Epiphany at the Rio Grande

Rio Grande Gorge, about 3:00 - 4:00 PM, looking downstream at the western wall from the center of the Rt. 64 bridge

Rio Grande Gorge, same time, looking upstream at the eastern wall, from the center of the Rt. 64 bridge. San Cristobal Mountains in the background!









Looking towards Wheeler Peak from the center of the Rt. 64 bridge. Taos is towards the right, at the feet of the mountains and far out of this photo's field.

The parking lot at the easterly end of the bridge is in the foreground, just to the right of the photo.





Taos! Its become mythic, my expectations are high! The road runs east-southeast, towards the mountains, and also slightly southerly. Still no significant signs of a city, a few small homes, some outbuildings here and there, but that’s not been unusual so far. On the left appear some very modern looking structures, long, low, with glass reflecting strongly in the westerly light. I’ve no idea what they are, but they certainly appear to be some forward thinking builder’s attempt to create a land hugging solar home. A small development, spread over many acres, but nevertheless a concentration. I’m later to find out that these are the Taos Earthships, and two days later I stop for a visit on my way towards Durango. More on those later.

Suddenly, I’m driving over a highway bridge. The terrain gives no indication, no expectation of a bridge. There are people walking on the narrow walkway between the roadway curb and the guardrail, and there are cars and campers parked in a lot beyond the bridge. Perhaps because of the pedestrians, perhaps out of habit, but anyway fortunately I look to my right, and down into a chasm! Stunned, I pull over into the parking lot on the easterly end of the bridge. I should have learned back in Carson, that the Gorge gives only the slightest signal of its existence in the plain, but I had forgotten.

Grabbing my camera, and knowing now why people were walking that bridge, I head back. The designers thoughtfully put lookouts, perhaps 10 feet wide and extending another 4 feet over the gorge, on each side of the bridge, at the center of the span.

The sun is shining strongly, but it cannot penetrate to the depths of the chasm! Probably only around midday does the sun reach the river below. It is again the Rio Grande, and the sky reflects off of the water, some 800 feet below the bridge.

My camera refuses to work!

I walk back to the parking lot, and for what is likely the first time in my life, the vison of the land brings me to tears. The sensation is indescribable. Struck with the absolute realization that humans are ultimately insignificant on this enormous terrain, insignificant in time, and yet profoundly arrogant, I’m thinking how could any person assert that some deity created us in their image, or cares one whit about any individual or synthesis of human society; and simultaneously I think how right the so-called pagan religions got it, how fundamental is every living being’s connection to the planet and to each other. No deity is needed. Good people of wisdom, shamans, prophets surely, but those only to help guide us to our individual recognitions of the resonance of all life. Maybe I’ve been to such powerful places before, but never before have I experienced such. If I had to go home tomorrow, still the purpose of this trip would have been fulfilled!

In the day and a half that follows, I meet many Taos residents. When I try to explain what happened out there at the Gorge to two of them, they both look directly into my eyes, don’t let me finish, and each in their own way tell me that they too have had that epiphany, and that no words can convey the experience. When I talk with one man about living in Taos, he tells me that I must not try to commit to the place, I must try it out, for Taos accepts some, and rejects others (chews them up he said) - and there’s no way to find out until you try to live there. He’s a cowboy, about my age, perhaps a bit younger, and a merchant - about the last person I’d expect to be so spiritual - but we’ve connected on a plane that cannot be explained.

I know now why people live in Carson, or on those sparse plains on the road to Taos. For now, I turn back to my SUV, and move on towards the City of Expectations.