Conspiracy Karma

Those years spent tracking down conspiracy experts to talk on the radio have come back to haunt me.

It was great fun and quite a challenge to endlessly seek out authors and lecturers who could talk at length about Kennedy assassination plots, 9/11, aliens from outer space and their unidentified flying objects, LSD experimentation, guardian angels, the bloodline of Jesus Christ and countless other topics. I learned how to conduct interviews and tease out answers from occasionally shy and reluctant authors. Those people didn't often get on the show, as they had to sustain a conversation for nearly 3 hours - in the middle of the night. Each show I produced was broadcast to nearly 16 million people across the country and around the world. I was very proud of my work - I was a nameless, faceless, behind-the-scenes person (the host never said my name on the air). I really didn't care that much. It was enough reward, knowing that an idea, conceived in my studio apartment, could become conversational fodder for millions of insomniacs.

Northern New Mexico is a magnet for all sorts of people who don't seem to fit into conventional society. The other night I met a woman who described Taos as "an open-air insane asylum". While I used to be considered a "wacko", in Pennsylvania, here I think I could be called conservative.I have fallen into a family of folks who spend a lot of their time playing music, carving stone and wood and writing books from their channeled extraterrestrial guides. Somehow they eek out a living or sustain themselves with a modest government stipend, like me. Most of them are night owls and insomniacs and guess what they listen to, late in the night. Yeah, my old show. And they are not discernible listeners. They believe it all. Hell, I used to believe most of it before I worked for the show.

Last night at a group gathering (a memorial service for a beloved dog), I was barraged by 4 or 5 night owls who lectured me, at length, about the global conspiracy to change the Western tuning from A 432 to A 440, (in order to create disharmony in the populace), the Princeton University report that discusses America's change from a democracy to an oligarchy, the vortex surrounding Taos and various UFO sightings, and the imminent destruction of Western society and the return to a local, agrarian way of life. And this happens all the time in this place. Everybody has the Internet, but nobody is watching Miley Cyrus's latest scandalous video or YouTube cats. They are going to websites (frequently linked to my old show's) and passionately devouring information about the end-times. While I am happy there are others who look behind the propaganda veil, a little goes a long way.

I wonder if it is my Karma, as a former producer of this food, to be forced to ingest it until I throw up?

Along the Side of the Road

Things you see in this town for sale along the side of the road:

Used cars with their prices on the windows, written in white soap.

Roasted ears of corn, still in their husks, drenched in butter and chili powder.

Pickup truck and driver, waiting with a cord of wood, ready to follow you to your house.

Truckloads of potatoes, $10 for a 40 pound sack..

Authentic New Mexican souvenirs.

Wreaths and long strands of dried, red chili peppers.

Bales of hay.

Hand carved pot pipes and whale bone feathers.

Knock-off genuine Indian rugs.

And today, I saw a trailer with a sign that read "will pay cash for your antlers" parked at the gas station. Inside, the thing was filled to the ceiling with deer and elk antlers.