Roswell Night Skies – Jill Domschot

Roswell Weekend Journal

The weekend began with a storm. It was the first of Roswell Night Skies’* Movie in the Park; we were showing Lilo & Stitch, and when I arrived on scene, the crew that had been enlisted to set up the screen were battling heavy winds. They were determined, however, and the nonprofit board’s president did not want to cancel the first event of the season. We made it about halfway through before the wind and slanting rain drove our audience away. It was fun while it lasted. To the positive, the venue this year is Roswell’s Cielo Grande Events Area, which has a natural slope that is perfect for an audience. Hopefully, the weather will cooperate this Friday, when we will be showing The Iron Giant. Be there at dusk and bring a blanket or lawn chairs. There will be concessions.

After the storm, my weekend never lost its turbulence. I had numerous stacked events on my schedule, including the Corpus Christi procession on Sunday. Corpus Christi is generally at the start of June, which is the hottest month in Roswell. The internet says it’s July, but the average high is the same. In my experience, it can top 100 on multiple days in June, but what do I know? The point being the Corpus Christi procession is a hot one, done at fake high noon**.

There are much longer and more elaborate processions around the world than ours; we have four altars to place the monstrance on around the parish campus, each with its own Bible reading and prayer. The choir chants, and the various groups carry their banners and wear their matching uniforms, and the altar servers carry the cross and incense. The priest carries Christ’s eucharistic presence in the monstrance.

A typical monstrance. Attribution: Broederhugo

Gebruiker

As an Altar and Rosary member, I helped carry flowers from altar to altar. A few years ago, a priest that used to be with our parish asked us to scatter flower petals along the path; apparently that was what they did in his native land of Nigeria. The bookkeeper balked at the price of petals from the flowershop and asked why I didn’t pluck them from the rosebushes out front. For my part, I questioned if stripping the church roses of petals was part of my secretarial duties. Calling a flowershop, yes. I can pick up a phone. Making the elderly people cry over decimated rosebushes–not really part of my job description. Since then, we have carried red and white bouquets and skipped the petals.

How ever we decorate the altars, we have a fairly big campus and have never yet sought city approval to process up the street chanting, let alone scatrering petals–although, when I went to the grocery store near the a parish after this year’s procession, I could smell the incense that had drifted there on the wind. We didn’t get approval for that either!

My weekend ended with dessert and lemonade shared with a friend indoors, which was pleasant and cool. Thank God for these summer relief strategies.

Now that it’s Monday again, I’m wondering why life is so difficult. Not my job per se, although I do plan funerals as a regular course of events and sometimes step in to sing a capella in funerals, quinceañeras, or weddings when there are no musicians. Well, that is not quite true. Every time I’ve been asked to sing at these Masses a capella, I’ve found other people to sing with me. But, no, it’s not the difficulties of my job or the increasing busyness of the office that makes everything a tangle of problems, despite that I’m exhausted.

My friend was telling me yesterday, after we’d been talking for a few hours, that she had nothing to speak about except negative subjects. She’s experienced more than her fair share of trauma and recently went through a breakup, which has forced her to start life over.

Regarding having nothing else to speak about, I both agreed and disagreed with her. Trauma can put people in that position, where the nervous system is on edge. Talking through the negatives can help us heal. Sometimes, we need to talk through the negatives. Forcing positivity can be counterproductive to the nervous system just as ignoring clunking sounds in your car’s engine can cause further damage. There is no sense in whistling while your house is burning down, either. On the other hand, making small steps forward and acknowledging successes are also part of the process of healing, and there is always something to be proud of or grateful for, no matter how small. For my friend, she has a new place to live, a new job, and she loves artwork: creating it and looking at it. All positives.

My positives would include dragonflies and accordions, of course.

But no worries if your sight is clouded temporarily by how bad everything is. The storm we experienced while trying to run the movie on Friday seemed to dissipate after we’d packed up the equipment. We couldn’t see that while our screen was blowing down or the rain pelting the sound mixer. Nor was it wise to continue with the movie, not knowing what Roswell would throw at us next.

A last relevant point: in the Corpus Christi homily, our priest spoke about following Christ, how his presence has been given to us in the Eucharist–it is very real and personal. And the procession is an embodiment of this concept. When life gets difficult, sometimes all we have is the presence of Christ. That is no small thing. It is the biggest thing. It is vital.

*Roswell Night Skies is not a Catholic organization, despite that I talk about Catholicism in this post. I’m just writing about my life in Roswell.

**Under daylight savings time, high noon is actually 1 p.m. We’ve been distorted by a false sense of time!

Weekly Adventures in Roswell

I talk about my accordion adventures in this YouTube video: Adventures With the Accordion. If you want to learn about the accordions I’ve acquired over the years and hear the distinct sound each one has, you’ll want to listen to the video. I discuss how I came to purchase a piano accordion from Facebook Marketplace last week, even though I was only scrolling on Marketplace in search of the perfect classic truck. This is a regular habit of mine. Someday, I will have the classic truck of my dreams. Instead, I found an accordion and purchased it on a whim.

The part I wanted to focus on here is where I purchased it from. The seller on Facebook told me it was at the “music shop.” What did he mean? Roswell has a music store at the mall, but they do not sell vintage accordions. Rather, they sell standard new instruments like keyboards and guitars, along with equipment pertaining to playing and amplifying instruments. It turns out there’s a music store right next to Chero’s Boots.

Chero’s Boots in the old Payless building

It’s a consignment music store, and I believe the Facebook seller traded or outright purchased a different accordion from the shop and left the one I purchased there on consignment. But before you get excited about the possibility of finding an accordion for yourself, the shop, Neo Music Exchange, doesn’t regularly deal in accordions. It’s a rock music store with numerous guitars. It was still an adventure worth having, as I drove out there on my lunchbreak and had to drive really fast (going the exact speed limit, of course) to get back to work on time and in the process exchanged money for a heavy suitcase filled with musical delights. Adventures often involve going without the comforts of our usual tasty foods and cozy naps, which is what I normally enjoy on my lunch hour. Just as Bilbo had to leave his Hobbit hole and tankard of ale to fight a dragon, so I had to leave my cheeseburger and the dark shadowy reading room at the church to procure an old accordion that sounds like an organ.

My Three Accordions resembling Papa Bear, Mama Bear, and Baby Bear

On another day, I might have also popped in next door to gaze at the beautifully tooled boots I can’t afford. Have you been to Chero’s Boots? I have a couple of times. Once, to admire the goods, and another time to purchase tickets to see Los Huracanes at the fairgrounds.

For my weekend adventure, I went to the movie in the park that was put on by Main Street Roswell but operated by Roswell Night Skies. It was the first movie in the Park of the year — the official summer lineup will start the first Friday in June at Cielo Grande Park. Last summer, we played movies in Russ DeKay Soccer Complex, but the city no longer operates there and, therefore, we can’t get a permit to use it this year. Instead, NMMI (which owns the property) will now use it as their own soccer complex. Or whatever. I don’t know what their plans are.

Usually, it’s hot by May in Roswell. This last weekend was an exception. The movie in the park was as cold as the one we helped with during the Christmas Fair on Main Street. I had put on a jacket for the event and ended up running home for my coat, and I was still cold. While it only dipped to about 40 degrees that night and did not freeze, the temperature in the park was colder than the rest of town. This was owing to the heavy rain that saturated the earth and grass combined with the cold breeze. Nobody needs or wants a swamp cooler when temperatures are below sixty. The crowd was relatively small, about seventy-five people, but they stuck it out on their blankets, many wearing shorts and t-shirts.

My weekend adventures ended with Mass this morning. The songs were fun to sing today, and my priest gave a very important announcement: he will be leaving us to go to Illinois and have his own adventure at a Catholic parish and school. I will miss him, and it’s difficult not to cry. Actually, I have already cried. He is my boss and my spiritual mentor, and what if his replacement is lazy, passive-aggressive, or doesn’t want to have full-time staff? Priests are, after all, human beings with their own foibles and opinions. I guess that is an adventure not yet seen. This is why faith in God is paramount. I know God is with me and will take care of me, even as far as his kindnesses such as providing the means to purchase accordions and good health that allows me to be participate in nonprofits.

Oh, speaking of, another mini adventure was the Mass and Altar & Rosary Society meeting on Saturday morning. Yes, these are the types of adventures I have. Don’t judge my boring life. Anyway, I was voted in as secretary for the society. It is what it is. I will happily take the meeting notes starting in July.

May we all have adventures in the coming week. Blessings from Roswell!

Roswell Mall Vibe

When I was in the thick of editing as a side freelance job while writing the book that became The Minäverse, I did a few work stints in the Roswell Mall. Like many small town malls, it persists with a few anchor stores that are hanging on. This one has a Bealls and a JCPenney and a couple of shoe stores, a GNC…. You get the idea.

It’s small and cozy, with one main wing and a few short side halls. Being from the 80’s era, it is filled with natural lighting from the skylights and high ceilings; the light falls on the neutral tones of the tile work on the floor. The benches are pale wood as part of the aesthetic of being in nature while indoors and spaced throughout for the malcontents who no longer wish to be shopping while their significant other is in the thick of buying the perfect shoes for whatever. The only element lacking is the potted plants, which I’m sure used to exist at one time. Sans the synthetic fragrances, the mall is a peaceful and relaxing place to be. It can even be a healthful place if you go on the mall walking tour. I’m not sure how many times up and down the main hall makes a mile, and the intrigue won’t be there as it certainly will be at the cemetery, but many people do indeed keep their step count up at the Roswell Mall.

I spent a good chunk of my Saturday here this week trying to sell raffle tickets for the nonprofit, Roswell Night Skies. The mall manager is on the board, and she set up a table for us near the main entrance for selling as many tickets as we could manage on a busy Saturday. Unfortunately, it was not a busy Saturday by any measure, and the usual crowd that would be buying pictures of their kids with the Easter bunny were off doing other Roswell activities.

That is one reason, of course, for needing to stay on top of the local community calendar. While my interests tend towards cemetery walks and norteño concerts, actual family events should be on my radar. As it turned out, there were a few other fundraisers and an Easter egg hunt at the military institute. And who knows what else? Saturday is the one day of the week this mall is usually busy. Mala suerte that today wasn’t.

Overall, it hasn’t been a bad day. I’ve enjoyed myself, if nothing else. Next week is Holy Week, one of the busiest weeks of the year for the Catholic church. The office will be busy, and I will be singing first at a funeral, and then for the Masses and Good Friday Veneration of the Cross of the Triduum. I love the Triduum, and I have no fewer than two blog posts in drafts I wrote about this important three days of the church calendar. Somehow, I never managed to publish them. Maybe I’ll publish something next week.

Meanwhile, I’m now soaking up the relaxation at the Sunshine laundromat. I’ve used this same location to wash my clothe on and off since moving to Roswell, when I had no washer and dryer at my disposal. I don’t recommend a laundry tour of Roswell — there’s one that’s scabby, where you will find meth heads that manage a load every now and again; there’s one that’s in-between in its cleanliness, and then there’s Sunshine. Well, there’s no other choice. Honestly, I like the sound and feel of laundry running. And unlike the mall, there are potted plants filling one entire corner of the shop. Water, soap, sunshine*, and plants are balms for the soul.

I’ve also spent some time editing and writing books here while the washers or dryers are running. Maybe I could come up with a writing tour of Roswell: Places I’ve Carried My Current Writing/Editing Tool: the mall, Sunshine Laundry, Stellar Coffee, Denny’s, Starbucks, the Roswell Library, Assumption Church (while waiting for choir practice or other events), Gateway gym, Christ’s Church…. That’s all I can think of right now.

Peace and sunshine to you on your weekend.

Roswell Night Skies: a New Local Nonprofit for FREE Community Fun

Roswell Night Skies is the brainchild of local resident Mark Salas. Resident is a mundane word to describe Mark, who is also a local musician, band teacher, photographer, marketer, etc. He’s also a kind man who cares about people and his lifelong community here in Roswell. I interviewed him a couple of years ago for my vlog, if you want to know more about him.

A year ago, this nonprofit opened its doors. Since then, the small crew of board members and volunteers managed to bring TEN free summer movies to the Russ DeKay Park, complete with food trucks. This feat was managed through fundraisers and hitting the pavement to find sponsors. Movies are not free to stream to audiences, even by nonprofits. The equipment also cost a fair chunk of change.

For the Christmas season, they worked with Main Street Roswell to bring a Christmas film to the Christmas Market. They also brought their very own fun Christmas Lights Competition, using the entry fee to help offset the cost of prizes. At the same time, this competition also required more fundraising and sponsorships.

Full disclosure, I’m on the board of this nonprofit, and I performed a fraction of the work compared to Mark. But it’s still exhausting, and yet very rewarding to work through the difficulties with equipment, location, etc. and accomplish a free gift to a town we all love.

This is why they (we) are now running a 3-2-1 raffle that has high potential winnings with a first prize of $2000. We are trying to get a jump on our summer movie costs. You can support this effort by buying a ticket here for $50: https://roswellnightskies.org/.