Promises of Armadillo and Longhorn hide

11/5/10 – Fort Stockton, TX

It sure has been a while since I sat down and started writing. Don't know exactly why I do it right now but it just feels good.
This morning it started in Las Cruces, NM, After a very comfortable bed I woke up rested and eager to start the day...,
My friend Lee made a wonderful breakfast while his three, warm shower, bicyclist guests and me watched him while setting the table. Then we talked about the world and enjoyed Cinnamon French Toast topped with a Butter simmered Apple-Banana mix and, last not least, the classic maple syrup. It was quite a breakfast for me...
Right before I wanted to leave the morning party, my CA friends Bev & Greg messaged that they were only 90 miles South along I-10. We set up a PEC (Path Crossing Event) in a Starbucks downtown El Paso, So off I went...
40 minutes later we were chatting and feeling familiar bonds in unknown grounds. They told me about a coffee and tea place in Van Horn called Crossroads Coffee with two couches and friendly owners. I decided that I'm going to visit them too and make a stop on my way to Fort Stockton. Now this particular stretch of I-10 can sometimes be a little disturbing because of all the border control, and the subsequent stop at a Check Point, followed by the questioning of your Citizenship and destination... Though it shouldn’t, it always stresses me a little, but then I'm tempted to ask them where they come from and if they still have family or a sibling oversea...but then...after all it is only a short moment out of hours passing wonderful landscape, endless horizons, white feathered water blue sky, and the shear endless yellow dotted line that I follow.
Just enough time to let my mind play, let it follow its own way, and be the observer in meditation, concentrated and yet loose, obligated to choose one or the other, and then bouncing of the far peaks of the grey mountain range that spans on my right. Segments of “Lord of the Rings” could have been filmed in the Big Bend National Park, the Southwestern corner of Texas along the banks of the Rio Grande bordering Eastern Mexico. Even in bright sunlight the Mountains almost refuse to reflect the light and keep most of it trapped under their barren, colorless, rocky skin.
To my left runs an endless low horizon, two feet long grass that follows ferocious wind, and dark green bushes that roam as far as I’ve ever been. Then behind me the sun keeps falling down and blinds me throwing pure white rays against my mirrors. The light turns quickly red and the last bit bravely bleeds over the fields and finally fades into a starry blue night, loyal, filled with promises of armadillo and longhorn hide, horses and fires, tents, drums and dances under a moonless sky.