Peyote Roadkill

is a portrait of the spiritual evolution of a family in the Southwestern United States over a period of forty years. Its three acts take place in 1947, 1967 and 1987 in the parking lot of a general store/filling station/tavern/chapel. In the corner of the parking lot stands a huge tower supporting high tension power lines.

The progenitor of this family is Charles Owsly, an independently wealthy and alcoholic photographer who keeps the store as a hobby. His wife, Leda, is an adventurous Country and Western girl who is eventually broken by Owsley's profound indifference to her. She becomes absorbed in her memories and in valium. Magdalena, the Owsly's servant, is of mixed Spanish and Huicol Indian blood. She uses the traditional drug of her tribe, peyote, to maintain contact with a group of half-breed angels who visit her from time to time with wisdom from the old ways.

The opera opens with Owsly taking pornographic photographs of Magdalena. By the end of the scene he has raped her. This rape results in the birth of a son named Little Crow. Little Crow is brought up helping in the store unaware that Owsly is his father. He becomes a survivalist with an addiction to amphetamines. In 1967, Leda, Owsly's wife, seduces Little Crow at a tailgate party in the parking lot and they conceive Jason. At Jason's birth Owsly forces Leda to give Jason up for adoption. In 1987, Jason returns to the parking lot and, high on cocaine, picks a fight with Little Crow. Neither of them realize that they are father and son. As the fight gathers violence, Magdalena, Leda, Owsly and the angels gather around. The women try to stop the fight while Owsly is absorbed in taking photographs of it. Little Crow gets the better of Jason, chases him up the power tower and ties him there. He then gets his blow gun, a favorite weapon of the survivalists, and prepares to shoot Jason with a poison dart. Owsly casually tells Leda that Jason is her son and Leda rushes at Little Crow, knocking the blow gun off its aim. The dart hits Owsly in the neck and he dies. With Owsly dead, a enormous burden is lifted from the family's shoulders and there is a loving reunion of all at his funeral.