Maggie says:
I know, I know. People have been on me about m-pyre's, uh... break. Sorry.
I have stuff in mind, just can't find the head space to write about it right now. But it's coming.
In the meantime, check out our friend Erik's blog Alterdestiny.
In Heroin in the Española Valley, you can read a pretty powerful assessment of drug addiction in the area, tied mostly to folks' loss of connection with the land. A great, really interesting read.
It may be hard for urbanites to understand the connection between people and land. We move all the time. We change careers at the drop of the hat. Most of us have lived in multiple states. But this is a function of a modern culture that has left a lot of people behind. There just is no tradition of alternatives to farming in the Valley. Sure, some people have got out, or stayed and been successful. But a lot of people are unable to overcome the fact that English is a second language, that their schools are third-rate, that they don't have the economic resources that Anglos do, or that they are tied so closely to family...
...The transformation of the Valley has taken power out of the hands of its long-term residents, leaving them lost, alienated from their land, without job skills for the high-tech Los Alamos economy or the artist-dominated Santa Fe economy. In addition, it is quite possible that young people, seeing the extravagent wealth of Los Alamos kids, have become both desirous of that wealth and bitter at their own isolation.
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