The photographs I took that day do not look like tourism. They look like a woman quietly documenting where she was while trying to make it home safely.
Copyright © Jennifer Norris. All rights reserved.
When I look back at the photographs from March 8, 2013—my last day in Albuquerque during my first trip to New Mexico—I notice what is missing.
There are no smiling selfies. No carefully framed scenic views. No joyful photographs of a tourist trying to capture every beautiful detail of a new city.
Instead, I photographed a strange sticker that read “STABBED IN BACK.” I took a couple of poor-quality pictures showing where I had eaten in Nob Hill. I photographed the entrance to the Raymond G. Murphy VA Medical Center. And when I finally reached the Albuquerque International Sunport, I took another picture inside the airport.
That was it.
Viewed together, those photographs feel less like vacation memories and more like documentation:
This is where I was. This is where we stopped. This is where he took me. This is proof that I made it back to the airport.
I do not believe I fully understood what I was doing at the time. My conscious mind was still trying to act normal. My instincts were doing something else entirely.
They were leaving a trail.
My First Full Day in Albuquerque, New Mexico: Excitement, Faith, and Warning Signs (March 6, 2013)
Retracing My Final Day Through the Photographs
Because of the brain injuries I lived with for years, I have had to reconstruct parts of my past from photographs, emails, travel records, published articles, and other documentation. I do not pretend to remember every minute of March 8th perfectly.
What the photographs appear to show is that Michael Matthews and I stopped for something to eat at the Flying Star Cafe in Nob Hill before going to the VA for personal health care business that concerned him.
Flying Star’s Nob Hill location sits on Central Avenue, along historic Route 66. According to the restaurant, its first cafe opened there in a 1950s retail building in 1987. I had never been to Albuquerque before this trip, so under different circumstances, a stop in Nob Hill might have become a happy travel memory.
But that is not what these pictures feel like now.
One photograph shows the decorative metal gate marked “NOB HILL.” Another shows a sign inside Flying Star that reads “FOOD FOR THOUGHT” and explains the restaurant’s commitment to buying local.
They are not good photographs. They are tilted, blurry, and impersonal. There is no food in them. There is no portrait of me enjoying lunch. There is no warmth or excitement in the composition.
They simply establish the location.
I was there.
“Stabbed in Back”: A Premonition?
The strangest photograph from that day may be the first one.
It shows a black-and-white sticker slapped onto a blue sign. The message reads:
STABBED IN BACK
Why did I stop and photograph that particular message?
Was it just a random image that caught my eye? Was my subconscious already processing what my conscious mind was not yet ready to accept? Was it a premonition?
I cannot answer those questions with certainty.
What I can say is that the image feels haunting now. By that point in the trip, my excitement had already been replaced by uneasiness. I had observed behavior inside Matthews’s home that disturbed me. I did not like how he treated those closest to him. His behavior when he drank made me uncomfortable. Most significantly, I had overheard a dark telephone conversation while I was lying in bed trying to sleep.
From what I heard, I believed he was talking with someone in the military sexual trauma advocacy community about taking another person down. I could not prove that the person they were discussing was me, but my central nervous system suspected it was.
I know what I heard. I know the conversation sounded evil. I know I became afraid that I might be the target. And even if they were talking about someone else, I wanted nothing to do with people who spoke about destroying another human being that way. He is no advocate.
After everything that happened in the months that followed—the name-calling, the accusations, the gang bullying, and the attempts to damage my work and credibility—that “STABBED IN BACK” photograph feels less like a random snapshot and more like a warning captured before I understood how much it would eventually mean.
The Survival Skill I Learned as a Child
Once I began to feel unsafe, I did what I had learned to do long before I ever traveled to New Mexico:
I played dumb.
I acted as though I had not noticed what I noticed. I did not confront Matthews about the phone call. I did not challenge him while I was still dependent on him for transportation. I did not reveal how frightened or suspicious I had become.
I let him take the lead while I quietly prayed that he would take me where I needed to go and, eventually, return me safely to the airport.
Some people may mistake that kind of behavior for passivity. It is not. For children who grow up around unpredictable or abusive adults, playing dumb can become a finely tuned survival skill. You learn to read a room without announcing that you are reading it. You learn not to show all your cards. You learn that revealing what you know can increase the danger before you have a safe way out.
By March 8, I was thousands of miles from home. I did not have my own vehicle. I had been staying in a stranger’s house. My return to Maine depended on reaching the airport safely.
That was not the time for a confrontation. It was the time to stay calm, keep observing, avoid escalating the situation, and get home.
So that is what I did.
The Stop at the VA
After Flying Star, the photographs show that we went to the Raymond G. Murphy VA Medical Center in Albuquerque. The reason for the visit involved Matthews’s personal health care.
What matters to my story is that I photographed the building.
The image is wide and unmistakable. The facility’s name is visible above the entrance. The Sandia Mountains rise in the distance beneath a partly cloudy sky.
Again, it looks like documentation.
At the time, I may not have consciously thought, I need proof of where I am. But that is what the photograph provided. It preserved a location in the timeline of a day when I no longer felt comfortable depending on the person driving me.
Trauma is sometimes recorded by the body before it can be explained by the mind. We may take a photograph, remember an exit, notice a license plate, track a route, or send a seemingly ordinary message without fully admitting to ourselves why the detail suddenly feels important.
Looking back, I believe my nervous system was paying attention even while I was pretending everything was fine.
Proof That I Made It Back to the Sunport
The final photograph from that sequence was taken inside the Albuquerque International Sunport.
It shows a large advertisement featuring Michael J. Fox with the message “Determined to outfox Parkinson’s” and the word “OPTIMISM.” Airport counters, ropes, wheelchairs, and terminal signs can be seen behind it.
To anyone else, it might look like another random airport photograph.
To me, it documents something much more important:
I made it back.
I was inside the terminal. I was in a public place. I was no longer dependent on Matthews to get me where I needed to go. The most important part of that trip was finally within reach: boarding the plane and returning home safely.
While I waited, I listened to a Sunport Serenade. The airport’s arts program began presenting its year-round concert series in 1998, bringing local musicians into the Great Hall to play everything from classical and jazz to mariachi and polka.
After the tension I had been carrying, that music was lovely.
There is something beautiful about remembering that moment. Fear did not get the final word on my first trip to New Mexico. Music met me at the airport. A message about optimism stood in front of me. And despite the warning signs, I was still able to recognize beauty.
Most importantly, I was safe enough to exhale.
Gang Bullying Behaviors: Seven Patterns That Reveal How Group Abuse Works (August 21, 2026)
Thank You, Lord, for Getting Me Out
Two days earlier, I had stood inside San Felipe de Neri Parish and prayed the Lord’s Prayer.
I had said:
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
At the time, I did not know I would soon hear a conversation that would make me fear I needed protection. I did not know how differently I would view the people around me by the end of the trip. I did not know how much ugliness would enter my life after I returned to New Mexico in June.
But God knew.
I believe He protected me before I understood that I needed protection. And after I realized I might be in danger, I believe He continued protecting me—helping me remain calm, conceal what I was thinking, and get back to the airport safely.
Thank You, Lord, for protecting me when I did not know I needed it.
Thank You for protecting me after I figured out that I did.
Thank You for getting me home safely to Lee.
I Was Never Traveling That Way Again
When I left Albuquerque on March 8, I made myself a promise:
I was never going to put myself in that position again.
I would not fly across the country and make myself entirely dependent on people I barely knew. I would not surrender control of my lodging and transportation simply because someone presented the arrangement as generosity or because we supposedly supported the same cause.
Shared causes do not guarantee shared character.
Hospitality can create access. Transportation can create dependence. A free airline ticket can become very expensive when it costs you your ability to leave.
I also left New Mexico vowing to return in June. I had seen enough of the state to know that Albuquerque and New Mexico were bigger than this disturbing experience. I wanted to explore on my own terms.
And that is exactly what I did.
When I returned for the Justice Denied documentary premiere in June, I had my own damn hotel room and my own rental car. My service dog, Onyx, was with me. I had independent transportation, a private place to stay, and the ability to leave any situation that felt wrong.
That was not being difficult. It was not being a “bitch.” It was not being a “snob.”
It was wisdom earned the hard way.
What These “Shitty Pictures” Mean to Me Now
Technically, the photographs from March 8 are not impressive. Some are blurry. Some are poorly composed. None would belong in a polished travel brochure.
But their value is not artistic.
Their value is that they preserved my final day:
- the message about being stabbed in the back;
- the stop in Nob Hill;
- the Flying Star Cafe;
- the VA medical center;
- and, finally, the Albuquerque International Sunport.
They trace a path from warning to safety.
They remind me that intuition does not always arrive as a complete explanation. Sometimes it appears as discomfort. Sometimes it tells you to remain quiet. Sometimes it causes you to document details without fully understanding why. Sometimes survival looks like smiling, playing dumb, and letting a person believe you do not see them clearly until you are safely out of their reach.
I arrived in Albuquerque excited, trusting, and dependent on other people.
I left alert, grateful, and determined never to surrender that much control again.
And when I came back, I came back differently.
I had my own room.
I had my own car.
I had my service dog.
I had an exit.
Most importantly, I had learned to trust the warning inside me—and the God who had been protecting me all along.
March 8, 2013: Our route went from Nob Hill to Matthews’s VA appointment and then directly to the Albuquerque International Sunport. Because the VA reimburses mileage for medical appointments, the federal government effectively helped him pay to drive me to the airport.
Sources and Related Reading
- My First Full Day in Albuquerque, New Mexico: Excitement, Faith, and Warning Signs (March 6, 2013)
- Divinely Protected: The Lord’s Prayer I Prayed at San Felipe de Neri Parish in Albuquerque, New Mexico Before Everything Changed (March 6, 2013)
- From The World Radio Interview to Gang Bullying Three Months Later: What Happened After My Trips to Albuquerque, New Mexico (March 7, 2013)
- Flying Star Cafe: Nob Hill
- Raymond G. Murphy VA Medical Center
- Albuquerque International Sunport Arts Program and Sunport Serenades
Jennifer and Lee 
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