My Tiny Vegas: Las Vegas, New Mexico News, Stories, Photographs, and More!

Have Gun, Will Travel

I published an article called "A Mom called Paladin" last week, about my boys and my gun. Since the setting for most of the story is the Las Vegas New Mexico People's Flea Market, I thought I should post the link here.

Cowboy Up!

Around these New Mexican parts, Labor Day means the annual Bean Day Festival in Wagon Mound. Each yearly event features a free bean barbeque and the best rodeo this side of the Pecos! Of course I lassoed my two young boys and tossed them hogtied into the car with the promise of an American tradition. We didn't notice the band of black thunderclouds following us across the plains to Wagon Mound. We drank fruit punch from a community paper cup and passed around a plastic bag of kettle corn we bought at a farmer's market. My sons stared at the herds of antelope dotting the open range, at spires of chipped red rock rising from green pasture. A faded red falcon matched our speed, extended curved talons with a flat rise of his wings, grabbed something wiggling from the grassland.

We saw Wagon Mound from a distance. It sits on the old Santa Fe Trail, a mountain shaped like a rumpled covered wagon resting in green dirt, overlooking the tiny Bean Day Festival. The sky grew heavy and dark as we drove through old vacant streets in search of the rodeo. We found it, a circle of cattle wire and pickup trucks on the outskirts of town. I pulled my Saturn into the entrance line, behind three farm trucks, all hauling livestock.

I diverted my boys' attention to a group of four straggly heelers. They ran along the fence, back and forth, each in line with the other, chasing cattle into a side pen. I paid a few dollars each for our admission and we made our way into the wooden stands. Maybe thirty other people sat in the bleachers with us, all rodeo folk, most waiting their turn in the games. A tiny girl in pigtails and jeans stared at my rhinestone-studded flip-flops. I wiggled one foot at her and winked. I rummaged through my purse and pulled out a few more dollars, gave them to the kids for the concession stand below us. They returned with nachos, burritos, a serving of Frito pie. We ate, watched the rains begin to fall as a parade of children and horses sauntered into the area. They carried two American flags and a bright yellow state flag.

Everyone stood for the Pledge of Allegiance. We continued to stand through the national anthem and then for an opening prayer in which Jesus was asked to spare any rider from harm. Funny thing was, when the prayers stopped, so did the rain, as if on cue, as if God herself waited to turn off the spigot. An announcer praised the breaking sun and the rodeo began!

I blushed those next few hours, time and time again. Not because I sat next to a handsome cowboy in mud-splashed jeans, but because the event held so much life. Cowboys hoisted themselves upon painted ponies. They held the horns of cattle, thighs squeezing cattle-back in mutual fear and ecstasy, tackling wild steer for the simple prize of a belt buckle.

A teenaged girl grabbed a rope and galloped into the ring. The mud sprayed across her chaps, her horse's mane, and she rose out of the saddle,leaned forward, tossed the noose! It hung in the air for a brief second, unsure where to land, then bee-lined for a crazy young bull, grabbing him by the horns. A lone cowdog howled Hooray from the sidelines, and the audience rose to applaud. She won first place, a silver buckle, and the men and boys cheered her as one of their own. I slapped palms with an old man missing two front teeth, his breath a symphony of green chilies and tobacco.

The drive home was long and silent until my son, 11, cleared his throat.

"Mom?"

"Yeah," I answered as my little 9 drooled against the passenger window.

"People really are the same the whole world over, aren't they? It doesn't matter what they look like." He looked at the flying world as he spoke. An antelope ran alongside us, turned east, stopped short to watch us rumble goodbye.

"Yeah. We are all the same in all the ways that matter. I wish I was a cowboy."

I pictured myself leaping on a horse mottled gray with a braided mane and a woven saddle.

"Me too, Mom. I wish that, too."

We watched the sun fall behind some unknown hill, the youngest son dreaming of Frito Pie and the few living things who can ride fast.