The La Quinta Apple Retribution
Mike Smith
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If you take Exit 180 off of Interstate 10 coming from Deming and turn left onto Avenida de Mesilla and then right on Hickory Avenue nestled in between gas stations and a local McDonald’s, you will find a veritable oasis in the desert: The La Quinta Inn de Las Cruces. Unlike their commercials state “La Quinta” does not mean “high-speed internet” but rather “country inn” or “country estate” and just as its name suggests this hotel is decked with beautiful flowers, plants and fruit---be they real or plastic.
The plastic fruit became the center of an altercation that took place at the edenesque La Quinta Inn on June 24, 2008. According to the Las Cruces Sun-News a Sierra County woman’s breast implant was damaged when attacked by the hotel’s plastic fruit, a plastic apple to be exact.
Women and apples have not gotten on well since the beginning of time when Eve plucked the first fruit from a tree in the Garden of Eden. As the story goes Adam and Eve were enjoying a life of ease in the garden when Eve picked the forbidden apple, fed it to Adam and caused sadness and despair to reign down on mankind. Adam and Eve were forced to leave the garden, and Adam forever complained that Eve’s apple-plucking ways turned him from a man-of-leisure into a hardworking farmer.
In Greek culture three women and an apple caused the Trojan War. The gods were partying on Mount Olympus one fine day, enjoying their ambrosia cocktails and engaging in small talk when a golden apple was thrown into the throng. On the apple appeared the words ‘To the Fairest’ and nothing else. The three fair goddesses Aphrodite (love), Hera (hearth & home) and Athena (wisdom & warfare) all argued that the golden apple was theirs. An impartial judge, Paris, was chosen to determine who the fairest goddess was. Paris was swayed by Aphrodite who promised him the love of Helen of Troy for a judgment in her favor. Unfortunately, Helen was already married, so when Paris stole her away an army of Trojans followed with doom and destruction a close second.
In New Mexico, the historic hostility between women and apples has manifested with a new twist. While the Sierra County woman lounged in the pool, allowing the sun’s rays to crest over her freshly-enhanced figure she noticed a group of people throwing plastic fruit they had gotten from inside the La Quina Inn. She warned them, “I don’t care what you do, I just can’t get hit.” But hit her they did --- with a plastic apple nonetheless. No mention was made of plastic grapes or bananas. Injured and now off-center the woman complained to hotel staff and police were called in to investigate the apple attack. When they arrived the woman stated that “her right breast was sinking down and to the left,” but she refused to call an ambulance or seek medical attention.
Stranger still is the fact that the woman could not provide any description or characteristics of her attackers. The trauma of being assaulted in such a vulnerable area combined with the loss of thousands of dollars of surgical body beautification may have caused temporary memory loss or dementia…perhaps. Or perhaps, in New Mexico, the apple itself has gotten vengeance after centuries of abuse by womankind.
—Megan Walker
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