Both Saturday and Sunday morning, I was awaken to the smell of morning food cooking. Seeing as the guest room is right off the kitchen, this isn’t surprising. One morning, it was the smell of chorizo, sizzling in the pan. It has a unique aroma, and it was fresh chorizo, from a health food store, local material, local blend.
I once read the ingredients, while in a supermarket, on the label of the “good” brand of chorizo. It was basically various pig parts, leftovers that couldn’t be used in other fashion. One place in Austin makes its own chorizo, and while it’s good, it’s not nearly as good as that stuff which is just swept up off the floor of a slaughterhouse. I can’t tell about the El Paso brand of chorizo, other than it mixed well with scrambled eggs, and the mixture made a perfect burrito, a little for breakfast and little for later.
There was something calming, invigorating, and altogether unique about waking up to the scents of peppers being boiled for fresh salsa, an onion being sautéed for peccadillo beef, and the coffee pot dripping fresh coffee. Nothing fancy, but the earth tone, the earthen hues, and the smell of a real Southwestern breakfast being started in the early morning, it’s one of those experiences that can’t be duplicated.
I was running up and down the western flank of the Oregon & Franklin Mountains. Pretty much the eastern edge of the West. El Paso, Southern New Mexico, Ciudad Juarez and old Mexico across the river, the lights in Mexico at night? All laid out like diamonds on a jeweler’s black velvet display cloth.
The second part, and of the experiences I most miss in El Paso proper, is the Tigua Indian Casino. I usually did well there. Liked it. It was fun. And it was closed. Drove most the traffic right across the street to Sunland Park. It’s one of those situations, bounce over the railroad tracks and there’s another casino, which is so weird, as it’s looks like it’s in El Paso, but geographically, it’s really in New Mexico.
One night that casino. One of the very crowded nights, I watched as two little “mamacitas” were nattering back and forth in Spanish, tipping some solution out of bottle, rubbing it on the slot machine’s window, then hitting the numbers. 7-7-7. Again. Again and again. More stuff rubbed on the window.
“Hey,” I suggested in a jovial manner, “rub me, too!”
“No. Machine bizzy,” she glared. O gringo was going to take her winning machine.
My companion explained in fluent Spanish that I just wanted some of whatever it was they were rubbing on the machine? Rub it on me.
I was Patchouli. They showed us the bottle. Cheap perfume, linked to winning. It was Tabasco branded slot machine, in fact, three in a row, and all three were hot that night. Those little old ladies weren’t about to give up their spots. Plus, that bottle of patchouli was almost empty.
The next day, while I was Heart of the Dove, I asked about the other branch, which is “Ancient Legacies,” an aromatherapy place. “Got any patchouli?”
The Moon was in Aries, the faintest sliver sowing right after sunset with Venus making a focal point just past the Moon’s fertile horns, and I had some of that patchouli. We all decided to give it a try.
Did it work? Not until after 11 at night. Then it works well.