In 1995, my family moved to Santa Fe for just shy of two years.  We joined a food coop 
and picked up our weekly share at the farmer’s market.  Not sure what to do with a
pumpkin, I put off cooking it for a week or two.  When I finally took up the knife,
the pumpkin was completely dried, had become a sound-producing instrument. 
This kind of magical transformation happens in New Mexico where, I learned,
there’s even a word for rain that dries before reaching the ground, virga.