Some thoughts from a friend on being New Mexican (shared with permission):
"...finally, I am beginning to understand why NM forms an integral part of my identity and why it may be challenging for fellow Americans to understand it or envision it as a place within the US.

First, there may be no place within the continental US that has been shaped more by its pre-American cultures, peoples, and societies than NM. In other words, NM's indigenous, Spanish, and Mexican cultural past has not been relegated to the history books--rather, these cultures

persist and will forever shape our identities, beliefs, values, and understandings of our place in the world.
Second, NM is one of a few majority-minority states in America, and I believe this unique characteristic changes how we define what is "American."

From our vantage point, "America" is brown, "America" is indigenous, "America" is Hispanic, "America" is multicultural and multilingual, "America" is individualistic AND collectivist, and of course, "America" is also that imported culture from the East and West coasts.

Yet, this understanding of the country is not what the majority of people define as "American," nor is it something easily relatable or conceivable for the rest of the country.
Finally, for those of us New Mexicans who identify as Indo-Hispano/Hispano/Hispanic, I have come

to understand that land itself is inherently sown into our identity and perhaps even more so into our ethnicity. For many Indo-Hispanos, we tend to identify ourselves in relation to a specific place/region where we not only acknowledge our heritage but also feel that

place constitutes part of our soul. We view land as a collective resource; something that we honor and sanctify and that in turn nourishes our bodies and souls. Though some of us might not recognize this, the feeling comes from our continual engagement and connection with

the indigenous communities in our state. From the vantage point of the first Americans ("anglos") who came to NM, we Indo-Hispanos had more in common with our indigenous brothers and sisters than our European ancestors because we identified as a "place-based people" and I would

argue that this is true to this day.
We New Mexicans are one of the few peoples where pre-American cultures forced "American" culture to bend toward our heritage and therefore remade "America" into our own image."

I have tried before to explain why I feel like the dirt here runs through my veins and the wind lives in my hair, but I think my friend did so much more elegantly than I ever have.