Convivial Fridays: Chris Milligan, the Santa Fe Barman

Cocktail 1

The bitters, on my pale hand, are dark like blackberry juice and sorghum molasses. I rub my sticky palms together and smell them. Cinnamon, willowbark, coffee. For an instant I step into another world. Flashing back to the present, I race after my bartender as he beckons me to his dim-lit kingdom filled with hiss and foam, fruit and flame.

My cocktail, when it comes, is a flashy deep purple. Chris muddles plump local blackberries with fresh lime juice and tequila, Licor 43, and a couple dashes of homemade bitters. I stand for a moment with my first sip, giving it the reverence it deserves.

This cocktail newbie’s getting hooked.

Santa Fe, NM / night / with Chris Milligan, The Santa Fe Barman

Tongues Tangle in Arcata

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Too often I’m focused internally when traveling, instead of externally. When a portly woman with waist-length silver and black hair crowned with paste jewels crosses my path, I’m focused on my aching feet. Or when I drive past a drum circle swaying in the lawn, I’m feeling my sun-dazzled headache.

Which is why it was a small miracle that as we drove through central Arcata today, we… stopped! I pulled my camera out and snapped while each brilliant sidewalk square dazzled me. Turns out, we’d happened upon one of the largest art events in Northern Cali, a yearly fundraiser called Pastels on the Plaza. The air thrummed with energy. A tanned itinerant with a djembe argued with a policeman. Children skipped past or drew their own designs with sidewalk chalk, pale against the intense pigment of the pastels.

Serendipity was kind to us today.

Arcata, CA / early afternoon / Pastels on the Plaza

Dance with My Salty Mistress

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Your salty kiss lingers on my lips, your twinkling caress on my toes. I leap and twirl while you advance and recede, our forces meeting again after far too long. In your waters the sand glistens and rises, performing its own intricate dances beyond my glance and washing in to join our waltz.

You’ve always intrigued me, Lady Pacifica, and sometimes when I’m far from you you invade my dreams with washes of translucent water that fill my vision and float me into a new world where breath is precious and bubbles fill my vision. Now you call to me and I venture deeper, deeper, and I abandon control and let you tumble me in your dangerous embrace.

Arcata, CA / mid-day / Samoa Beach Dunes Recreation Area

My Traveling Companion

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His hand feels warm and solid around mine. The blond hairs on the back are soft as I rub them against the grain with my thumb, and when I tighten my grasp I can feel his pulse. Between us a gentle peace is tangible, a peace forged from many dark and tender moments. The trees blur by outside the window of our travel-worn Ford van. We are somewhere in Oregon, barreling down the 5.

He smells like coffee and adventure and wonderful stubbornness. He sounds like beat-boxing and doom metal. He looks like Ireland, Missouri, and everywhere in between in one strong person. He is my traveling partner, my companion.

somewhere in Oregon / afternoon / off the grid