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tradition was alive, gone digital, buzzing through telephone wires and cell phone frequencies up and down the valley, from Taos down to Las Cruces and to Chihuahua. Down to el Valle de Tejas all the way to Brownsville where the river emptied into the gulf. Plática infused the poetic marrow of every community.
    Sonny listened. The buzz roamed here and there, reminiscences of the way things used to be, world problems, the devil loose in the world, terrorism, Iraq and North Korea, the Santa Fe legislators spending their taxes, Social Security going broke, help with prescription drugs. And today, something happening in Jemez Springs.
    They turned to look at Sonny.
    â€œBuenos días te dé Dios, Sonny,” one said. Ladino greetings.
    â€œCuidado con los dog dreams.”
    â€œSi los perros sueñan, entonces los gatos también.”
    â€œGato dreams.”
    â€œPussy dreams,” chortled Clyde. “Ha, ha, ha.” The oldest of the clan, rumored to be taking Viagra, at eighty.
    â€œEntonces todo los animales sueñan.”
    â€œEntonces la vida es un sueño.”
    â€œI dream forty-year-old mamasotas,” Clyde said, stroking his waxed mustache.
    â€œForty? They run you ragged, Clyde.”
    â€œLa problema no son las mamasotas, la problema son los terrorists. Como lo que pasa en Jemez. What is it, Sonny?”
    â€œYeah, what’s happening?”
    â€œPendejadas,” Sonny answered.
    â€œBueno, que Dios te bendiga.”
    â€œBy the way, Sonny,” one touched his arm. “We can’t remember the Spanish word for oar? Tú sabes, paddles. For a boat.”
    Sonny didn’t know. The ancestors had been gone too long from the sea. They had no need for an oar in desert New Mexico. The words of the sea culture were forgotten, as the words of every culture are destined to be forgotten. And so they created a new language, Spanglish.
    â€œYou can say, ‘se fue en el barco con paddles.’”
    â€œPorque no.”
    â€œI want to know the Spanish word,” the vecino insisted. “I’m writing a poem.”
    â€œI’ll look it up in my Velasquez,” Sonny promised.
    â€œGracias,” they nodded and went on sipping their coffee as they talked, turning over and over the dog dream question.
    Sonny paused to look around.
    The cafe was packed with the workers of the City Future. Electricians on their way to wire a job. A mexicano crew of roofers, mostly men from Chihuahua, Sonny surmised, about the only workers that would do that hot, heavy work all day long. Plumbers working in the new North Valley mansions that kept sprouting like tumbleweeds. Drywall men, their pants covered with chalky dust. Painters in paint-splattered overalls, which if framed and hung on a wall would fetch de Kooning abstract art prices. A couple of Bernalillo sheriff’s deputies, one a very nice-looking Chicana who smiled at Sonny. Sirena. They had attended Rio Grande High together, and Sonny had almost scored one night. Those were the heavy-duty hormone days of almost going all the way.
    â€œHi, Sonny,” she said. “How’s your dog?”
    â€œStill barking,” Sonny replied, returning her smile.
    A few horsemen who kept stables along the river sat at a corner table, and by the window a smattering of the ubiquitous North Valley yuppie rich: attorneys, doctors, and businessmen and women who worked downtown. They ate huevos rancheros while they read the Wall Street Journal . Eating at Rita’s Cocina was a shot of culture for the North Valley yuppies.
    Republican immigrants, Sonny thought, sniffing the air, glancing at the blonde in blue who looked up and smiled.
    From a corner table, a haggard-looking mayor signaled for Sonny.
    Sonny sniffed again. There was no threat in the air, only the honest smells of hardworking people, paisanos. The yuppies acknowledged Sonny’s presence as he walked toward the mayor’s table. They knew about