September 23, 2026- Hana is having the unique experience of cutting both her top lateral incisors and her upper canines at the same time. She is holding her own, but at times it is extremely uncomfortable. The canines are coming through seven months early, according to the chart I have in front of me. Other sources allow for a wide variation, among children.
She has a new toy, of sorts: The larger fiber storage basket for her playpen toys. She can fir about half of herself in in, so this has become her “hide and seek” go-to. She “gives herself away”, though, giggling when I call for her. I think she knows that I can see her.
HANA’S NOTE– I like the stand-up frame that I am put in, for my showers. I feel more like I am washing myself.
EXPANDING CIRCLES: New Mexico- The Land of Enchantment is Texas’s western neighbour, and the gateway to the Southwest. The Turf- Eastern New Mexico is largely an area of high plains, with rugged canyons and an extinct volcano in the northeast. The Rocky Mountains take up the state’s mid section, from Raton and Chama, in the north, to just east of Las Cruces, in the south. Western New Mexico is a mix of high desert, the Gila Mountains and forested plateau. New Mexico is watered by the Rio Grande, as well as the San Juan, Pecos, Chama, Gallinas, Puerco and Canadian Rivers.
First Nations- New Mexico is the ancestral home of four different Puebloan groups: Tewa, Tiwa, Towa and Keresan. These groups comprise the Eight Northern Pueblos, along the Rio Grande, Isleta, south of Albuquerque and Zuni, in western New Mexico. It is also home to a large Dineh population, with northwest New Mexico largely a part of the Navajo Nation. There are two Apache groups: Mescalero, in the south and Jicarilla, in the north. Utes also claim northwest New Mexico and Comanches (Numunuu )ranged across the eastern plains.
The First Nations of the Rio Grande Pueblos gave freedom-loving people the world over a road map, in rising up against the Spanish, in 1680. Though the rebellion was eventually put down, by superior military force, Spain never quite regained the control it once had over New Spain, and the seeds of the revolutions that created independent nations, across Mesoamerica and South America, 130 years later, were sown in 1680.
Dineh people also sowed seeds of resillience, by largely surviving the Long Walk from Chinle and beyond, to Bosque Redondo, at Fort Sumner. 3,500 people died on the Long Walk, between 1863-66. The rest mostly survived internment. Those who hid in the canyons of Arizona, western New Mexico and Utah were there to welcome their returning brothers and sisters, in 1868. I have visited Fort Sumner, and felt lingering grief.
New Mexico was another home for me, during my decades in the Southwest, along with California, Colorado and Nevada. Though Arizona was Home Base, not a year would go by without visits somewhere in the Land of Enchantment.. The vibrant Native American and New Mexican Spanish cultures are features I hope she can experience, even while still a child. Zuni holds special significance, as that is where I met her grandmother. I also would like to share Carlsbad Caverns and White Sands, in southern New Mexico, a region with which I am less familiar.
Where I feel most at home: Santa Fe, Moriarty, Madrid, Gallup, Old Town Albuquerque, Taos, Cimarron and Bosque del Apache. I would gladly take Hana to any of these towns and neighbourhoods
Where I feel most at peace: Rio Grande Gorge
With a look at New Mexico, our focus now shifts away from Texas’s neighbours and to the other states of the Southwest.
NEXT: Colorado
