Chapter 24
Jack and Sally Falling in Love
The Land Yacht arrived in Santa Fe too late for Patty to call her friend Mari, but Patty told us, “Mari suggested a couple choices for campgrounds. Let’s go check them out.” The first was a place called “Las Campistas” and was a miniature version of the place we’d stay at with Peaches and Sunshine outside of Phoenix, mostly pavement, not quite as many over-the-road truckers. So we drove on to the next place, a little out-of-town on Route 475, Hyde Memorial State Park. Wow, breath-taking views, hiking trails, a lodge with a restaurant, an outdoor fire pit, but really more a campground for us to set up tents than an RV park for the Land Yacht. We went to the lodge to see if anybody was still up.
The park ranger in charge of reservations said we could park the RV in the main parking lot by the entrance, but camping there would be prohibited. “There is, however, a camp site big enough for one large tent and a couple small tents, right here,” she said, pointing to a spot on the map on her desk. “And we do have weekly rates, as well as overnight rates.”
Patty claimed Mari was sure we’d enjoy spending a week here in Santa Fe, that she was planning to have a party in our honor, that there were lots of people she wanted us to meet, including a group just back from a meeting with Deb Haaland, Biden’s Secretary of the Interior, concerning plans for honoring treaty rights. “Mari’s last words to me were: I hope you brought your Minnesota sleeping bags – it gets cold here at night.” Hyde Park became our new home. If Sally ever showed up, there was plenty of fishing to be had on Little Tesuque Creek.
The next morning, when Skip (back in L.A.) heard about our new place, he told Rocky both he and Sally were heading our way. “Don’t leave early,” he said.
In L.A., all break-ups were amicably negotiated, one a little tricky. Ken was happy to give up being a co-organizer of a Rump legislature, and thought his Hollywood friends might host a “Good-Bye Party/Fundraiser” to help defray web design costs. Jesse was already working-up a plan to run a rump session remotely out of Portland – so no problems there. The Dodgers lost the rescheduled play-off game so Skip’s baseball buddy in Muir Beach wasn’t coming down to see a World Series game. Skip was still not talking about what he knew, and not even Ken had any idea how troubled Skip was about almost everything at the moment. Dirty Nick’s agreed to host the fundraiser to raise money for the rump-third-party idea.
But Sally was having a hard time breaking it off with Jack. Plus, she didn’t like Skip’s idea that they would hitchhike to Santa Fe. “Pirate Jack, I think I love you, but I got to get back with my friends on the Land Yacht. I can’t just move in with you. I have a house in Saint Paul. It’s too early to make any commitments. Do you understand?”
He did not. “Look Sally B [his nickname for her – B for beautiful], let’s find a nice place, have a late-night dinner by the ocean, bring a blanket, find a secluded spot on the beach, just you and me and watch the sunrise again – just like our first night. Then see how you feel.” Well, that worked. By morning Jack had announced it was time he took a sabbatical from his job, that he was thinking of buying a new Jeep Land Rover anyhow, and “Why don’t I drive you and Skip to Santa Fe?”
“Would you!!!” Sally exclaimed and gave Jack the biggest hug he’d had in years.