One City’s Secret to Happiness: The Annual Burning of a 50-Foot Effigy

In the achievement society, we suffer from an internalised pressure to achieve – to do more, to be more, to have more. Whether we are aware of it or not, we have internalised the capitalist work ethic to the degree that our successes and failures weigh heavily on our individual shoulders. The primary result of the achievement society is burnout – t

Every year in September the city celebrated the Spanish reconquest of New Mexico with pageantry, religious services, music, dances, parties, and the public burning of Old Man Gloom.