Item From the Past: Madrid, NM

No wonder I haven't heard news announcers on the radio use the name of the volcano that's disrupting air travel in Europe, which I finally read today: Eyjafjallajökull. Iceland might not have the GDP it once had, but it's still got cool volcano names.

For us, the Year 2000, as it used to be called, was a good year for going places. In late March, I was offered a new job starting May 1, so a window opened up for late April. We -- just three of us in those days -- went to San Antonio that year in time for Fiesta, and then flew to Albuquerque one morning and drove to Santa Fe for a few days. Before leaving Albuquerque, we ate a fine lunch at the M&J Sanitary Tortilla Factory, a place of local renown, I heard. I'm glad we did, because a few years later it closed.

Without any need to rush to Sante Fe, we went by way of New Mexico 14, which roughly parallels the Interstate. Lately I've learned that this brief stretch of road is also the Turquoise Trail National Scenic Byway, so designated only a few weeks after we drove along it, winding our way through a number of small towns. One town was Madrid, which the U.S. Census Bureau says had a population of 149 in 2000; these days, I've read about 300 people reside there. It's a place with a curious history: a 19th-century coal mining boomtown, then deserted, then a late 20th-century arts and crafts town, which is what we experienced. Arts and crafts isn't so surprising. It's near Santa Fe, after all. But coal mining in New Mexico? Who knew?

We stopped there and ate something, dessert maybe, at a shop that had art and crafts for sale as well, plus a screen door that fascinated Lilly. So much so that we had to tell her to stop opening and closing it. This is what she looked like at that exact place and time.

For contrast, to the right is a picture she took of herself a few weeks ago at most, one of many, many self-portraits. Such is the ease of photography in the digital age. At this moment standard parental sentiment says I must point out how fast my eldest daughter has grown. But thinking about it, the last 10 years seem like a long stretch of time. The Year 2000 seems remote as a small town in rural New Mexico.