Maestro Gaxiola Writes

Maestro Gaxiola's Bodie Adventure

2011-12-10T11:30:00.000-08:00

After learning the process of editing and adding background music to my first video, The Cowboy Takes a Model, I felt confident to take on a larger project for my next video. I had met a young woman working in a copy shop near my home in Albany, CA who was into performance art. Her name was Geri Gray - her persona was a Mermaid. We talked about the artistic similarities between my cowboy persona and her Mermaid persona, and she said we should do some kind of art piece together someday. I agreed, but she moved to Hollywood before we had a chance to ever do anything. We kept up a correspondence however through the mail discussing art and sending each other photos of our various art projects.

As I continued to think about subjects for my next video the thought occurred to me that the juxtaposition between a cowboy from the badlands and a Mermaid from the ocean might make a good subject for a video. I had been thinking about a video where a painter had lost his way and was suffering from “artists block” when he wonders into a ghost town where he finds a Mermaid who shows him the way back and gives him new life.

I ran it by the Mermaid and she agreed that it might make for an interesting situation. So I asked her if she would agree to play the Mermaid part if I did another video, she said she would.

The idea got larger and larger in my mind and soon I was thinking about doing a big production number. I started thinking about putting together a crew then traveling up to the Nevada ghost town of Rawhide to do the shooting. I had seen photos of Rawhide and it’s old buildings in a book about ghost towns of the west. It looked like a perfect setting to do a video. I asked my good friends Casey and Linda Lewis, who had helped me with my first video, if they would be interested in going to go up to Nevada to spend a week helping me shoot a video for my next Maestro Day. I wanted Casey to be the “guy with the clipboard” taking care of all the details and making sure everything went smoothly so the mermaid and I could concentrate on writing the script. I asked Linda if she would shoot still photos of everything. They said they would be happy to do it. I also asked our mutual friend, photographer Dennis Hartelius, if he would handle the filming and directing. He also agreed to do it. Then, because I had just watched the documentary film, Burden of Dreams, by Les Blank, I asked Casey’s sister Sue Mahannah if she would come along to document this adventure with a second video camera. She said she would. That rounded out the crew. With all of us in agreement that we could spend a week together in the cramped quarters of an RV, out in a desert ghost town working on this art video, I was ready to roll.

I rented a large RV, my wife stocked it with food, I brought along a few props, I picked up the crew, and off we went. Casey and Linda followed along in my wife Alice’s VW bug which we were going to use as a shuttle vehicle to scout out locations or to go for supplies rather than try to manipulate the big RV on those mountain roads. We kept in touch with walkie talkies - this was back before we had cell phones. The Mermaid flew into Reno, Nevada and we picked her up there. I had brought along a typewriter so her and I could collaborate on refining the script as we went along. We had a general idea and I had a basic script for the video but we wanted to add things that were inspired by the ambiance of the location.

After driving from Reno most of the day we finally found the old mining ghost town of Rawhide up in the Nevada mountains. But to our surprise the old ghost town was gone and a new mining operation was working the property. We were sunk before we even started - I had no plan B. I didn’t know what to do. By chance we started talking to some workers that were there by the road, telling them what we had planned to do and how disappointed we were that the ghost town was gone. They told us the best place to film a ghost town video would be Bodie State park in California because most of the buildings were still there and the town was accessible. They said they were heading for the highway that would lead us to Bodie and told us to follow them down off the mountain. So off we went on a wild ride down the mountain to the highway that would take us to Bodie.

From the highway it took over an hour to drive the rough, unpaved road up to the park. I had driven ahead in the VW while the crew waited by the side of the road because there was no use driving that big RV up that terrible road if the park turned out to be closed. When I got there I talked to the ranger on duty. He told me there were no accommodations in the park and we would not be allowed to park the RV there overnight. He recommend an area just outside the back entrance of the park where a miner who leased the land would occasionally let hunters park their RVs while hunting. But he said to be sure and get permission from him in the morning. It was night time before the crew and the RV finally made it up the very long rough and winding dirt road to Bodie.

The next morning we see this pickup truck with a gun rack in the cab coming down off the mountain. It was the miner. We pictured a grizzly old bear of a man who didn’t take kindly to city folk or non-hunters. It didn’t look good. We went out to the road to greet him. To our surprise he was a young man, clean cut and cleanly dressed in levi’s and western work shirt. We told him who we were and what we wanted to do then invited him into our RV for coffee. I mentioned to him that our coffee might be a little strong because it was special coffee from a place in Berkeley called, Peet’s Coffee. To our surprise and amazement he said, “Oh I know about Peet’s coffee, my mother lives in Oakland and buys it there all the time.” Well what do you know, saved by Peet’s coffee! He said we could stay there as long as we needed.

So now that we had a base camp secured, the first order of business was to go back to the park and talk to the ranger about our plan to film in the town. In order to look more “professional” I had hand embroidered six jackets with the Westernman Film logo on the back. We looked pretty professional as we walked into Ranger Russ Guiney’s office. I told him we were from Westernman Films and we wanted to do a film in and around Bodie. Then came the bombshell. Ranger Russell told us that we needed a permit to film in the park, which often took months to get, and we needed to put up a cash deposit, plus a ranger needed to be sent down from Lake Tahoe to supervise…and we needed to pay his salary! My heart dropped. My video was finished before it even got started.

With a humble heart I fessed up…we weren’t professionals after all I admitted. We were just some artists from the Bay Area with an idea of doing a video in a ghost town. I had actually made the jackets myself. I also told him I was just a country boy from San Luis Obispo trying to do an art project. Bingo! He lit up. Turns out he was from Morro Bay, right near San Luis! We talked further and he finally said that there was no law against tourists video taping in Bodie so if we didn’t bother any of the other guests and limited ourselves to the small equipment we had he didn’t see a problem of us making the video. My heart soared again! The second obstacle in the road to producing my video had been removed.

With renewed vigor we left the ranger’s office and started looking for places to shoot. The script called for some long shots of the cowboy walking, first in the desert and then entering the town and walking past some old buildings. The Cowboy eventually comes upon this old white bearded miner who is sitting in front of a building playing the accordion. He ignores the painter. The cowboy sets up his easel and begins to paint. However he becomes irritated with the constant accordion playing so he yells to the player to stop playing. The man continues to ignore him…finally he yells again “Knock it off, I can’t paint!“ Suddenly the man appears behind the cowboy looking at his painting and says, “You’re right , you can’t paint.” The cowboy says, sarcastically, “What do you know about painting” to which the man replies, “ I don’t know anything about painting,… but I know more about it than you.”

The cowboy gets more irritated but continues to paint, then the man appears in front of his canvas and, while holding a pair of steer horns, gestures and says, “Do you want to fight?, do you want to fight?” to which the cowboy in anger throws his brush at the man only to find it was all an illusion and the brush lands on the ground. When he goes over to pick it up, sitting on a nearby bench is the Mermaid, “Hi stranger”, she says, “new in town?”

Those were the basic scenes so what we needed was a place where this could all be filmed without interfering with the tourists who were there to see the town. Fortunately there were only a few there at that time.

So we scouted out areas where we could shoot those scenes. We walked around Bodie discussing various camera angles and positions for the old man playing the accordion and the mermaid to be in in order to make the shots as dramatic as possible. We had planned to start shooting the next day. Casey was scheduled to play the old man. We were going to put talcum in his beard to make him look old. But as fate would have it, back when we were talking to Ranger Russell a tourist had peeked his head in the door to ask a question…he was an elderly gentleman with a white beard. Casey and I got the same idea at the same time. That guy would fit the part of the accordion player to a tee! But that seemed like an impossibility. To get some tourist to stop being a tourist and be in an amateur art video made by some Berkeley artists who he didn’t know seemed highly unlikely to say the least. But as it happened as we walked around the town scouting for places to set up the camera we ran into to the guy and his wife. They saw our jackets and they asked us what we were doing. We told them we were artists from Berkeley and were doing an art video…he said his name was Bob Meinhardt and he and his wife were from El Cerrito, and that he was an artist himself! Can you believe that!..luck was on our side that day. The Lord does provide!

Say Amen brothers!

We invited him and his wife to join us for coffee back at our RV. They came and we talked. Finally I looked at Casey, he nodded and I popped the question. I asked him if he would consider playing the part of the accordion player…to our joy and amazement he said he would, but we would have to do it right away because they were about to leave Bodie.

We hastily grabbed the equipment, found a site, Dennis set up the camera, and began to shoot. He had to do a lot of takes because Bob couldn’t get his lines right…finally we just ran out of time and sunlight so we had to call it quits. We thanked Bob said goodbye to him and his wife and returned to the RV for dinner. After dinner we looked at the days shooting. Much to our chagrin most of Bob’s dialog was in short clips, unusable for editing. The problem was that Dennis had never used this equipment before and some technical glitch backed the tape up over each take when he stopped shooting. So instead of getting pauses between takes all the dialogue sort of ran together. It would be almost impossible for me with my primitive equipment to edit the dialogue part of the shoot into the video. The accordion scene was all we had that I could use.

As re-shooting the scene was out of the question we had to figure something else out before we started shooting the Mermaid’s scene the next day. So the Mermaid and I worked frantically into the night re-writing the script to accommodate what parts of Bob’s dialogue that were unusable. We had to leave out the, “You call that painting?” and all the rest of his lines and try to work the essence of them into the Mermaids dialog. The part where Bob is playing the accordion was fine so we worked around that scene. We decided that rather than me throwing my brush at the accordion player when I said the line, “Knock it off, I can’t paint!” we would have the canvass fly off my easel and reveal the Mermaid on the bench where the accordion player had been setting. We had to get the Mermaid closer into the shot so we had her say, “Why don’t you bring your canvass over here so I can see it.“ that way we would be closer as we did our dialogues. Once I was closer to her the mermaid would continue with the dialog that she had written for herself. We were all flying by the seat of our pants because we didn’t have the luxury of re-shooting any of the scenes later during editing. We only had five days to get it all shot and we already lost one day driving from Rawhide and another shooting Bob‘s unusable scenes.

The mermaid’s scenes came off fine, Dennis got used to working with the equipment and the recordings from then on were fine… considering the primitive equipment he had to work with. This was 1984 and home video cameras and VHS recording equipment were relatively new at that time.

The next day we filmed walking scenes outside of town and in and around the many old buildings plus some face close ups. Then there was a serendipity scene that helped pulled the whole “walking into town” bit together. Where we had the RV parked there happened to be an old fire pit with some wood scattered around plus a pole about seven feet high planted in the ground next to it. Since my mantra has always been that painting was a religion not a business I got the idea of taking an old plank that was lying there and fastening it to the pole to make a Christian cross. Then I had Dennis shoot a scene of me arriving into this ghost town and coming upon this cross and the fire pit. I thought the symbolism would fit nicely. Dennis came up with some great camera angles, one from the top of the RV and one from ground level that made for a pretty impressive scene. The only problem was that the miner, whose mine was up on the hillside overlooking our encampment, happened to be one of those Bible believers and he wasn’t sure if we were mocking Christianity or not. When he came down to have dinner with us that evening he brought up the subject of the cross, I scrambled to tell him about my “painting is a religion” philosophy and that the cross had nothing to do with Jesus or the Bible. He was a reasonable man and he accepted my explanation and said no more about it…however he did expound a bit on religion and his dislike for Catholics later.

So then, we had the cowboy scenes of coming into town, walking through town, running into the accordion player, confronting the mermaid and being rendered unconscious by the mermaid’s kiss. Now all we needed was the resurrection scene of the cowboy transformed into this new reborn painter. The mermaid and I went over scenario after scenario. One plan was for the cowboy to appear in the town cemetery as if resurrected in all new fancy cowboy clothes with a new white hat ready to return to the city and ready to paint again. Then we came up with the idea of maybe using the miners cabin to do the final scene…the cowboy standing on a hilltop in fancy gear ready to take on the world. We asked the miner if he would allow us to shoot the scene up at his cabin. He said that we should come up to see if it was suitable first. So Geri and I took the VW up the hill to his cabin. When we got there he showed us around and when we saw the mine shaft with its little trolley wagon we both got the same idea. The Cowboy being pushed out of the mine shaft would be like coming out of the womb, a rebirth of the painter…perfect! Another miracle!

Say Amen brothers!

When we told the miner about our idea he agreed to play the part of the miner pushing out the wagon with the cowboy on it. The miners part was that he had found this delirious cowboy in town and had brought him up to his mine shaft to recuperate….he then supplies him with a new set of fancy clothes, including a new white hat and sends him on his way. We didn’t write a script for this scene, it was going to be totally adlib. The miner knew what we were trying to do because he had been in on our after dinner conversations all week. So when it came time for him to do his part he did it ad lib, even though you can see me nodding my head in the affirmative when I wanted him to say, “yes.” We ending the shoot with the miner and the cowboy walking up to that cross and biding each other goodbye. The miner wishes the cowboy good luck on his journey….fade to credits.

It was a perfect ending to Bodie adventure. And what makes it so profound and thought provoking was that most of it happened by chance. It could have easily been a total disaster. Or was it by chance? Perhaps it was meant to be given the supernatural theme to the video. I don’t know. But I think the whole crew would agree that something magical happened up at that mountain and in the ghost town of Bodie, something we may never understand but are aware that it did indeed happen. Ah art, don’t you just love it!

Say Amen brothers, say Amen!

The video that I made as a result of this Bodie adventure is titled, The Cowboy and the Mermaid. It was shown only once in 1985 at my annual Maestro Day art show in Albany, Ca. I will post it on my nyt35 Youtube channel soon (if I can) Watch for it.

Dennis Hartelius, Maestro Gaxiola, Sue Mahannah, Linda Lewis, Casey Lewis, Geri (Ariel-Owen) Gray

Shake a Hand, Shake a Hand

2010-05-23T10:27:00.000-07:00

An Essay On Handshaking

I'm a hand shaker. I've done it most of my life. I couldn't even begin to guess how many hands I've shook over these past sixty four years,..but I can say this,.. there's been a whole lot of shake'n go'n on. I've done one heck of a lot of handshaking. I know how it got started too. You don't go shaking hands all your life without asking yourself, "Why am I doing all this shaking?" I don't see a lot of other guys doing it. Why me? It's not the most profound thing to be reflecting on but nonetheless I have pondered it and I believe I have come up with the answer.

It was an under-classmate named Tony Garibay who got me started. This guy put me on the path of a lifetime of hand shaking. Tony was a jolly sort of a guy, always laughing and joking and when he would greet you he would always stick out his hand and shake yours as he told you some joke or tidbit of information he had gathered. I always thought it was cool, to take the hand of the person you are talking to, it sort of gets and holds their attention. It's sort of a non-aggressive way of saying, "Listen to me." You can't very well ignore someone who has a good grip on your hand now can you. I found it the best way to get your message across. Of course it's standard procedure for all politicians. I'll bet Tony is Mayor of some city by now.

I got in a lot of shaking when I was a traveling hardware salesman. Salesman, like politicians, use hand shaking as their primary weapon against a hostile audience or buyer. No matter how much you don't want to talk to a salesman if they stick their hand out you return the gesture and he's got you for at least a few seconds.... and with some salesman that's all they need to get a foot in the door. They have phase two ready and swing into action the minute they make hand contact. It's an art.

Speculation is that hand shaking goes back to when the human species was still bonking each other on the head with clubs and such. The way to "sell" the idea that you weren't going to clobber somebody was to show him that you didn't have a sharp stick in your hand. "See, my hand is open, nothing harmful here." "Me either." Shake shake shake. It worked. Word got around from cave to cave that if you didn't want to get bonked, greet every stranger with an open hand. It builds up confidence in your fellow cave dwellers. It makes cooperation possible.

But wouldn't you know it, there was always somebody who figured out that grabbing someone's hand could also be used to an advantage. Shaking your opponent's hand throws him off guard so you could konk him with the stick you were holding behind your back in your other hand. That was the beginning of the politician/salesman hand shake. "Hey, how ya doing... I'm from the cave over yonder and I was admiring your Saber-tooth skin rugs and .....Bonk!! Sucker!

But for the most part it worked well. The more civil cave people found it a good way to make alliances and mend disputes. It worked like a seal of approval. Once the three of four cave communities decided they would stick together and share hunting and gathering techniques they sealed their alliance with a handshake. No tricks here. It's all for the good. That's how the handshake was able to become a part of our civilized heritage. Not only was it was a sign of respect but it showed you were one of the "civilized people," not one of those cave dwelling brutes that goes around with a club in his knuckle dragging hand.

Hand shaking remains the official sign of respect and civility the world over. Even a reluctant handshake, as in the famous Arafat/Rabin handshake , you can still see a certain respectability that is comforting, even if you believe there are still some sticks somewhere nearby. For us out in television land watching all those world leaders shaking hand after hand makes us all feel,... well, warm inside. It's all for the good. We'll hunt less and gather more. When I see our president shaking hands I feel like he is showing America's good side, we are a civilized nation, take our president's hand. It doesn't matter to me if he is Republican or Democrat; if he shakes a good hand he's got my support.

Now some men are not good hand shakers. I remember a certain priest, who shall remain nameless, who used to shake my hand like ...well,.. shake is the wrong word here, he used to rock my hand back and forth in a twisting motion like he was rattling a door knob. It was unnerving. But it never stopped me from offering my hand when we met, I always kept hoping he'd get it right. He never did.

Then there is the "limp hand" shake. The limp handshake gives you a queasy feeling. It's like you have a hold of something you shouldn't be a'holding. I drop those hands fast. I like a good firm handshake. Thank God my daughter married a man who knows how to shake a hand. He's good. He has a good positive, man's man handshake. Lots of confidence, good eye contact, nice timing, good release, and good follow up. Some men, after you shake their hands, sort of back up and look awkward, like they participated in something foreign, some strange ritual. They look uneasy for a second or two, kind of confused, not knowing what to do next.

Most young adolescent boys are that way. They shake only when a hand is extended in their direction. They would never offer first. I remember some of my daughter's teenage boyfriends meeting me for the first time. They didn't quite know how to respond to a father who stuck out his hand when they were introduced. Most fathers of teenage girls give a grunt in the direction of, "those punks" and that's about it. But as I said, I'm a handshaker. My daughter picked up on it right away too. She passed the word around, if you want to please my dad, shake his hand. I noticed a sharp rise in handshakes after that. Once in a while even a half firm one.

One of the benefits of the feminist movement for me was that suddenly it became OK to shake a woman's hand. What a boon for me! I increased my handshaking possibilities by a factor of two. I don't really "shake" a woman's hand though; I more or less just hold it. You get a chance for a few seconds of accepted civilized intimacy. I don't think women ever give it a thought that you might be holding a club behind you back...... that's a male thing.

But you know what's really troubling me? It's the, "High five." What is that all about? High five? Sounds decadent, like some third world ruling party. The high five is fast becoming the hand contact of choice replacing the good old "press the flesh" handshake. What gives? Are we becoming uncivilized? How did this barbaric ritual get a foot hold in our culture?

My guess is that it started on the football field. A player makes a touchdown and wins the game. He raises his arms over his head in a typical gesture of triumph. Up comes another player and slaps his extended hands. The "High Five" is born. Soon fans in the stands were doing it. A player makes a touchdown, the players gather around, slap slap slap, high fives all around. Up in the stands, slap slap slap, the fans are mimicking what is being done on the field. You would think the fans had made the touchdown.

The fans go home, tell their kids, "We won!" slap slap slap, the kids join in. What's going on here? I thought it was the player, a man of great talent and discipline who worked long and hard to make the team, made the catch. Does the kid think his father, who drives delivery truck, made the catch, won the game? If the players had given each other a handshake do you think the fans would have offered their hands to other fans? Would the father come home and shake his son's hand and say, "We won." I don't think so. The kid would say, why are you shaking my hand? You’re my dad. I'll tell you, high five'n has nowhere near the class or meaning of a good firm handshake. To take someone's hand, apply just the right amount of pressure, with just the right amount of motion while making good eye contact is a pleasure beyond description. To slap someone’s hand as a gesture of friendship and human camaraderie seems to me to be a contradiction of intentions.

Think of where this all could lead. We have a chess match. Kresokof moves Queen to KR5....checkmate. Slap slap slap, the audience breaks out in high fives. Or, can you imagine after a Beethoven symphony the conductor going over to the first violinist and giving him a high five?.....and then the entire orchestra starts giving high fives to each other? then the audience... how....how....uncivilized! Or our president signs a non-aggression pact with China. Both leaders rise....slap slap slap, high fives all around! Now that would be a great way to start a non-aggression treaty wouldn't it...with some good old hand slapping aggression. Were leading our hands down the wrong path I tell you. Right? Right. Let's shake on it.

Maestro Gaxiola

December 2000

An Alien In Area 51

2010-03-20T13:03:00.000-07:00

Area 51 is supposed to be a top secret Air Force base out in the Nevada desert about 100 miles north of Las Vegas. I say "supposed to be" because the U.S. government still doesn't admit it exists. They say there is no such place in spite of the fact that it is mentioned in everything from video games and TV dramas to serious news programs like 60 Minutes. All this secretiveness supposedly is to hide the fact that there is an alien spacecraft and the bodies of its crew stored there... all of which were recovered in Roswell New Mexico when the extraterrestrial-populated craft slammed into the desert in 1948.

It doesn't surprise me that the government doesn't know what it has, or where what it does have is -exactly, but the stories of mysterious "Black Mailboxes" on a lonely road in the Nevada desert and white Jeep Cherokees or champagne colored Ford pick-ups with black camo-clad silhouettes patrolling the desert made me think something is there in spite of their denial. After all, it's the code of “The Secrets" to deny, deny, deny.

So, taking a cue from Gertrude Stein I decided to see if there was a there, there. Maybe I could untie this Gordian knot. If the government didn't know what it had, perhaps I could do a painting of "it" and send it to them to bring them up to speed. It seemed like the good citizen thing to do.

To start I thought I would visit my long time friend Ed Alden who not only knows the area, having lived his life in the high desert, but was somewhat of a "secret" guy himself. He was a nuclear physicist and had top secret credentials and all that. Having known him for over 45 years I still don't know exactly what kind of work he did for the government. He doesn't even admit he worked at all! deny, deny, deny. He was just, there.

Anyway, Alice and I dropped in on Ed and his wife Cam using, "just happened to be in the neighborhood" as a cover. I couldn't tell Ed my real intentions because old dogs don't unlearn old tricks. He would have clammed up tighter than 007 on holiday in Russia. So after the usual pleasantries, we went to a park for a little picnic where I subtly broached the subject of Area 51. "So Ed,... ever been to Area 51?" I asked. "Only as a tourist." was his reply. Now what does that mean? Tourists can't go there....even if there is a there to go to. I pressed on, "So you have been there" I said. His answer was typical secret guy stuff. He said, "If I had been there I couldn't have been there because there is no there to be there at." Huh? Good sandwiches! Great picnic! Now I definitely had to go there.

So, early the next morning we rolled out of Bishop on Highway 6 heading for Nevada. It's a long stretch of high desert with not much to see. At about noon we came to a wide spot in the road called Warm Springs. It was warm but I sure didn't see any springs thereabouts. It was all rather dry and dusty. This is where Highway 6 and old highway 375 intersect. I call it old Highway 375 but the name has been changed to, EXTRATERRESTRIAL HIGHWAY.

Now we are getting somewhere; maybe not there but somewhere. The Extraterrestrial Highway sign looks official enough, all green with white letters. It looked like it must have had some sort of Government approval, local or otherwise. I could also see that I was not the only pilgrim to pass this way because the sign was full of stickers and graffiti. "Zork Was Here," that sort of stuff. Naturally it was a perfect place to put the Maestro "Cross over M" brand, which I did. "The Maestro Was Here Too!" Not there yet, but here for sure.

The Extraterrestrial Highway is a long stretch of two lane highway that is straight as an arrow for miles and miles. Bald Mountain is way off in the distance to the right but other than that nothing but flat desert. After what seemed like hours we saw a small clump of buildings in the distance. It was Rachel. I can't call it a town because there is nothing there but a restaurant and gift shop called the Little A'le'Inn. There were a few old trailers where the workers live and a small gas station that had sign on the road that said, gas for $1.99.9 a gal.,... except when you got up to the pump you found that there was no hose. You had to fill up at the other pump where the price was $2.29.9 a gal. Bait and switch desert style.

I had heard that the Little A'le'Inn was the information source for Area 51 so we pulled in. It was late and not enough time to see Area 51 and drive on into Las Vegas so we decided to take a room at the Inn. Bad idea. Those trailers turned out not to be for the employees but were actually the guest rooms. We had to share a trailer and bath with two young men who smoked the sweet weed most of the night. The smell came drifting through the two inch thick walls. The wind came up too and blew assorted trash and junk, that was the Inn's only landscaping, up against our trailer. There was plenty of eye, nose, and ear stimulation all night long.

The Inn did however supply me with some useful information. First of all I was able to purchase a map of the area, for 33 cents, which had written on it in bold black letters, AREA 51. It also had a diagram of its boundaries. Now I was getting somewhere. Not there yet but somewhere. So with map in hand off we went looking for the "black mailboxs," - that's where you turn onto Groom Lake Road that leads to the Area 51 boundary. The girl at the Inn also told me not to intimidate the guards. I thought, hah, what guards? If there is no there there who would need guards to guard something that wasn't there. I need to get to the bottom of this. I'm confused enough without this Area 51 nonsense making things worse in my head.

When we got to the black mailboxs we found they are not black at all, they were white. So much for that mystery. Turning on Groom Lake Road we headed out for the boundary. The road is flat and straight. It is a dirt road and the dust plume behind my truck was about a quarter mile long. We are heading for a small line of foot hills that loom up on the horizon. It is about thirteen miles down this dusty road to the boundary of Area 51. No one can sneak up to the boundary on this road because the dust can be seen for miles.

When we got to the foothills I spot a white Jeep Cherokee ominously parked on a side slope facing Groom Lake Road. Inside are two black shadowy figures who sat motionlessly watching our every move. To say fear came over me sounds like a cliché, but believe me that is the best way to describe my feelings. I slowed down and sort of wimped my truck up to the boundary line. All that was visible were a couple of signs that said, in bold red letters, Warning Restricted Area. Deadly Force Authorized.

Now hold on there partner, I am only a humble cowboy looking for something to paint, no need for violence. I reckon I can find something to paint elsewhere…..I’ll just be moseying along now if it’s all the same to you.

This is no place to be fooling around acting silly. These people are as serious as cancer: you don’t want to be messing around here. Still, after all that, I needed to prove that I was at least here if not there. So I slowly stepped out of the truck, making sure my hands were where the guys in the truck could see them, grabbed my easel, set a canvas on it, had Alice take a photo of me behind it, then I slowly put it all back in the truck, turned the truck around and slowly, but deliberately, drove off down the road from where I came. It's obvious to me that there was nothing to paint there because there wasn't a there there. And I wasn't there even if I was there because there was no place to be, there.

I had set out on this adventure with the idea of having a little fun, you know, just doing some little crazy Area 51 art project. It was supposed to be just a little project that I thought my artist friends would get a kick out of. But my plan had taken an unsuspected turn, this had become all too serious for this cowboy. When I hit the main highway I wheeled to the right and headed out for Las Vegas as fast as my little Ford Ranger would go. I was sure of where I was going this time because I know Las Vegas is there – ain’t no doubt about that: it’s there with a capital “T.”

…and just in case you’re wondering… don't ask to see the paintings that I didn't paint cause there aren’t any paintings that I didn’t paint.

A Cowboy In Indian Country

2010-03-16T20:06:00.000-07:00

Canyon DeChelly
By Maestro Gaxiola
April 2001

The Navajo Indians are the largest Indian tribe in the U.S. Their reservation covers some 14 million acres in Arizona, New Mexico and Utah. The Navajo Nation owns some of the most beautiful real estate in the world. Monument Valley is perhaps the most beautiful and best known of their possessions because of all the Western films and commercials that are shot there.

However, a much less known, and equally breathtaking in it's own way, region of the Navajo Nation is a small (small as compared to Grand Canyon) canyon area called Canyon DeChelly. (pronounced Dee-Shay) It is about a two and a half hour drive northeast of Flagstaff, Arizona. The depth ranges from 30 feet at the mouth to over 1,000 feet some fifteen miles up the canyon. It's in the shape of a "Y" with the two split ends being the deepest parts. There is a North and South rim drive with overlooks for viewing the sheer cliff walls. From some of these overlooks you can look 700 feet straight down with only a small retaining wall to keep you from joining the birds that you can see flying around some hundreds of feet below.

A small number of Navajos still farm and raise sheep down on the canyon floor. You can see some of their Hogans from the rim. You can also see the ruins of ancient Puebloans structures tucked in along the canyon walls. The Navajos offer motorized or horse trips up the canyon floor that you can take for a fee. Otherwise you can only see it from the rim. It's private land.

We had been to Canyon DeChelly once in 1985 when I was doing my video, "Along the Navajo Trail". We had filmed along the south rim where I painted among the rocks. We could see the tour trucks below but didn't have the time for a tour ourselves. But this year we decided to stay longer and take one of those motorized tours up the floor of the canyon. You buy your ticket for the tour from the trading post at one of the three motels or lodges that are located just outside the canyon entrance. They have all day tours or a half a day tours, a morning tour and an afternoon tour. A half a day tour was $40.00 per person. We took the morning tour which started at 9 AM.

If you don't want to take a tour and you are adventurous, you can drive your own SUV up the canyon, but you must hire a Navajo Guide to go with you. Most of the trip is up a river that flows through the floor of the canyon in about a foot and a half of water. They know where the rocks are and aren't.

At 9 AM we boarded our converted WW II surplus troop carrier and our guide, Frank, introduced himself to us. The truck was open topped with two rows of six double seats facing forward. Frank stood on a little platform that was right outside the driver’s compartment. He made a few jokes about having to pay to take a photo of any Navajo children, "Give them a dollar if you take their photo....I charge $10.00!" We all laughed, but I knew he was half way serious. Indians from Sitting Bull to Geronimo have all charged the white man to take his image in the little black box. Time changes nothing really.

Frank, like all the other Navajo Guides, (there were about ten of them hanging around the trading post) was decked out in full western gear. Indians make great cowboys. He had on a cowboy hat, big silver buckle, Wrangler jeans, packer boots, and best of all he had on a great Wrangler shirt with an Indian pattern going horizontally across the chest and arms. The only thing he had on that I thought was un-hip was a pair of hip John Lennon shades. I had my "Lone Ranger-Ray Charles" mask type, sun shades on and I, for one, thought I looked cooler. But he looked to be around thirtyish and I am sixty four so coolness kind of gets blurred with age. It was a toss-up as to who was dressed better though, him or me.

I didn't want to overdress to go out on the back of a truck - I could get dirty - so I elected to wear my Turquoise boots and my new turquoise Wrangler solid color work shirt. I had on my, "Along the Navajo Trail" sterling silver buckle which I had made to commemorate the video I did when I was here in 1985. It was attached to my hand made belt which had hand engraved Conchos I made myself out of copper pennies. A lot of Navajo influence here. Of course I was topped off with my 6X Resistal silver belly hat. I was understated as far as typical Maestro gear goes but to the cowboy gear aficionado I was holding my own in the Navajo Nation

After Frank's little jokes he jumped into the truck cab and off we went.

Now I've been on a lot of tours in my lifetime and I have noticed how over the years, because of so many lawsuits over so many different things, tour guides are instructed to run down a litany of "dos and don'ts" to cover themselves in the event someone does something stupid, like fall off the truck. Well in the Navajo Nation they don't seem to have the same fear of lawsuits as the white man. Frank never muttered a word about "safety" or what to do or not do while he was in charge of our lives. I even got the feeling that he was deliberately trying to throw some of us off the truck the way he hit some of those bumps on the trail. I noticed that he was laughing and joking with the other drivers in the Navajo language over his trucks CB radio. Uhhh, big Navajo joke on white man.

If someone had of fallen off the truck he would be lucky if Frank would have even stopped to let him get back on. If he did stop he would have probably told the guy, "Hey!, clean yourself off before you sit back down, don't get the truck dirty!" I find that totally acceptable; it's the Navajo way.

Navajo's are a cold looking people. They don't seem to be interested in anything. But a guy like Frank can't spend that much time on the way he dresses and not be interested in something; I could tell that Frank was an interesting guy despite his stoic look. I came across a book that I think describes the Navajo people. It's title, "Cold Faces, Warm Hearts." That jives with my take on the Navajos at least. All the Navajos at the Holiday Inn where we stayed were friendly and helpful but they looked indifferent and un-enthusiastic about everything. A quick aside here: The Navajo's have their own time. You've seen those clocks at the airport that show the time in other parts of the world...well the Navajo's have two clocks in the Hotel lobby. One clock says, "Arizona Time" the other says, "Navajo Time" - an hour difference.

The tour was fun. Alice and I grabbed the back two seats on the left side of the truck. I wanted to look back without unnerving someone behind me.. You know, I learned that lesson as a little kid in church, "Don't look back at the people behind you!" They'll give you that, "What are you looking at?" sort of look. Anyway the canyon was breathtaking as seen at the base of seven hundred foot sheer red rock cliff walls. Frank would stop here and there to describe some pictographs and petro glyphs and show us the difference between the two.

Now here is another funny thing about the Navajos. Every time he would stop the truck there would be some Navajo's with a blanket spread out selling some trinkets. I find that as ironic as the photo taking charge. Indians have often called other Indians who do that sort of thing, "Hang around the fort, selling trinkets to the tourist Indians." Yet the Navajo's can pull it off and it doesn't seem offensive. They don't look a bit uneasy about it. They usually sell turquoise jewelry and a lot of sterling silver stuff. All along the rim drive at every overlook there are six or seven pickup trucks parked with a rug either on the ground or on the hood with a non-interested Navajo nearby. You can look and/or you can buy something. The Navajo will take your money. Other than that there is no human interaction to mar the beauty of the landscape. Somehow the Navajo's have found a way to "do business" and still be in harmony with the universe. That's quite a feat in my mind.

There are two fifteen minute, drink-water-go-to-the-bathroom, stops on the trip. The first one is at White house ruins. An old Anasazi ruins that has one whitewashed building among the otherwise adobe colored structures. I have forgotten what Frank told us the reason was for that but it was probably done by the Spaniards or other white people who invaded their homeland many years ago. Those invaders didn't pay any Navajo guide to show them the way either I'll tell you that right now. Kit Carson and his men, for example, burned and pillaged their way straight up the canyon.

To make the point, Frank stopped by a large bluff that stands in the middle of the canyon like an island. He told us rather impassionedly about how Kit Carson and a troupe of soldiers trapped a large group of Navajos up there. They had gone up to the top of this bluff to avoid capture. After burning everything on the ground, to the ground, Kit pitched camp and waited three months for the Navajo's to get hungry enough to come down. He then promptly killed everyone over the age of fourteen and sent the rest to Florida. That area is called, "Canyon del Muerto,” The Canyon of Death. I don't know about you but I am going to re-think my American hero status for Mr. Carson.

At one point Frank asked if there were any questions. I raised my hand and attempted a little joke of my own. I said, "do you hold any grudges?" Some of the white people laughed but Frank said "no"... like I was serious. Them Navajo's are hard to get a handle on.

The last stop was at "Sliding House Ruins". There were several other tour trucks gathered there letting the white people take photos of the ruins and/or buy trinkets. Frank went off to an area where the other guides were hanging out. For me it was great to see six or seven Indians dressed to the nines in great western gear laughing and joking and having coffee. I hardly even see that at a rodeo. Rodeo cowboys don't do much hanging out, they have another Rodeo to get to down the road, no time for hanging out. And where I live....forget it. I have to look in a mirror if I want to see a cowboy. I am the only cowboy I get to hang out with. Starbucks afternoons are lonely afternoons for this cowboy.

I sent Alice off to buy a little something for our neighbor's two small girls. I thought it would be nice to give them a little something from a place where only Navajo's and white people with a Navajo guide can go. I stayed on the back of the truck and did a small water color and ink painting of the ruins. As I was painting I thought about the "artist" who chipped those petro glyphs into the cliffs behind the ruins some five hundred years ago. Frank told us that when you see horses in a petro glyph it means that it was done about the time when the Spanish came through the canyon. The Indians who lived there then had never seen a horse before so some guy started chipping away at the walls to leave a record of this new phenomenon.

I am sure the whole community was pleased at what this artist was doing. He was leaving a visual message for generations to come of what they had all seen for the first time. Art served a communal purpose back then. It was an important thing to be, "One who speaks for all." One who, "records an impression of what he saw." I was wondering if anyone on our truck felt the same about me; not hardly. Art has no such meaning today. And an artist is not viewed as anything special unless he is out there in the money market. It's not what he does but how much money he makes that makes him important. But then, I've gone over this trail many times before and nothing has changed. So forget I said anything. One woman asked to see what I had done, but other than that I was just another tourist.

When everyone started gathering around the truck to load up I heard someone ask Frank if he could get a photo of him. Frank jokingly said, "For five bucks...." The guy just laughed and took the picture. I, on the other hand, knowing the tradition, went over to Frank and said, "Here, I'll give you five bucks for a photo." He smiled, took the money, stuck it into the pocket of that great looking shirt and said, "OK."

Alice was on the truck already so I told her to snap a photo, which she did. I climbed aboard and off we went back to the hotel. All in all, I feel I got the best of the Navajo's on this day. I got the image of one of their finest looking braves in my black box, I transferred onto paper, with ink and color, the image of one of their most sacred places, I held my own in western fashion and style, when outnumbered ten to one, and I brought away two small bracelets to give to the girls next door. I did all this without upsetting the harmony of nature or the harmony of the Navajo Nation. Not a bad days work for a cowboy in Indian country.

Hank III - Will The Circle Be Unbroken

2010-03-15T11:48:00.000-07:00

By Maestro Gaxiola,

November 2000

To get to the Covered Wagon Saloon in San Francisco, I took the Fifth Street off ramp and went up one block to Folsom Street. I was supposed to meet Les Blank there at 9 p.m.. He said he would have a ticket waiting for me at the door. It was my birthday (64) and he was treating me to an evening with Hank Williams III, the son of Hank Jr. and the grandson of legendary country icon Hank Williams. My cowboy pal Johnny Westurn turned me on to Hank III a few months ago. I, in turn, turned Les onto him. I bought Hank's one and only CD, Risin Outlaw, and pushed Les until he too filled his hand with a Hank III CD. Tonight Hank was playing at the Covered Wagon Saloon here in San Francisco. [The Covered Wagon Saloon is basically a Punk/rock venue, not, as the name would imply, a country honky tonk.]

This was new for me. I seldom go to clubs of any venue, or for any reason... and hardly go anywhere without Alice, yet here I was, alone, pulling into the parking lot across from the CWS looking for a place to park. (Alice was down with the flu.) My naivete and I suppose my age was apparent. It made me an easy target for one of those "fake" parking lot attendants who rushed up to my car and stuck a ticket on my dash. He said, "Going to the Covered Wagon?" As I reached for my wallet I said, "Sure am.....how much?" He hesitated for a moment, sort of sizing me up, "Ah...six dollars." I said "OK."

Now here is where my age worked to my advantage. I can't see much without my reading glasses in good light let alone here where it was quite dark. So I am fumbling through my wallet trying to find some money. Meanwhile he is making small talk, "I hear they got a country guy there tonight, heard he's good....you from around here? jabber jabber jabber, distract distract distract" I finally handed him a ten. He comes on with the old, "I ain't got no change" bit. To which I said, "Come on,..you're a parking attendant without any change?" He starts mumbling something and I start looking again in my wallet for six bucks. But as I am looking I happened to look out my windshield and I spot a sign attached to a light pole with bold letters saying, "Do not pay any attendant to park. Only put money in metal box provided" So I said to the guy, "OK, I've got six bucks, give me back my ten. " He said OK and handed me back the ten. I put it in my wallet, put my wallet away and said, "That sign says not to pay any attendant so I'm not paying you." He mumbled something about it being a special night. But I just parked my car and said that I would check at the Covered Wagon before I paid any money for parking. Hey, I'm 64, I wasn't born yesterday.

There was a big green bus parked right in front of the saloon which is a small San Francisco type building with what looked like two floors of apartments up above. I can't for the life of me believe that anyone could actually sleep nights in an apartment right over a fully plugged in punk/rock club. Maybe it's for the employees. There were a few people hanging around out front but tickets had not gone on sale yet. The paper said that the show started at 9 p.m. Les was supposed to be there at 8:45 to get the tickets and I was to meet him inside at nine. It was exactly 9 p.m. But this was a punk/rock club not a train station. No Les, no ticket, no open door. Doesn't anyone believe in time schedules? Where is Mussolini when you need him.

To go to a club, and especially to see the grandson of an American legend who helped popularize the fancy western outfit, (although Hank III is not a fancy dresser) I naturally decked myself out in my bright red fringe leather jacket with matching red boots with burnt gold wing tips and heel counters. I trimmed out with silver collar tips, large silver buckle, watch band with a gold "cross M" brand and my silver concho, silver laced, "MaestroBelt. I was not the kind of guy you see at these kinds of clubs on a regular basis.

All eyes were on me as I pulled the door open and walked inside. A very nice long haired guy with a black leather jacket came over and asks me,... politely I might add, "Can I help you with something?" I told him about my parking attendant problem. "Those damn guys, they're not supposed to be doing that," he says. So he comes with me to the parking lot and confronts the "attendant." I think they knew each other from prior incidents. They started to argue. I don't like confrontations over pocket change so I handed the "attendant" three bucks and said, "Here, watch my car." The guy said, "OK, thanks." That ended it. I wasn't paying for parking I was paying for someone to watch my car, like in Mexico. The club guy and I talked as we went back to the saloon, he was nice and seemed happy that I resolved it without any bloodshed. That's one good thing about ageing, you don't have time for petty arguments. You do what the situation requires and you move on. No winners, no losers,... just, situation ended. Period.

Les and his friend Gina came about 9:45. I was in line although I sort of stood by the bus facing the crowd with my hands behind my back looking like a security guard for Hank III. I think they bought it too, why else would a guy my age, decked out in full fancy cowboy gear be standing by Hank's bus. Don't mess with that dude, he's probably pack'n.

As Les bought the tickets I sort of hung back then just walked in like I belonged there. I'm sure, once inside, Les, Gina, and I looked like we must be "somebodies" because we did not look like part of the usual crowd. All you have to do is look like you're not interested in whatever is going on and you automatically are assumed to be "somebody." People who pose and look around to see what's going on and what other people are doing think of themselves as "nobodies." That's why they look around all the time,.. they're looking for a "somebody." If you can look and act like a somebody, you are a somebody. It's all in how you are perceived.

That is something else that comes with age. At 64 it's not easy to impress me. My face is fixed. It reflects years of experience in a wide range of situations without me having to move a muscle. Like a good poker player, and Les is a master at this, I can observe everything stoically, showing no facial emotions. Like Les, my eyes can scan everything down to the smallest detail but my face looks like it could care less,... been there, done that. In reality I was as excited as a third world peasant in Costco. Everything my eyes took in was dressed in swaddling clothes. Just born images eager to be held and caressed.

I lost control only once, my face opened up with surprise, like I had just drawn four aces on the first deal, when I saw a young woman who was about five feet tall weighing in at a good two hundred pounds dancing on top of an old pool table. She was scantly attired in an old dance hall girl costume and there was cleavage coming out in all directions. A sight that added another detail to my experience bank. Later I found that there were actually two of them, one working on top of the bar. Just as big, just as cleavaging. Carol Doda! see what you've gone and done!

As we were waiting around for the music to get started the in house DJ was blasting some punk/rock music from a small closet like booth. The entire club was no more that thirty feet by forty feet, including the twenty foot long bar. There were no chairs for us older folks to sit on. There was a outcropping along each side wall where one could sit or stand depending on if there was a band playing or it was intermission. We sat.

There was only a handful of people there and it was already 10 p.m. Several people struck up a conversation with me asking about my boots and jacket. It happens all the time. I gave out Johnny Westurns web site so they can visit the page with photos of my boots and jackets. That's what the page was made for, to keep me from explaining myself. Thanks JW.

At about ten thirty the first band came on. I can't remember their name but they were from Minnesota where Prince is from, if I remember right. He must have inspired a lot of young impressionable kids. This, I suppose, was just another band trying to grab the golden ring on music's magical merry-go-round. Lots of luck. What was their name? Blonde singer, bass, two guitars and drum. Amps at 10. Loud.

The place was starting to fill up by the time the next band came on, the 401 K's. Guitar, bass and drum. Amps at 11, one more loud. But I will say that they played with a certain professionalism that impressed me. They were in tune and they started and stopped together. But my ears were ringing. Gina found that they were giving away ear plugs and she got some. We all three plugged up. I should say here that although Les and I are at the Beatles magic number 64, Gina definitely is nowhere near that number. She only put in the plugs to save her hearing so that when she does finally reach the magic number she can still hear her Happy Birthday song.

Another break to set up for Hank. More pool table dancing. More loud records. More people. More drinking. More smoking. More sweet smells. More ringing in my ears, and more movement on my poker face. Just when I thought I had seen it all they announce that for one buck you can go into a back room and see one of these dancing girls completely nude!! Have your eyes ever seen the glory....can your eyes stand the glory... I'll pass.

My mother used to play her Hank Williams records out at the ranch on her old wind-up Victrola,... and I'd listen. That was probably about 1945 before his big hit, Lovesick Blues. Lovesick Blues hit the charts in 1949 and was on for almost a year. I was thirteen. I remember it well. I actually liked his touring partner, Lefty Frizzell better when I was young, but in the long haul, (the only haul that counts for anything), I side with Hank as being Americas finest singer/songwriter of the twentieth century. He's just that good.

He was divorced, sick, and flat broke when he died at age 30 in the back of his 1953 Cadillac on January 1, 1953. Hank died from overuse of alcohol and drugs brought on by too much fame too fast and not enough time to prepare for it. Too many songs in too many smoky bars. Too much whiskey drenched soul hung out to dry on a guitar string clothes line. He was done when he started, all he had to do was fill in the middle part. He's resting easy now though, under a sixteen foot monolith in Montgomery, Alabama. Next to him is his wife Audry under a matching marker, both surrounded by artificial turf. But there was nothing artificial about Hank Williams, he was the real deal.

Now his son Hank Jr. is a little different story. He's "kind of" the real deal. We'll have to wait until he is under his monolith before we can really judge him. That Monday Night Football thing kind of muddies up the water.....at least it does for me.

So here I am, to see, in person, the third Williams; Hank III. I have listened to his only CD and I liked what I heard. I've read a few thing about him and I've liked what I've read. He is anti- Nashville because of all the corruption brought on by bean counters in the music business. Profits now dictate the direction of country music not the music itself. That's wrong and it's bad for country music. And since country music is America's music it is bad for America. Money and the way it corrodes and tarnishes whatever it touches is the single most destructive force active in the arts today. I've not only come to see the grandson of an American legend, I've come to see a soul mate, a brother in arms, a patriot, a fellow revolutionary in America's cultural revolution.

He travels with a five piece band. Drum, lead guitar, stand up bass, fiddle, and Hank himself on rhythm guitar. Loud but solid. My first impression of him is that he's good. Professional and focused. In his element. Not his father's son, not his grandfather's grandson but his own self. He rides on no one's back. He's good on his own. He has the true country sound in his voice, in his attitude, even in his forearm and hand as he fans the guitar strings. Watching him sing and play I was mesmerized by what I was watching.

Somebody kept blowing these large puffs of un-inhaled smoke at him. It was like a reenactment of some tragic story. Great artist rips heart out, dies from playing too many smoked filled bars. Here we have a direct descendent with the same lonesome voice singing his heart out in a small bar and someone engulfs his head in smoke. It's unreal, yet oh so real. He looks so young so clean almost virgin like with his smooth unblemished skin. Yet the murkishness of death hovers around him like swamp fog.

I felt we were all in some way part of some strange ritual. Even my being there in my fancy outfit played a part. I visioned my mother dancing on the pool table playing her old wind up Victrola and laughing loudly. I visioned thousands of Reverend Howard Finster's Hank Williams paintings with cryptic religious messages scrawled over them, floating in distorted waves throughout the room. I thought of the ancient Aztec rituals of fancy dressed priests and swaying stupefied throngs of drunken revelers dancing with arms raised as the sacrificial vassal is groomed and prepared for sacrifice. And the vassal, knowing his fate, and caught up in the frenzy of the moment, happily leaning into the knife.

That's what I saw there in this club, the great American temple. Another sacrifice to the music gods. This young musician, born for the part, tearing his heart out and serving it up to the cheers and applause of the adoring masses. Will the circle be unbroken. I stayed to the end, not wanting to miss a second of this dramatic ritual. When the lights came up, I walked over to Hank and offered my hand,.. which he politely took. Our eyes locked, "I enjoyed the evening" said I. "Thank you very much." came the reply.