C enizo Not es
by Carolyn Zniewski, publisher and Danielle Gallo, editor
O
ne of the things
I love about Big
Bend is how
close we all are to
Great Mother Nature.
When you live here you
have to adjust your
schedule to the dance
of the weather. If you
see someone in trouble
you know it’s up to you
to help, there won’t be a taxi coming along
anytime soon. Everyone is neighborly regard-
less of fortune, family or politics. We need
each other to keep the wolf from the door.
The winter holidays have been spent and
we’ve renewed our community. Winter is a
time for gathering your wits.
Last quarter was crazy-hectic for me. It
often is in the fall and through the holidays.
I’m looking forward to some cold and windy
weather as an excuse to curl up by my new
wood stove and putter away at some good
reading, craft projects and good old-fashioned
daydreaming. When I read the Folkways
about Dragon Fruit I thought someone down
in South County should start a little Dragon
Fruit farm. Great climate for Pitaya and a
chance to be one of the first in the US market!
Big Bend is sometimes described as being in
the middle of nowhere and we are certainly
far from the metropolis. Yet Big Bend seems
to be the starting point of so many interesting
things. The solar farm at Marfa, the wind gen-
erators at McCamey, the ‘off the grid living’ of
many homes, papercrete building and innova-
tive arts and theater to name some of the best.
It’s a special place where old technologies
combine with new to bring about some very
creative ends. In a place like Big Bend a
Dragon Fruit Farm isn’t that farfetched.
Who’s game?
G
earing up for
spring in the Big
Bend is always a
time of ambivalence for
me. I love the lengthen-
ing days and the
ever-increasing warm
breezes, the buds on the
trees and the return of
the vultures. I hate that
last freeze that prevents
me from getting the garden in before Easter,
and robs my fruit trees of all their blossoms.
I love seeing all the new faces around as vis-
itation picks up, especially after a long dark
quiet winter, when the Big Bend can feel even
more isolated than it usually does. But I hate
the sudden “traffic” on Highway 90, even
though I know a dozen cars between
Marathon and Alpine isn’t most people’s defi-
nition of traffic.
I love the return of daylight savings, and
eight o’clock suppers on the front porch, and
those endless mornings when the sun doesn’t
rise until it’s had its fill of sleep, like me. But
there’s something to be said for the early
evenings of winter, with their lemony sunsets
and the bare branches silhouetted against a sky
that fades from green to navy blue to inky
black.
I suppose it can be said that any time of
transition is a time for contemplation, as we
have one foot in the past and one in the future,
and the present is more of a bridge than any-
thing else. This issue of Cenizo showcases
some of our Transpecos history and some of
the now; arts in Marfa, the lives of the Apache,
the Big Bend Gem and Mineral Show, the
preservation of pronghorn sheep. Enjoy the
stories as the desert stirs itself from winter
dreams, and prepares for another spring.
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Cenizo Journal will be mailed direct for $25.00 annually.
Make checks payable to: Cenizo Journal, P.O. Box 2025, Alpine, Texas 79831,
or through Paypal at cenizojournal.com
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Deadline for advertising and editorial for the Second Quarter 2015 issue: February 15, 2015.
Art, photographic and literary works may be e-mailed to the Editor.
For advertising rates or to place an ad, contact: advertising@cenizojournal.com
Cenizo
First Quarter 2015
7