Martha Ginaine
Special to the Beacon

    SAN FIDEL - Big changes are coming to Saint Joseph Mission School in San Fidel. The 87-year-old school started the 2010 school year with a new administrator, Antonio Trujillo, who intends to encourage cooperation between the student body and local residents.

Outdoors
By
Jaclyn Waggoner

ve always admired the trophies and souvenirs of others that I've seen during my lifetime. Some were small tokens of a trip or occasion, while some were literally as large as a moose, hanging on a hunter's trophy room wall. They are reminders, no matter of size, of generally a fond experience.  In recent years, as hunting and time became more precious, I've started a collection of my own. I've harvested a javelina, or peccary, the elusive wild pig of the desert, and had its head mounted. It hangs on the wall in our home's living room. The third season of hunting brought me that one. I hunted alone the first season. Our youngest daughter Regina accompanied me during the second year, while her sister Elisa studied for her nursing school's spring mid-term exams. My wife accompanied me during the hunt that scored this animal. It was a wonderful three seasons.  I have a bearskin rug that was the result of a harvest in Pecos during a mule deer muzzle-loader hunt (during which bear season was also open). That occurred with my brother-in-law Phil. The camaraderie of that hunt comes to mind and still brings my joy at the sight of the rug.  I had a mount of an Albacore Tuna made for Regina this past year for Christmas, and we recalled the two day fishing experience on the Pacific Ocean just south of San Diego, California, where we caught a couple tuna each. We reflected on that trip with zeal.  Then, there is a nice antelope buck from the Saubel Ranch in northeast N.M. that I harvested last fall. Its head, as well as one from the oryx that I tracked and later killed near the White Sands Missile Range last December, are at the taxidermist for processing.  Not all trophies are the result of a hunt, but some are trophies of the heart.  Here is the tale of the grandest trophy that I have:  It was a cold February night in 2004 that my wife and I took a trip to Pecos to bring back things that belong to her mother. Things that she would not need anymore. Things of hers that she wanted for us to have.  Her Alzheimer's had progressed to the point that it was too difficult for her family in her hometown of Pecos to continue providing home care for her. Her medical needs had changed in that she needed continuous medical monitoring. Her doctor recommended that she be placed into a nursing home. Her grandson Gene and his family would soon be moving back to N.M. from Kansas and would make residence in her now vacant Pecos home. It would become their home.  We stopped in Santa Fe to dine before going onwards to Pecos. It was a quiet meal as we talked very little while we ate. The reality of this being the last trip to her Mother's home was starting to sink in and was saddening my night.  As we approached the turnoff from 1-25 to Glorieta, my mind started to revert back to yesteryear. 1 recalled the mid-winter trips we often made here. At night, the beauty of the light streaming through the blue and yellow stained glass from the Glorieta church windows often lit up the snow covered valley like the rays from a lighthouse welcoming travelers to the valley. It reminded me of a beautiful winter Christmas card. I smiled as I drove our pickup truck over the hi-way's overpass and turned east towards Pecos.  ”This is sad,” I inadvertently said, thinking aloud. I was going deeper in thought as we approached the turn off of State Road 223 and headed up and over the hill past the old Griego's Store. This store is about a quarter mile from my mother-in-law's home. When we visited her in the years past, when our daughters were small, we often allowed them to walk here, together, or with their cousin Phillip, to buy treats, and then back. Times seemed safer then. The store has long since been closed; all its windows are now boarded over.

Hope
and Faith
By
Bob Brittain