The Hundredth Meridianrnby Chilton Williamson, ]r.rnChristmas in JulyrnThe crickets which stopped singing atrnThanksgiving have come inside at last,rnalong with the spiders and an occasionalrnskink. The leaves dropped from thernpecan trees around the beginning of December,rnand crevs are at work in the orchardsrnbeside the Rio Grande gatheringrnthe nuts. The bermuda grass is brown inrnthe backyard, and my heating bill soaredrnto 54 dollars this month. The New Mexicansrnreact to 45 degree highs by wrappingrnup protectively like Arctic explorersrnor going nearly naked in defiance of therncold, while over at the country club thernAnglo immigrants from El Norte congratulaternthemselves on having discoveredrnthe perfect climate. It must be winterrnin New Mexico after all. You coiddrnhave fooled me.rnThe rains that inundated the lowerrnRio Grande Valley turned to snow overrneastern New Mexico. Immobilizedrnamid eight-foot drifts the sheep and cattlernslowly starved while the ranchers,rnsnowbound in their houses, were unablernto reach them. National Guard troopsrnorganized a rescue operation that forrnnearly two weeks airlifted five-ton hayrnbales in G-130 transport planes andrndropped them from a height of 300 feetrnto burst on impact, scattering hay behindrnihe fleeing animals.rnI threw the cross-country skis in thernbed of the pickup truck and drove eastrnone morning, across the Tularosa cactusrnflats to Alamogordo and from Alamogordornup to the town of Gloudcroft in thernSacramento Mountains in search ofrnwhat could fairly be described in accordancernwith the truth-in-advertising lawsrnas winter. In Gloudcroft the inner-tubernrental outfits were doing a land-officernbusiness, and ice-skaters stood in line tornget on a flooded depression in thernground slightly smaller than anrnOKmpic-sizedpool. Ahvo-footaccumulationrnof snow with the consistency ofrnwet plaster covered the northern aspectsrnof the mountains, but the east- andrnsouth-facing slopes were nearly bare.rnThe last best hope for winter lay fartherrneast in the region lately declared a disasterrnarea by President Clinton. It seemedrnlike a long way to drive to go skiing, butrnthe Texans have been doing it since theyrnquit being Texans and began looking forrnmountains to conquer.rnMariana as a way of life works no betterrnfor Anglos like me than it does forrnanybody else. Here in the Southwest arnprudent man seizes on a cold day as unthinkinglyrnas, in the Northwest, he takesrnadvantage of a hot one. The long easternrnslope of the Sacramentos was lovely, butrnmost of the snow had melted out longrnago. I kept driving east anyway, followingrnthe Rio Pefiasco down from thernpiney forests into the pifion and juniperrnhills where the upward sweep of thernHigh Plains breaks at last like a greatrnwave crashing. The river ran fiill and thernmeadows beside it were flushed with therngreen of early spring, in spite of the dimrnwinter light and the lovv-traveling sun.rnWild turkeys strutted in the fields, andrnwhere the valley widened below Mayhillrnstrangely familiar trees grew in rowsrnabove the floodplain: apple orchards setrnout in the southern extremity of thernRocky Mountains, a shocking juxtapositionrnof Johnny Appleseed with Billy thernKid. At the summit of a prairie swale arnfew miles beyond Elk, New Mexico, I satrnoverlooking the vast yellow plain stretchingrnin undulating folds of mud to thernTexas border. Conceding defeat at last Irndrove into the mountains again and returnedrnto Gloudcroft by an alternaternroute. The wet snowdrifts reappeared asrnthe elevation increased, and with the approachrnof evening the deer began torncross, sleek and healthy-looking from therneasy winter. At the lodge at Gloudcroft,rnhigh above the town amid tall pines andrnpiles of the slumping snow, I had arnscotch-and-soda on the enclosed porchrnoverlooking the Tularosa desert 5,000rnfeet below. A spreading luminescencernon the desert floor inspired the brief, unguardedrnhope every desert mirage raises.rnThe White Sands, of course. There’s alwaysrnearly retirement in Havre, Montana,rnto look forward to.rnNo one, I discovered the next morning,rnhad raked the leaves in my absence.rnSince southern New Mexico, so far as Irnhad been able to tell, is lacking a fall asrnwell as a winter, I hadn’t bothered rakingrnleaves. At home in Wyoming I was alwaysrntoo busy hunting to rake, and by therntime hunting season ended whateverrnleaves had fallen during the previousrnmonths were covered by two or three feetrnof snow. In Las Gruces, it seemed, Irncouldn’t rely on snow to solve the leafrnproblem, so I looked to the wind instead.rnWith any luck at all the spring winds, ifrnnot the winter ones, would blow all thernleaves, and the branches and twigs withrnthem, into the Organ Mountains togetherrnwith the trash lying along Highway 70.rnThe sensible thing was to forget aboutrnraking leaves and take a horse into thernDofia Ana Mountains instead, whilernthey were still in a comfortable deeprnfreeze and before the arrival of springrnand the related dangers of sunstroke, skinrncancer, and smotheration.rnIn Dofia Ana the turned chili and cottonrnfields warmed under the mild midwinterrnsun. Most of the horses at MikernCisneros’s stables were gone from theirrnpens for roping practice, and Mike wasrnloading his own tall bay roper for the ridernover to the arena. Overfed and underexcercised,rnhot from too much protein, therngelding evaded me briefly, ducking andrnrunning the fence, before I could get thernhalter on him. His coat and the mare’s,rnwhich had started to lengthen late inrnSeptember, had grown out half way beforernunseasonable weather aborted thernprocess. Now, instead of resemblingrnyaks, they looked merely motiey, the tuftsrnof chin hair giving them a goatish appearance.rnI loaded the horse into therntrailer and drove north of Dofia Ana, underrnInterstate 25, and up an arroyo comingrndown from the mountains. WhenrnAPRIL 1998/49rnrnrn