowa, Quay, Trementina, Colmor, Dawson, Gallina, among others, had schools--now they are just wide spots on a road.
The community got together in the late 1970s in Maxwell to build a ball field, dugout, and track. The current village administration planted grass on the field, but to protect the grass, they won't allow anybody to use the field.
The old sugar beet mill has been converted to a facility that chips up logs to make bedding for pets.
I took the camera along and practiced some more with the telephoto lens. I think I have to wear my reading glasses when I look through the viewfinder; otherwise, the images are blurry. I spent some time in Tecolote, and here are some of the better images.
Wire mesh in the dirt.
Down a road.
Two rock walls.
A rock wall and abandoned house.
The church.
4 comments:
It's really sad. But I guess it's a fact of life. Or "progress." A few miles from the folks' farm where I grew up there used to be a little village. When I was a tot, it still had a school (Florence taught there as soon as she graduated from high school.) And by the time I left, I think it had disintegrated to the point hwere only the dhurch and graveyard were left, with Mass maybe once a month or so. And now I'm sure the graveyard fence has disappeared and cows graze over the graves. It's sad.
Sorry to hear that your little village has turned into a hole. Times, they are a-changin'.
Your pictures are pretty. I should get a fine camera.
Communities have to have people in it that care, and when you and Pee left, it sounds like it collapsed. I could not believe all tha tyou tow did for the town.
I agree with Poss. I wondered how much of the decline was due to you leaving. You were such a huge part of that community. It's sad. Where will the children go to school? Springer? Raton? Which is closer. Such a shame.
P.S. I am terribly sorry to you and chelbert on the loss of your kitty...
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