America the Beautiful

Stay strong. Love each other. God bless us, every one.

Photo by Eric Froehling on Unsplash

It’s been a rough week for anyone with compassionate awareness and a love for enduring democracy and freedom. Everyone I know is struggling. On this beautiful day, I don’t want to hear the word impeachment, and even less, the word retribution. But I live in a beautiful city in a beautiful part of the country — so I throw on a windbreaker, hop on my Schwinn cruiser, and pedal across the I-40 bridge over the muddy Rio Grande into Old Town. I turn right on Central, then into the parking lot of the El Vado Motel.

According to the website, “When it opened in 1937, El Vado was one of New Mexico’s first motels to greet Route 66 travelers.” El Vado means “the ford,” or crossing, named for the motel’s location near the Rio Grande. Its Spanish Pueblo Revival style remained relatively unaltered for more than 70 years, leading to its designation as a National Historic Place in 1993. In 2005, the lights went out. After a decade behind a chain-link fence, El Vado was reimagined into a new/old, Route 66 landmark offering a public patio, taproom, and a handful of restaurant pods — as well as a 22-room motel. Even though I’ve been living here for nearly a year now, it’s my first visit. Parking my bike, I begin exploring, one of my favorite things…