Well, I've been having tons of fun this last week up in Santa Fe! Just got back home around 7 (Mountain Time) and had dinner. I have much to discuss.
Santa Fe is the capital of New Mexico, in the middle of the high desert. That means it has both trees and cacti - whereas El Paso, where I live, has....cacti and sand. It's also basically the oldest city in the United States. Now, I know what you're thinking - wouldn't that be back east with all the colonies and what not? No, my dear friends, the Spanish and Native Americans were here ages before the English.
You see, around here, old doesn't mean colonial old. Old means 2000 year old Cliff Dwellings in southern Colorado and 3000 year old Mayan temples down in central America. As it turns out, Santa Fe has one of the oldest stucco houses in the US - there were people originally on the land even back in 1200 AD. Now it's a little adobe house with tiny doors, which is right next to the oldest church in the US, San Miguel, built in 1610. Despite being an atheist/anarchist/sinful wrongdoer, I love old churches. We have 3 just a little bit newer (late 1600s, early 1700s) here in El Paso. Santa Fe has them all over the place, including a gorgeous Gothic chapel called Loretto and the Cathedral Basilica of Saint Francis of Assisi (animal dude). The Cathedral is the largest of them all, and our hotel was about 50 feet down the road from it - you can imagine the commotion the bell caused every hour!
I hate new churches, but the older ones are very restful places - they're one of the few places you can go these days in a city and be guaranteed peace and quiet. I'd like to think that one day all churches will be seldom-used antiquated pieces of art (at least the nice ones. Tear down the awful ones made in whatever building they could find).
Moving on, we were in Santa Fe for two reasons: My father had a conference on Non-Linear optics and had to do some research at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum of Art.
A vastly simplified and probably somewhat inaccurate explanation of non-linear optics: basically using light and fiber optics in the place of electricity and cables.
As for the art museum: My father, a chemist, is working on a project which allows you to protect great works of art from being damaged by light by taking out the frequencies you don't need. You see, light fades artwork eventually, and by taking out unneeded colors in white light you can give that work a much longer life expectancy.
At the non-linear optics conference, we met with some of my dad's old friends, including the guy who, mark my words, is going to cure cancer. They haven't been able to do human trials yet - they'll be using dogs soon - but he predicts that he'll be able to cure something like lung cancer in an out-patient procedure that lasts six days and has none of the side effects that chemotherapy and radiation do. Seriously awesome stuff.
At the Georgia O'Keeffe thing, we heard a lecture on Georgia O'Keeffe (great southwest painter), Ansel Adams (black and white photographer and one of my inspirations for my own occasional venture into photography) and various other artists. Ansel Adams' son was actually there, which was pretty awesome. It was very posh - artists remind me of myself a little too much for comfort. We're intellectual, aloof, and usually a bit egotistic.
On a side trip, we also visited the New Mexico Museum of Art, the New Mexico Capital Building (which is minimalist yet gorgeous), and The Palace of the Governors, the old capital building on the plaza (square). They all had tons of nice art, and the Palace of the Governors had these huge old tapestries that depicted battles with the Native Americans. It also had some great stuff from central American tribes (Aztec, Maya, etc.).
All the buildings, ALL of them, are adobe, and there are actually rules against towering skyscrapers. Everything is low to the ground and lets you look around and see everything there is to see. The town has lots of character - Native Americans beating on drums in the plaza, playing guitars, hell, I even saw a guy on an accordion. The culture is lovely.
And, to tie this into what the blog is actually about, I saw TONS of humanist/atheist/tolerance bumper stickers. More than I'd ever seen in one place. All the places sell crosses and crap, but the city is actually very liberal despite its small town homey face. It reminds me a lot of a European style city. If you ever get the chance, I definitely recommend visiting.
Lingering among the waves
In froths of white sea foam
The sat a form along the rocks
Restless in its exile
The ocean churns beneath its feet
Longing for the cliffs
Where whitewashed rocks of ivory
Are slowly carved smooth
The seabirds call in quieting
As the storm rolls in
Shadows cast over the hills
Which shiver in the din
For which answer does he stoop to find
And risk the tremulous seas?
Where sharks prowl and water
Swallows all that you might see?
-Com, tired but wired
