Nova Lux, the place of new light, is the name of the home where Brenda Laurel and Rob Tow have lived since October of 2020, in Santa Fe County, New Mexico.

We arrived on the night of October 19th in the biggest snowstorm the area had seen in years; over nine inches fell while we unloaded in the dark, with two road-weary cats, Mizzle and Hikaru, surveying the unfamiliar floors with astonished skepticism.

Soon we faced the DMV. I got TAUZERO for my plate; Brenda requested the same custom letters she had in California, NEOGAIAN. But she got a reply back from the New Mexico bureaucracy that this was a homophobic slur in the Thai language, and thus forbidden. Rather than appeal, we brainstormed, and came up with “Nova Lux,” which was accepted for her car, and became the name of our new home.

Now we listen to trembling aspens, the same wind chimes that hung at Locus Voci, desert coyotes at night, and wandering thunderstorms. And we wander the high desert roads.

Before this, for many years, our home was Locus Voci in the Santa Cruz mountains.