New Mexico Homesick

New Mexico Homesick

Kim

Our Grandpa

By Stephen L. Wilmeth

            Two weeks ago at Redrock, I was sitting in a circle of Gila River children and our discussion had reverted to our surroundings. Behind us was the Gila with a rather meager albeit constant flow of water. It ran against an undercut bank nearest us, and there was a good hole in the bend 45 yards upriver. We would have drifted a worm by either of them if we had been fishing. We learned to do that more than two generations ago.

            If I had been blindfolded, couldn’t see where I was, but offered a sniff of it, I would still have known where I was. That distinct odor comes from a myriad of things no doubt, but the water motés and the cottonwood must contribute much of it.

            In the discussion at hand, Hunt had remembered an incident when he was just a kid up the river at their place. He and his dad were horseback when two fellows came along in a pickup and stopped to talk. There were some cattle in the river bottom nearby and a slick pair was with them. The unbranded calf was a heifer. One of the men asked Hunt’s father if he thought he could rope that big calf out of that brush.

            “Well, maybe we can,” was the response as he took his rope down and shook out a loop.

            As soon as the horsemen charged, the old cow headed for parts tight and gone with the calf right behind her. Brush was popping and limbs were breaking. Hunt declared in an aside that he was no help at all as soon as they hit the brush. All he was doing was trying to stay up and in the saddle. His dad, though, got them headed, the big heifer roped, and snaked out of that brushy bottom.

            “Well, that was as good as if it was all seven Wilmeth brothers!” was the comparative assessment of the requester.

            I was floored at that reference. Who, even among this group, would have known two much less all seven of those brothers? They have been gone for years and all but the two have been gone from the river more than 90 years.

            Walt, though, had the last word, and, as it was, the last laugh.

            “Those guys had been watching that slick pair and had bet each they were going to be the first to put an iron on that heifer,” he explained. “Well, the one that branded HIT on the left hip got it done.”

            Knowing there had to be a punchline, he was finally pushed to finish. “Well?”

            “Yea, the next time he saw that heifer his buddy had added an S to it.”

            Kim

            The first time I saw Kim was the day she was brought home from the hospital. She was lying in a bassinette and it was all I could do to see her over the edge of it. What struck me that lingers to this day was all that long wavy raven hair she had growing in every direction. Babies weren’t supposed to have hair like that!

            She grew up to be a beautiful woman.

            She lives in Texas now and I see her only at funerals on rare occasion. So, it was a surprise when a message was received via electronic express from Iraan that Kimhad posted on Facebook a picture of Albert Wilmeth, her great grandfather.

            “I am New Mexico homesick tonight,” she lamented.

            Ah, Kimmie, we are all homesick for the New Mexico to which you refer! In so many ways, though, it no longer exists. We had no idea how complete and simplistic our world was when Albert and Sabre Wilmeth were such a dominant feature in our lives. They moved into town in 1961, but the days of awe were always on the Mangus in that little board and batten house.

            Your memories stirred much emotion.

            It isn’t the intent to add to your words, except for the sounds in that old house that will never leave my soul. It was the tick tock of that clock in the living room, the lowing of cattle drifting through the open windows before dawn, and the sound of horses munching oats in the stanchion in the corral a short time later.

            Certainly, one of the strongest images of any man I ever witnessed was one afternoon in a blistering lightning storm at the barn when Grandpa stood exposed in the open door. We had just unsaddled and were caught inside waiting out the downpour. In a simultaneous lighting strike and explosion of thunder, his profile was lit up. His face was lifted to the heavens and his eyes were closed while seeking the full impact of its smell and its power.

            That was one of those precious, formative moments I knew exactly what I wanted to do in this life.

            There were so many other things packed into those years. I have often thought of my grandfathers and this one was the role model in seriousness. There was seldom departure from it, but there was always something learned, and always something completed.

“Little jobs everyday become big accomplishments.”

He tolerated no fool or foolishness. He chose who could go with him by who would pay attention and stay up. He’d wait on you one time before he would tell you to stay up. The second time there was a consequence.

Yes, I loved him, too. In some ways, though, I think the respect is stronger today than then. I didn’t understand the full consequence of it then. There are so many times I catch myself wondering what he would do in certain predicaments.

Maybe, I have a case of that New Mexico homesick, too.

Stephen L. Wilmeth is a rancher from southern New Mexico. “The picture of Albert Wilmeth (on the left) and John McMillen was taken by a Life photographer in 1931.