The Journal of a Mud House, a continuation --2

[Illustration from "The Journal of a Mud House", Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant, Harper's, May, 1922]

As you can see from the photo above, Ms Sergeant did get her Mud House into habitable condition before she had to leave Tesuque that summer, whatever summer it was, when she bought a couple of acres and its ruined adobe to have a place to stay out in the country.

The wing to the left is her new kitchen that was added to the original three room house at her direction. Well, it was built then torn down then built again because the adobes were set wrong by her main worker, José, who was quite a character if her descriptions are in any way accurate -- which I'm sure they are.

Building and tearing down and building again is fairly routine in parts of New Mexico. It's just what you do, assuming you have the time and the inclination to do something like that in the first place.

Building and abandoning the project is not unknown, either.

Or building and staying a while, then abandoning the project...

You get the picture.

Got to get those ruins to renovate somehow.

Our own project took ten months to get the house into more or less complete enough condition to move in to, quite a good deal longer than Elizabeth Sergeant's project which only took a couple of months over a summer. But then, she only had three rooms plus one added. So it wasn't that much of a job.

Except...

It can be hard to get stuff here, which she found out over and over again. I look around this house today, and I consider what it must have been like for the pioneers who built it originally starting right around 1900 when this section of the East Mountains was opened for settlement.

(The court battles over ownership of the land went on and on, and finally, if I recall correctly, the court ruled none of the claimants had a valid claim, so it was open for homesteading. Whoo-hoo! But even then, people knew it wouldn't be easy.)

There was a railroad spur, though, the remnants of which are still visible, and a little town was laid out, and a handful of settlers moved in and built their scattered adobes, most of which are still standing... more or less. Some are ruins.

From the railroad, of course, you could get things to build with. And so it was. Much of what could be got through ordering it from Back East is still visible in our house -- the doors for example as well as some delightful cabinetry in one of the halls (that I'm sure was built on site but from finish lumber that was ordered in); quite likely the floors were made from pine lumber brought in by rail. The baseboards in some of the rooms, and the window casings -- though not the windows themselves in most cases -- also date from the early period and are obviously made of fancy finish lumber from elsewhere. But when I went up in the attics, I found rather randomly placed joists and beams made of rough finished pine which I figured came from more or less local sources, and their rather casual disposition is perfectly "New Mexico" in my view.
This house is obviously self-built, and some of the details are quite fancy. On the other hand, it's quite primitive, too. There was no indoor plumbing originally, no gas for heating (there are holes in the ceilings for the chimneys of wood stoves that would have been in each room though.)

Of course there was no electricity early on, but some of the wiring clearly dates from very early 20th century, and it appears that there was a wind-powered generator on top of what's now the garage.

Over the years, the house was expanded, most of the extensions built with adobe, and sometimes I think of expanding it again by finishing the attics and perhaps adding a new wing on the north to serve as a living room and transforming the current fairly cramped living room into a rather large dining room cum library. I've also thought about reconfiguring the two west side bedrooms (now used as small library and small workroom) into one larger room with a new bathroom. Adding portals.

But not changing the basic Victorian style of this house into a "Northern New Mexico" version of the Santa Fe Style.

That's the thing. Though this is an Old Adobe ranch house, it is frankly and forthrightly in the Late Victorian (simplified) Style, and so it sometimes strikes visitors as an oddity -- because it doesn't follow the conventions of Santa Fe Style, which -- to circle back to our story -- Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant was in the process of helping to create with her renovation of a ruined adobe (that she figured dated from the 1870's) in Tesuque in the early 1920's.

It took ten months to get our place into good enough shape to move into in part because our contractor had so much trouble with his workers. Yes. Understood. They were mostly residents of the East Mountains, too, though the contractor himself lived in Albuquerque. Nevertheless, they all complained constantly about having to go clear out to our place to work on the house. It was so far, don't you know. Travel time took up so much of their day so they could only get so much done. Worse, it was so hard to get materials and supplies out there, and we such demanding owners, constantly wanting "authentic this or that" instead of what could be found or scrounged locally. In fact, I had to order quite a few things online or purchase them in California and have them sent out to New Mexico because there was nothing available locally that would fit the style of the house.

The things I wanted just weren't available locally. Picky, picky, picky!

Also, I was working in California most of the time the renovation was going on, only making periodic flights out to New Mexico to check on progress and get the contractor paid. So ten months was good time under the circumstances.

I have found since then that indeed a lot of things you might take for granted elsewhere aren't easily available in New Mexico, and if you can get or find them, they cost a lot more than they do wherever you're from. Local materials aren't necessarily cheap; in fact, sometimes they are a good deal more costly than "imports." Thus, for example, there are considerable quantities of East Indian imported building materials available -- doors and columns and quaint things of all kinds -- and they are used as substitutes for Old Spanish stuff (which can be had either as antiquities or contemporary re-creations) because they are considerably less expensive than the "authentic" Spanish materials.

It's quite a sight to see a brand new Santa Fe Style house built with and full of East Indian antiquities. But it would cost a third more or even half again as much to build or renovate your adobe with "authentic" Spanish and/or Spanish style materials. So people go with the East Indian substitutes, which are quite nice in their own right, but seem somehow... foreign!

Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant would never even have thought of doing that. In her day it was possible, "even for a woman" (which was part of what she was writing about) to renovate a house in the truly authentic style of New Mexico, using local labor and materials, and adapting what was needed to what was on hand. She needed adobes, she got adobes -- from a building that had fallen to ruin. Her renovated roof was new-fangled asphalt instead of the piled-on dirt and debris that had been put on top of the authentic vigas and latillas back in the day. She had windows put in, casements no less, still the Style around these parts but harder to get now than they were then. She had a kitchen built and a cast iron stove put in. She furnished her house with locally made furniture and objects, much of it inexpensive by her standards. Anything like it now would cost a fortune.

She had -- and apparently needed -- no electricity, no indoor plumbing, and no heat except for the corner "kiva" fireplaces that were already part of the house when she bought it, and the wood burning cook stove she installed in her new kitchen. But it sounds like she only intended to use the house in summer, and though there might be rain, it's not cold in the summertime in Tesuque. Up in Taos, though, it would be frigid as the North Pole in the wintertime. As the locals there found out again -- if they didn't remember -- when the gas supplies failed during the coldest part of the winter this year.

But her story is about so much more than the house she renovated.




And that's the thing. Ultimately, it's a spiritual journey.

To Be Continued

Tent City

Harpers has got a really good, but ultimately hopeless-feeling, story by William T. Vollman about the homeless situation in Sacramento -- which has once again burbled to the surface as local, state and federal budget cuts ensure that more and more people wind up living as best they can on the streets, in camps and whatever corners of creation they can find and hold before they are rousted by Authority.

The striking thing about the story, though it shouldn't be striking at all, is the extraordinary humanity of so many of those on the streets, a humanity that shines through all the suffering and puts the lie to the constant carping and denunciations of the chattering classes and the Better People who aren't -- yet -- forced to drag their few pitiful things from place to place ahead of the cops, or see them confiscated and burned if they don't get away fast enough.

There are all kinds of homeless programs in Sacramento and elsewhere, of course, and they all operate as little independent fiefs, jealous and territorial as shit, and none of them doing more than a fraction of what's necessary to aid and comfort the dispossessed and undisciplined. It's a crying shame, and it has been this way for decades, so long in fact that few have any idea any more that there could be a better way of... helping.

The author, for example, describes a parking lot he owns in the Alkali Flat area that was being frequented by homeless people, some of whom camped on his lot, some of whom left trash and more personal offal and debris in front of his door -- expensive to clean up -- and given the situation, he wondered if it wouldn't be better (though it would no doubt be illegal) for him to install a port-a-potty on the lot for use by its temporary residents. Would it "help" or would it actually make things worse -- for the author and the homeless who might relieve themselves in private...

These kinds of moral dilemmas seem bizarre in the extreme, as mad in their own ways as so many of the homeless wanderers on the streets. You do what needs to be done to the extent you are able.

And that's where Safe Ground comes in. They are a competing operation for the homeless with a goal of providing some kind of safe place to accommodate those on the streets and their pets, their goods, and their chattel, and to the extent possible, to provide them with transitional housing and social services so that those who are able can get off the streets once and for all.

They do what needs to be done, and what they do is fought by the Establishment -- both the homeless services establishment and the more generalized Establishment day in and day out.

It is a continuing "controversy." No doubt it will be discussed and argued for many years to come, for that is how things go in the "services" realm. Endless debate, endless foot dragging. And endlessly doing as little as possible -- for as much money as possible -- for those left behind in our country's mad rush into the Social Darwinistic Future.

Safe Ground appears to be trying to break that cycle, trying to make a real difference, by offering Dignity to the homeless they serve. They have provided the opportunity for several self-governing, self-policing, self-defending homeless communities to arise in the area (some in areas where such things are not welcome like the American River Parkway) which have begun to show the way out of the morass of endless homelessness and homeless servicing. And for that, they are pilloried, harassed, driven from place to place.

The time will come, however. The time will come.

"Camp No;" Dr. Evil

Everybody is whispering in hushed and frightened tones about Scott Horton's investigative piece in the March, 2010, online edition of Harper's, a tale which could be of mayhem and the murder of three apparently innocent Guantanamo captives, all of whom were set for release, apparently tortured to death on the night of June 9, 2006, at a mysterious facility just off the GWOT concentration camp perimeter, dubbed "Camp No", where -- again, apparently -- the odd captive was now and again taken for "special treatment." Apparently. Or maybe not.

Well. One doesn't know. One has no way of knowing. The Offical Story is that the three dead captives that night committed suicide by tying their arms and feet, stuffing rags down their throats and hanging themselves in their cells from ropes made of shreds from their clothing and bedding. All three. At the same time. This was, claimed a shrieking, hysterical, Queeg-like caricature of a PrizonKamp Kommandant named "Admiral" Harry Harris (sure, whatever, Dude) a perfidious act of "asymmetrical warfare!!!™" designed to thwart the Pure Aims And Goals of American Goodness, an act that will live in Infamy, and on and on and on, spit flying out of his foam-flecked mouth, fire from his coal-black eyes.

Anyone who remembers the incident, and it was in all the press and media at the time, surely remembers Harris's over-the-top description of what happened and some of us remember the aftermath, a mad scramble to lock down the captives even more than they already were, take all their stuff, particularly their papers, and monitor and dog them 24/7. We may also remember their hunger strikes over and over, protesting their brutal treatment among other things (oh, like their innocence or their languishing without charges in a concentration camp in Cuba for years-and-years, that sort of thing.) We may remember there were occasional suicides among the captives. And there were persistent reports of torture.

From Horton's investigation, it is not possible to know what really happened. He says that witnesses came forth after Obama was elected, went to the Justice Department, spoke with highly placed lawyers thereat, and were promised a thorough investigation of what could have been a very terrible crime.

And nothing happened.

The investigation, if it was done at all, was closed with nothing more than a hint as to why: the "gist" of witness statements could not be confirmed. kthxbai.

Very strange, even suspicious.

Of course, that's Horton's point. And part of the problem here is that there have been so many lies, so much deception, so much perfidy and so much lawlessness, murder and mayhem surrounding practically every aspect of the So-Called Global War on Terror and its numerous extensions and side actions that it's really not possible for a mere mortal to know or understand what the hell is going on in any given case, let alone get a handle on the whole picture.

From appearances, the implications of the Horton piece in Harpers (and I really do suggest any reader subscribe to Harper's if only for Horton's periodic reporting and opining, there's always plenty more to get into, and the archives are a stupendous resource, but I digress)... the implications are that the three dead captives delivered to the camp clinic the night of June 9, 2006, were tortured to death en masse at the off-campus facility dubbed "Camp No," a purported Black Site, used for "special purposes" by... whomever.

And then a frantic effort was ordered and made to plant a cover story that the three had suicided themselves, perfidiously, and anyone who breathed a word about the truth was to be hounded until they desisted. The camp was the scoured for any potential "evidence" that could be used against prisoners and/or their attorneys, and -- apparently most importantly -- the "asymmetrical warfare" tactic of hunger strikes by the prisoners was to be ended once and for all.

Which may be ultimately what this is all about. I don't know.

The flaw in Horton's piece, so to speak, is that the story he tells lacks sufficient context to clearly understand what was happening in the concentration camp, the long-time resistance of the captives, and their persistent hunger strikes that were gaining a good deal of attention world-wide and bringing the whole operation of the Guantanamo prison camp facilities under increasing scrutiny and criticism. The three dead captives were, it is my understanding -- though I can't say I "know" anything about it -- were resisting their captivity, had been targeted (and at least one of them was scheduled) for release, and they had all participated in hunger strikes, may have actually been on a hunger strike when their deaths occurred.

Another prisoner is mentioned in the piece who claims in his attorney's affidavit that he was severely abused -- tortured -- that night as well, beaten and tormented for hours, but he survived. Apparently, he, too was on a hunger strike.

The upshot of the actions at the camp afterwards was to prevent the captives from communicating with one another and from communicating in confidence with their attorneys so as to prevent them from organizing further acts of resistance of any kind.

But resistance and a simple hunger strike (plus the occasional suicide) is hard to square with the kind of brutality and mayhem toward the captives that is still being reported out of Guantanamo.

There is still a lot we don't know.

But one thing that comes out of Horton's report is that the Department of Justice may be so corrupted it is now irredeemable. I doubt he would go that far, but given the backturning of the Department on this case, one of many egregious incidents, the prognosis for "Justice" ever being achieved through the agency of this Department is becoming vanishingly small.