After more than two decades, thousands of you have shared their experiences of lost New Mexico in the "One of Our 50 is Missing" humor column. Tell us your experiences at fifty@nmmagazine.com.
This Teacher Says
When I was in middle school, I got into an extended conversation with a teacher in Washington, D.C., at a Youth Court conference. As we parted ways, she said that I spoke great English. Confused, I asked her what she meant. She said that she expected me to have a much heavier accent, being from Mexico. I corrected her, saying I was from New Mexico. She nodded and said, yes, she’d heard me the first time. I said it was a state. She didn’t believe me. I asked her, “What is the state between Texas and Arizona?” Her answer? “Utah.”
...Needs This T-Shirt
I lived most of my life in New England, and when I mentioned to my co-workers there my intention to retire to New Mexico, one of them asked why I wanted to move out of the United States. A geography and history lesson ensued. Now when I go back there to visit, I wear a T-shirt that features an outline of the state and, inside its borders proclaims, “New Mexico. It’s not new and it’s not Mexico!”
does not compute
After calling from Rio Rancho to customer service about my computer, I suffered through numerous automatic responses but finally got a real person. The representative explained that she could not send a technician to Albuquerque, and asked, “Is this a city in northern Mexico?” I assured her that New Mexico is indeed a part of the United States, and that Albuquerque is a city there. Then she refused to send a technician to a “rural area.” I told her that Rio Rancho is the third largest city in New Mexico. After a long silence on the phone while she conferred with others, she told me she could send a technician for an additional fee. At this point, I gave up.