The Meadow 191 hills pushing the Rio Grande toward Mexico. Soon I would be standing in the trickle of this once great river before the upstream dams diverted all the water. On one side the opportunities of Texas and the USA; the other the desperate poverty of Mexico. I stood there on November 24th with sweat staining my shirt, my face a rosy pink and thoughts wandering. Where to go. No waitress, no movie script for my play, and few answers to an existentialist college graduate not wanting to go to war or stand tall for causes that had little rhyme or reason. I turned away from that Texas escape, my back to the border, and walked instead through the neon lights to the Newark draft board line. Many young men standing with me would be sent to death in Vietnam that year. I could’ve run but did not. Why? Two nights in West Texas in November 1971. I chose to come home and face the music. The moon still rises over the West Texas town, my waitress has moved to Odessa, the oil rigs ring at night as the wind stirs the wind turbines. I am not dead; we still fight senseless wars; many die for yellow ribbons and other patriotic symbols. The country is caught in an existential dance, the why, why, whys rise with the evening breeze, and small western towns hang on and then disappear. Ansel Adams’ black, white, and gray posters stand the test of time. There is no water running through the Rio Grande in West Texas. I took the right step back in 1971, walking into the maze that we call my life. The moon stands high at night when I wake to the eerie, all-seeing light. The aspens bend in the fall breeze. The coyote howls. I listen. I still wonder why?
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