Love Lowers the Sky

There is a saying I recently heard in Taos that goes something like this, “Move to Taos, lose a spouse”. On Peaks Island, Maine, where I call home, I have heard something similar: “Peaks Island: where cars and marriages come to die.” 

Fair enough if you consider the statistics and environmental strains. I can’t speak for Taos, but it is possible that Maine island life can, conceivably, be corrosive to both metal and marriage.

But I’ve played the odds and my bets are still on love. It is love that gently leaches through years of creeping corrosion and rusted-through hearts, offering the protectant they need to turn over and over again to go another 2,800 miles -which happens roughly to be the distance between Portland, Maine and Taos, New Mexico… if traveling by car with a solid frame with little to no rust. 

I flew here - on three planes to be exact. It feels like too much but It's quicker, and, statistically, more reliable. But that’s just the logistics of what brings you from there to here.

But I have some thoughts. I have had 9 companionless days to consider the true vessel of this journey of mine. It is love that allows you to drop out for two weeks and transfer all domestic responsibilities onto your partner. This includes, but is not limited to: multiple weather-related hassles, parking bans (utterly inconvenient if you live on an island), dog walks, fish, gecko, and chicken feedings, management of one stir-crazy cat and teen boy appetite, health-related fatigue, and over 2,800 other estimated responsibilities that are part of a shared home and intertwined life. But I get it. In the big-world-of-things two weeks isn’t a lot but it is love that creates the space and says “Yes. GO! Go do this thing.”

It is love that demands you let it all go and say “Yes. I’m doing this thing. On my own” to satisfy an intense and undeniable sense of wanna-be belonging to a place of strange beer-can-and-tire molded Earthships, sage bush dotted vistas, wild coyotes, soaring ravens, grazing Longhorns, deep canyons, snow-capped mountains, eerie mesas, dusty dirt roads, and so much beauty you can barely process it.

And. You. Do. This. Thing.  Alone on the mesa, you get spooked after dark and drink Goldhawk buttery chardonnay from a box in bed (ridiculous given there are so many local wineries!) while silently berating yourself for being selfish and spending too much money but then you rally, right yourself,  and answer those relentless inner voices outloud: “Fuck you, you earned this!” So you just do: You attend a fabulous launch party for a friend’s new project. Here you witness the power of unconditional friendships, family, and community support.  You are treated to decadent mineral baths privately nestled in jagged canyons. You dine fancy, you dine on-the-cheap, brew Pinon coffee for one. You never unpack your bra, shake red clay from your pants, and view art so powerful it provokes you to circle back through for one last look. You thrift shop and wish you were one rib bone smaller, photograph 2,800 visuals, hike with strangers-you-now-call-friends, trek across the mesa with a sausage-shaped corgi-heeler wearing a wacky-wonderful neon orange safety vest as your guide… and wonder if you’ve trekked out a little too far but who cares because you are here so you better marvel at the mountains and visualize what it might be like to be part of these vast spaces. Or be discovered dead out here all alone. And in all these glorious nervous moments You. Are. Grateful.

But. It is love that lowers the sky, closes the gap, and creates a subtle detachment and disengagement from the excitement of solo travel to casually review car rental agreements and connecting flights. It is love to recognize you have been given a gift and it is love to know exactly when the time has come to give it back. 

I’m ready to return. Back to Peaks Island: where marriages, partners, friendships, and rusted cars have a way of keeping on despite the acidic elements that threaten them.

And as for losing a spouse in Taos? 

These remote and isolated parts definitely lend themselves to getting lost but the curious thing about wide open spaces is there is always room for two, and, if you are truly seen by your person, your partner, you’ll never go missing. You’ve already been found. And that, to be clear, is love..and two weeks in Taos.

Heather Wasklewicz