The Santa Fe Review

Today on the cover of the weekly science section of the New York Times, I have a story, Unearthing Prehistoric Tumors, about the antiquity of cancer, which has probably existed since the first multicellular creatures slithered on earth. Several people have asked what I have been doing while away from The Santa Fe Review. The Times article is a sample of what I will be writing about in a new book about the science of cancer to be published eventually by Knopf in the United States and Bodley Head in England. I will post updates on my progress along with (I hope) more communiques on life and politics in Santa Fe. So many things have been happening and I just haven’t had time nor will to write about them. The other reason for my absence is a divorce, unwanted and unexpected. It will take awhile for life to seem interesting again.

Almost two years ago I wrote about my aversion to blogging (please see My Anti-Blog). I was an early adopter of the Internet. Since the mid 1990s I have had my own Web site, coded entirely by hand, describing my books and providing biographical information and links to my newspaper and magazine stories. Why would I also want a blog? And why would I need Facebook? Anyone could find me with a Google search, and my email address is on my web site.

Gradually I am becoming less hardcore. I now have a mostly private Facebook page, which I use to keep in touch with friends and colleagues, and lately I have been thinking of starting a blog about some of the amazing things I have been discovering about cancer. This post is a way of sticking a toe in the water.

Merry Christmas and New Year.

George Johnson
http://talaya.net

Venice Beach, Thanksgiving, 2010

You might have thought from the flashing red and blue lights on the police cruisers cordoning off Canyon Road that there had been a toxic chemical spill. There must be a less obnoxious way to keep cars out of the neighborhood for the annual Christmas Eve farolito walk.

“Union Pro-tec-teeva — what’s that?” said a loud voice behind me as I rounded the corner of Acequia Madre and Camino del Monte Sol. “Must be some kinda union.” You could tell she didn’t consider that a good thing. I started to explain that La Union Protectiva de Santa Fe was a mutual support society, almost a century old, started by neighbors to help one another with burial costs. But the moment passed.

“Everything’s closed,” complained a young blonde walking up Canyon, like she was expecting a last-minute shopping opportunity.

To bypass the hordes of revelers — some texting Christmas greetings on their cellphones — I cut up Gormley Street to Acequia Madre. It was a little more peaceful, and the display at the school was as pretty as ever, disrupted only by a high-tech exhibitionist projecting tiny blue fiber-optic laser lights into the trees. Any other night it would have looked cool.

I was glad to arrive at the Plaza and find it all but deserted. I listened to my wife (now ex-wife) sing a solo (Handel’s “Let the Bright Seraphim”) at First Presbyterian then ducked out the backdoor before the religious part began. I warmed up at La Fonda’s Fiesta Lounge with a glass of wine and the Bill Hearne Trio. In the hotel lobby I spotted Colonel Hawthorne with his long, white beard regaling a couple of tourists with memories of Oppenheimer and Los Alamos and complaints about the financial crisis: “It’s not a credit shortage, it’s a cash shortage!” A genuine Santa Fe experience.

According to a column in yesterday’s Journal by Dan Mayfield, the farolito walk ended badly with the Santa Fe police making “a slow, honking, sirens-blaring, crowd-parting, lights-blazing show-of-force,” their crackling bullhorns ordering pedestrians off Canyon Road. Christmas Eve is all about crowd control.

Every year there are fewer farolitos. Most of the bonfires are lit by art galleries instead of neighbors, and there is a charge for hot cider. Maybe it is time to put an end to this over-produced “tradition” and see what springs up naturally to take its place.

George Johnson
The Santa Fe Review

Christmas truck, Camino don Miguel

Around sundown on December 24th, I was walking down Camino Don Miguel toward Acequia Madre hoping that when I rounded the corner I wouldn’t see the usual police cruiser parked catty-corner from Union Protectiva with its red and blue revolving lights wiping out the glow of the farolitos. I got my wish. To block off the area to traffic, the city was using one of its friendlier public safety cars and its blinking orange beacons were barely a distraction. Turning right on Camino del Monte Sol and heading toward Canyon Road I encountered a woman in a witch’s hat decorated with battery-powered flashing lights. Another postmodern Christmas Eve in Santa Fe.

It was better this time. Just two or three years ago one of the galleries set up a public address system and had a d.j. blasting out happy talk and Christmas carols. But the shoulder to shoulder crowd with its dogs and cellphones seemed as big and noisy as ever. The closest I came to the silent night I’d hoped for was when I walked down the cul-de-sac of San Antonio Street where it almost seemed like what I imagine old Santa Fe to be. Near Acequia Madre Elementary I watched a flying farolito rising like a Christmas star and wondered, as I do every year, why the city can’t work with PNM to turn off the streetlights, or why for that matter we have to have streetlights at all.

On my way back I stopped at the bonfire on Acequia Madre and Don Miguel where the commissioner of the ditch and his family were serenading the night with guitars. Now this finally felt neighborly. I spotted Councilor Heldmeyer among the revelers and she told me that earlier that day a man driving an enormous tractor-trailer rig had squeezed onto Canyon Road, breaking some tree branches, and parked on a sidewalk with a load of sculptures to sell to the Christmas Eve strollers. When a tow truck arrived to haul away the vehicle, the interloper became so incensed that he had to be handcuffed.

Returning home along Camino San Acacio, I felt like Charlie Brown wondering about the meaning of Christmas. The closest I suspect I’ll ever come to seeing an angel is a flying farolito, but even an agnostic can be moved by Linus’s reply.

George Johnson
The Santa Fe Review