I know I’ve really got to work on my flower photos but, you know, when you get happy running across this stuff and there’s an iPhone in your pocket …plus this is what I told my sister in Montana I was doing before I saw the result and I’m just following through. But editorial discretion probably is the better part of iPhone valor …
First I just take in the blue, in this case in contrast with the white and green and brown. Then, at least this morning, I think of Maynard Dixon, power poles or no power polls, and thank the pueblos of Santa Ana and San Felipe for preserving the land and view.
My Cowboy 2 after hearing this morning’s coyote kerfuffle with dumb neighborhood dogs. He was quote “living outside” before his rescue by the Best Friends Sanctuary in Utah and then Animal Humane in New Mexico. These days in Placitas, he has no use for thunder, lightning or coyotes. He’s not even too sure about hiking. Been there, done that, he tells me.
Truly a monstrous front page, from the first-name reference to the governor to the juxtaposition of the “Natives Massacred” headline on a Congo story over a photo of Santa Fe kid in a Native headdress. In other news that day, my mother got hit in the head with an airborne Coke bottle in front of Zook’s on the Plaza.
AI helped me get lined out this morning. With my sidekick near, I woke with a cowboy tune in my head.
I couldn’t remember the exact words, only their lyrical meter and sentiment about trusty things by your side. Once at my desk with coffee, I worked through word searches on the internet and, with AI help, identified the music as “My rifle, my pony and me,” sung by Dean Martin, with Ricky Nelson and Walter Brennan accompaniment, in the 1959 John Wayne movie Rio Bravo.
I was glad to identify the tune but the setting was sunset instead of sunrise and I struggled with some of the other lyrics, especially “… with my three good companions, just my rifle, pony and me …”
I also am not a fan of Rio Bravo. But further research, and a dive into AI, revealed the tune I remembered had evolved from a theme in John Wayne movie that I do like, Red River, by the same songwriters.
Here’s Meta AI: “The song “My Rifle, My Pony, and Me” was written by Dimitri Tiomkin and Paul Francis Webster. It was featured in the 1959 movie Rio Bravo, where it was sung by Dean Martin and Ricky Nelson. Tiomkin composed the music, while Webster wrote the lyrics. The melody is based on a tune Tiomkin had previously used in the movie Red River.”
And here are the complete lyrics:
The sun is sinking in the west The cattle go down to the stream The redwing settles in the nest It’s time for a cowboy to dream
Purple light in the canyons That’s where I long to be With my three good companions Just my rifle, pony and me
Gonna hang (gonna hang) my sombrero (my sombrero) On the limb (on the limb) of a tree (of a tree) Comin’ home (comin’ home) sweetheart darlin’ (sweetheart darlin’) Just my rifle, pony and me Just my rifle, my pony and me
(Whippoorwill in the willow Sings a sweet melody Riding to Amarillo) Just my rifle, pony and me No more cows (no more cows) to be ropened (to be ropened) No more strays will I see Round the bend (round the bend) she’ll be waitin’ (she’ll be waitin’) For my rifle, pony and me For my rifle, my pony and me
And what is it with cowboys drivin’ and ridin’ to Amarillo?
Meanwhile, this photo of Cowboy 1 might have worked better for my morning reverie today. I posted it with some morning thoughts five years ago, (click here) “Coffee with Cowboy and O’Keeffe.”
It was kind of a cloudy morning but we’re working it out.
