My companionship with A Prairie Home Companion

Garrison Keillor is bringing A Prairie Home Companion to New Mexico State University’s Pan American Center on Saturday. For someone who loves the challenge of staying alive in a snowstorm, we may be too mild with our non-lethal scorpions and rattlesnakes.

I have been a fan of storyteller Garrison Keillor since the early 1980s. I own most of his tapes and CDs. Over hundreds of thousands of miles he has been my great traveling companion as I drove between Hobbs and Farmington, Animas and Clayton and most New Mexico towns in between. His wit and compassion have lifted me up.

Strange as it may seem, I feel closer to him than some of my own relatives even though we have never met. I have spent more time with him and enjoyed his company more. Sometimes I just let the stories wash over me while the miles go by. Other times I find myself in awe of his ability to use his voice, like his alternate version of Casey at the Bat.

I have heard his stories more times than I can count and work hard to keep them out of my writing while they reside in my heart. Garrison Keillor has made my life richer.

He is out seeing America, an America that has listened to him for so long and is a little shocked that he is in his 60s, but I am shocked that I am coming up on 60 myself. How could this happen to either of us?

I am glad he is visiting. The first recorded visitor to our area was Don Juan de Oñate. He traveled through here in 1598 continuing north and then turning west to the Gulf of California. On the way back he stopped at what we now call Inscription Rock, 100 miles wouthwest of Albuquerque, where he carved his name along with the famous words, “pasó por aquí” – I passed by here.

Years ago, the Las Cruces Public Schools built a new school and named it Oñate High School. I tried to get them to construct an Inscription Rock where graduates would leave the message, “I, (their name) pasó por aquí.”

To me it is the best description of the life we all live. At a meeting school officials listened to my idea. Then they stood abruptly and I was given two rejection slips. One was for the pasó por aquí idea and one was for whatever I thought of next.

My Swedish born great-grandfather Eric came to the United States in 1867 and then to the New Mexico territory in 1908, calling it the Promised Land. No, his eyes were fine; he was just thrilled to homestead here, as did my grandmother, a one-room schoolmarm at that time in Cloudcroft.

I have asked many people, visitors and new residents alike, what brought you to Las Cruces? Some answer, “My Ford.” Others say, “I tied a snow shovel to the top of my car. When someone finally asked, ‘What is that thing?’ I knew this is where I wanted to live.”

There are visitors who on a windy day in our little slice of heaven get out of their car, squint at the 50-mile-per-hour, dust-laden wind and ask, “My God, does the wind always blow this way?” We answer, “Nope, sometimes it blows the other direction.”

For those coming to live here we have four rules: First, we have no interest in how you did things back home. If it was so swell back home, stay there. Second, it is chile, not chili, and never say it is too hot. “Gee, this has a good flavor,” is what you say while you drain the pitcher of water in one gulp. Next, the use of turn signals is optional. It is a turn predictor and many who live here do not know where they are going so they cannot predict where they will turn.

Lastly, when someone says mañana, it does not mean tomorrow. It means, not now. When will you mow the lawn? “Mañana.”

Bienvenidos to the cast of A Prairie Home Companion this weekend. In the future we will proudly say Garrison Keillor pasó por aquí.

Swickard is a weekly columnist for this site. You can reach him at michael@swickard.com.