Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - Hidden Valley RV Park, Tijeras NM
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Hickory walking stick, November 8, 2011
So much for Albuquerque
I came here in large part to get the front end checked out and aligned to correct the altered right front tire wear that cropped up on the way out here with the trailer. But once I took a really close look at the tire wear and the mileage on the tire I decided it was not excessive and scuttled the plan.
So I made my stop at the Apple store, used their high speed internet connection to upgrade a few OS X apps and iPhone & iPad apps that are too big for my Verizon broadband accounts to gracefully handle, and managed to get out of there without any new toys. Amazing!
Walking stick
Having some time on my hands I came back to Hidden Valley and finished up the walking stick I had been working on. More on that tomorrow.
Night camp
Site 100 - Hidden Valley RV Park, Tijeras NM
- This is an older, 100 site, dirt pad, full hookup, RV park on a wooded hillside. The sites are a little small and close together by today's standards but are quite serviceable, quiet and clean.
- Verizon cell phone and Broadband service are available here with a strong signal.
- Locate Hidden Valley RV Park on my Night Camps map
- Check the weather here
When Hope Dies
When you give up on hope, something even better happens than it not killing you, which is that in some sense it does kill you. You die. And there's a wonderful thing about being dead, which is that they—those in power—cannot really touch you anymore. Not through promises, not through threats, not through violence itself. Once you're dead in this way, you can still sing, you can still dance, you can still make love, you can still fight like hell—you can still live because you are still alive, more alive in fact than ever before. You come to realize that when hope died, the you who died with the hope was not you, but was the you who depended on those who exploit you, the you who believed that those who exploit you will somehow stop on their own, the you who believed in the mythologies propagated by those who exploit you in order to facilitate that exploitation. The socially constructed you died. The civilized you died. The manufactured, fabricated, stamped, molded you died. The victim died.
And who is left when that you dies? You are left. Animal you. Naked you. Vulnerable (and invulnerable) you. Mortal you. Survivor you. The you who thinks not what the culture taught you to think but what you think. The you who feels not what the culture taught you to feel but what you feel. The you who is not who the culture taught you to be but who you are. The you who can say yes, the you who can say no.