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Blogs / The Whole Enchilada / June 2009 / How to Buy a Magazine

How to Buy a Magazine

When the previous ownership of the Santa Fean Magazine first offered it to me in February of this year, I was flabbergasted. I didn’t see it coming and was immediately overwhelmed with thoughts bouncing around between my ears. I walked in a daze. This was just prior to the Presidents Day weekend.
    The 3 day weekend was just what I needed to process the opportunity that I was being presented. I had no idea what my answer should be but knew I needed to ask some important questions.  First was to figure what the questions were.
    I boiled the questions down to just two. 1) Was this a good business decision and 2) was this a good decision for me personally. That weekend I skied all 3 days at Santa Fe Ski area, fortunate to have many chairlift rides alone to ponder.
    I thought about how I saw my life evolving over the next ten to fifteen years. I thought about what I wanted my life to look like when I was nearing seventy. I thought about my roots in Los Angeles, the family house that awaited me, and the joys and grief of life in Southern California.  I considered my beloved Pacific Ocean with the waves crashing against the rocks in Laguna, Huntington Beach Dog Beach, my surfboard and bike rides down to Scottsman Cove, south of Newport Beach. The ocean air and even thinking about it is intoxicating. I love the smell of the sea.
    There’s other smells I love also. The freshness of the desert on a warm summer evening after one of Santa Fe’s famous thunderstorms fills my soul, especially from my  convertible. Green chile roasting meanders into the September and October cool morning air. Pinon fire wood, wafting over the city and through my neighborhood on a cold winter morning. These are charming smells that give Santa Fe such a sense of place.
    My weekend of pondering did not return any great revelations, but it did set a couple of priorities in line. I could never completely leave Santa Fe, not ever. I might someday find myself catching up on ocean smells, but soon I would long for the desert smells of Santa Fe.  If buying the Santa Fean Magazine meant committing much of the rest of my life to Santa Fe, then so be it. As I have for the last twenty years, I would continue to savor the smells, blue sunny skies, the dramatic weather patterns and the many wonders that Santa Fe continues to deliver into my soul.