I’m trying to be a good New Mexican during the COVID crisis. I am not hoarding ammo or TP. I do not gather with more than one neighbor and another dog. But I draw the line at long hair.
I am afraid to check in with my longtime hair cutter in Bernalillo. She’s shut down like everyone else. She just moved to a new shop with lower rent and, back at home, she’s holding down the fort with a mother and grandaughter. I don’t want to tell her that I have mail-ordered a pair of clippers.
My mother used to say she timed her sons’ haircuts according to behavior. When you started acting like a jerk, you were due for another crew cut. In the early days, the task was taken on by my father, a former Marine. I can still feel the weight of his giant paw clamping my head while he got gung ho with the clippers. I let my hair cutter decide things for me these days. I just hope she can hang on.
Good guy or miscreant, I never wanted to look like a rock star. I dug out an old pair of clippers that I had last used on my late Australian Shepherd, Cooper. I cleaned the blades but his heavy coat apparently wore the gizmo out. So, it was on to Amazon, although it appears clippers might be as much in demand as toiletries and firepower. It’s been a couple of weeks and the hair cutting thing still has not arrived. Fearful of the Prince Valiant look, I am not trying scissors.
As usual, though, my problems are small compared to the rest of the world. I watched Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s news conference today on easing COVID-19 restrictions. But the easing does not apply to three counties in the northwest where many Native Americans live. The virus is rampant there.
I remembered the sunset photo I took from my back porch last night. It’s looking through the window of the Rio Puerco toward Zuni and the Navajo Nation, shot with a new iPhone from a mostly affluent Zip Code that has had just four cases of COVID-19.
I still don’t know what folks are gonna do with all that ammo and TP.
Also at Dream Ranch: Easter Parade
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