Chimayo

That was not enough time in New Mexico. My heart is still back there. Christmas is the luck of the draw each year, with D's work schedule. Then it was eyeglasses that fell out of a pocket and a day lost to replace them (a long story), my little brother's delayed flight from the east coast with all the snow, and it all meant we didn't get our annual overnight or two in Chimayo and Santa Fe.

We did have the family Christmas we all needed so badly, the long visits and going to sleep and waking up in our old house with the well-loved faces at breakfast, so, no complaints. Except that I am still longing for the two-day, peaceful interlude in northern New Mexico that recharges me for the rest of the year.

We made the most of our one afternoon and night, and after some time in Santa Fe, we got to Chimayo just at dusk. We went to the final night of the nine-day Las Posadas at the Santuario. I'll never forget it. I hope R is old enough to remember some of that night.

First they say the Rosary (only the Joyful Mysteries) inside the tiny chapel of Santo Nino de Atocha, the holy Christ child, with the baby shoes lining the walls. (The tradition is that when you leave a pair of shoes from a baby who has just learned to walk in front of Santo Nino de Atocha, you return in the morning to find the soles scuffed and worn. Santo Nino has worn them as he travels around all night doing good deeds.) Then Mary (on a real donkey) and Joseph--two high school kids from Chimayo who are descended from the original families--process to the Santuario singing Vamos a Belen. Joseph knocks three times on the wooden door with his heavy staff, and the pilgrims (los peregrinos) sing a version of the Posadas song:

In the name of the heavens
I request lodging from you,
Because she cannot walk,
My beloved wife.

From inside the church comes the reply:

This is not an inn,
Go on ahead
I can’t open up for you
In case you’re a crook.

(los Peregrinos):

I’ve asked you for lodging
Dear innkeeper
Because the mother is going to be
The queen of the heavens.

(The Innkeepers:)

Then if she is a queen,
Who requests it
How is it that at nighttime
She’s traveling so alone?

(Los Peregrinos)

My wife is Mary
Queen of the heavens
And mother who’s going to make
The divine oath.

(The Innkeepers)

You are Joseph
Your wife is Mary
Come in travelers!
I didn’t know it.

And everyone sings:

Blessed is the house
That shelters today
The pure virgin
The beautiful Mary.

Enter holy pilgrims
Receive this haven
That although it’s a poor dwelling
The dwelling…
I offer to you from the heart.

The door is opened and everyone files into the church for Mass. Afterwards there were homemade bizcochitos and hot chocolate.

It's much smaller and more intimate than I expected. There seemed to be only a couple of other people who weren't local members of the church. We waited awhile until it was time for Las Posadas to start, and walked around the grounds and went in and out of the church. The silence, the cold air, the smell of pinon fires, and the crooked Christmas lights and farolitos growing more defined against the adobe walls as the sky turns black, made my eyes well with tears. I was so happy to be there with my husband and my little girl. Santa Fe and Chimayo have always been such a solitary experience for me. I can't take off whenever I want any more, and spend as long as I want. But when I do get to go, they're with me.

While we waited for Las Posadas to start, we talked to the jolly gray bearded priest in the tiny church office who had a "Maryland" logo on his jacket. (He was from Takoma Park, and knew about my college in Annapolis. He had even spent some years of his childhood in Aurora, near Denver.) As we made one of our turns around from the river up to the church, we saw him standing outside looking up at the sky. I was too shy to walk up and talk to him. I wish I had. I wonder what he thinks about after he has talked to all the people who travel to Chimayo and he watches the seasons change and the pilgrims come and go, and daily life go back to the local families.

It was all local families pulling into the dirt parking lot in their pickups. One pickup screeched to a stop next to us as we walked to the chapel and a Northern New Mexico accent shouted "Is the play tonight? What time is the play?" It struck us funny that someone would think we would know. "Um, the internet said it starts at 6? But the doors are still locked." The grey bearded priest pulled up a second later in his own pickup "Aren't the doors open yet?" Just then everyone got out of their pickups and he said "Follow them!" He was heading down the hill to say Mass at Holy Family parish.

R is learning the Rosary this year in first grade, and she seemed to really like reciting it in that beautiful chapel. Although, among the forty and the six year old knees, guess who complained about the hard, narrow wooden kneelers? She loved the procession and seeing Mary on a real donkey. She snuck around to pet the donkey's nose while they were waiting for the procession to start, and I let her even though I had a vivid mental image of a rearing donkey and a ruined Posadas that was all our fault. It made me laugh so hard when she found herself, after the magical donkey procession and the singing, suddenly inside a church with the familiar words starting up and whispered to me in anguish "MASS? We have to go to MASS now?" I was so much older when I finally learned to love Mass and look forward to it, and I really sympathize. But what made me love it so much as an adult was the memories of hearing those words going back as far into time as I could remember, standing and kneeling and standing and kneeling, with my family next to me. So I think she'll be ok.

I will remember the voices raised in the Rosary, ragged and faltering, some ahead, some behind. Joseph pounding on the old wooden church door three times as it echoed in the icy air, and the utter silence as we filed into the church. The smiles of the ladies who had baked the bizcochitos as they handed everyone plates with Christmas napkins and two thick cookies cut in star shapes. Those are the best cookies, made with lard and anise seeds. Looking at the hole with holy healing dirt and a child's red plastic spade to scoop it out, and regretting that I had forgotten to bring anything to take some dirt home in. Turning back around to see R scooping it into the pockets of her coat and looking up at me, "For Grandma! I want to bring some home to Grandma."

As we left the church with our styrofoam cups of hot chocolate and plates of bizcochitos--(honestly, I could never bring myself to cook with lard, but after tasting those cookies, I would never fault anyone who does)-- the snow was just starting to fall. We had parked down below the church and had to walk along the river to get to our car, and R was laughing and running ahead and catching the snowflakes on her tongue. It was pitch black, no lights at all. We heard a snorting and whinny and thunder of hooves, and found ourselves up against the fence of a horse corral. We could barely make out a beautiful sorrel horse with a broad stripe of white on his nose. R was beside herself. He came right up and let her pet him. She wanted to give him her bizcochito and we reluctantly told her no. He cantered along the fence and whinnied softly. They were just enchanted by each other. Suddenly he took off, his hooves thundering in the soft dirt, galloping all around his pen. R was shouting with joy, and we were laughing at how excited she was and kind of thrilled ourselves, because horses are LOUD in the dark. The snow started falling faster, and he followed her all along the fence to the car and whinnied as she got in and she was crying because she didn't want to leave him. "Why can't we take him home? I'll feed him. I'll give him my own food! I'll never let his water bowl get empty. I PROMISE." We told her he belongs to the friendly Father that she liked so much. (who does he really belong to? I don't know.) And that Father would feel as sad if we took his horse away as she would feel if someone came and stole Charlie. She said she would write a letter to the Father and tell him the horse wants to be with her. She was mad halfway back to Albuquerque. But she told Grandma the next morning that she met a horse who really loved her but he belonged to the Father and she was going to let him stay there. I took photos blind in the dark, aiming the flash at where I heard the horse. When I saw the photos, there were crosses woven into all the links of the fence. All sizes and colors, hundreds and hundreds of crosses.