Time before last that I was in the Painted desert in Arizona, I made a friend.
It was freezing cold that day...it had snowed during the night, and I was glum. Had so looked forward to the day and the sky was slate, the ground white, the air bitter. There was a diner down the road, and I decided to go get some breakfast (sure to upset my stomach), drink some coffee and wait it out. Lucky me: turned into one of the most gorgeous days I've experienced. The sky lit up like a god was playing with planet-sized flashlights back there behind the clouds...to prove this, divine rays seemed to emanate from the storm front. The temperature was as bitter as ever, and would stay that way throughout, but it lended a crystalline and clear element to the day. It maintained scrims of ice on the water, and patches of snow here and there. When I returned to the hotel that night, I'd notice my hands were frost-burned.
The drive through the Painted Desert is always amazing. There's a particular entrance you want to begin with (I want to say the Southern one), as there's a rise it's important you go over one way and not the other...the one direction provides an eye-widening vista. The other, you start within the vista, and there's no moment of epiphany. But I can't remember which, damn it. Logic decrees it was the Southern entrance, as I wanted to head out on the 40 afterward via the Northern exit.
As for my friend, he joined me about halfway in. The cold had kept all but the most cussed inside. It was just me, a few darling European boys (never quite divined the accents) and an elderly couple in the park, as far as I could tell. Amazing to have the view all to myself, or close enough as to not matter. The wind was so harsh, it pulled my hands. Many of my photos from this trip are askew; there wasn't any way to keep the camera level. At one point I took note of two hook-beaked hoary ravens cuddling up on a fence. They were amazing! And huge. They let me get abnormally close for a shot - I'm sure this is because of hundreds of tourists tossing crumbs each day. I was glad for the luck to see them and drove on.
A few miles down the road, I decided it was time for a snack. The day was wearing on me; it was hard to hike about in the chill and wind. I'd purchased something awful from the entrance store, Fritos or the like....but also still had a few biscuits left over from breakfast (I'd had them wrapped thinking I might need the carbs). I opened my door to swing my feet out and let crumbs fall where they might, when a dark form fluttered down next to me. A very large raven, as big if not bigger than the other two, sat there and peered at me. Or more specifically, at my biscuit. So I tossed him a quarter slice. He seemed to appreciate this, as he followed me from stop to stop for the next few miles. As I drove, he'd fly next to my window, and when I stopped, he'd land, looking for more biscuit.
Keep in mind it was me, the raven and nothing else. Just the howling wind and cliffs. I started to get a little spooked while at the same time charmed. I talked with him, egging him on, seeing if he'd continue to follow me (we pulled the whole "drive and fly" about five times). I'd throw some more biscuit occasionally. I chatted with him, laughing and asking about Coyote (I'd been reading trickster myths), asking what Odin was up to these days...and thinking to myself that he wouldn't mind one bit if I went careening off a cliff, giving him something a bit more toothsome than a biscuit to sink his beak into. Wasn't suffering from any illusions regarding his presence. He was hungry and I had food. Or could be food. I can't say I was unhappy when we finally parted ways. There's something amazing and beautiful about having all that space to yourself, but - much like when I lived in the Adirondacks - you always have that reality check in your head, the one that notes how easy it would be to become a smear on the side of the road, a lump at the bottom of a cliff...The Girl Who Was Bitten By A Rattlesnake In The Middle Of Nowhere...etc. A healthy dose of respect for Nature is required. And I nodded to the raven as he flew off.
This past summer was possibly the worst I've experienced, and the best. It began with poor choices and ended with several choices whose effects have yet to be weighed. I was still traveling for work, staying in hotels predominantly. I'd left my roomie/friend of nearly 10 years to fend for himself, and had decided against getting another place. Problem being: there was a lull in between projects. Things became awkward. Luckily another friend had a house in the desert; he was rarely there and appreciated the house sitting. And so the summer began. I'd just come off a lovely run of desert trips, and had been working in Albuquerque for 4 months, driving back and forth between California and New Mexico. The first thing I did once back was go with my former roomie to Monterrey, driving up the 1 and seeing Big Sur along the way. Symbolically, this ended the project and began a time of depression and restlessness.
Depression and restlessness. It's a fine description. I was either frantically exercising (for two, sometimes three hours a day) or asleep on the couch. A bad sleep, a dull sleep, where you woke and your head hurt. I lived for e-mails and phone calls. The drive into LA ran 2-3 hours as well, and was hard...didn't want to drive all that to see friends and drive back home the same night. Hard. There were a few nights where I nearly went off the road for need of sleep and had to stop. Dangerous.
One night, mind numbed by this and that, I was driving back from the Starbucks via the main drag - everyone drove 40mph, despite the 30mph speed limit; an unwritten law. This time, someone walked into traffic (were they drunk?), and the car next to me going in the opposite direction ran them down, dead. The body flipped over the top of the SUV. It happened right next to my window, like a bad TV show. Shock, panic...stopped the car. By then a crowd had already surrounded the body, and I decided to go home. Numb. What could I tell the police that they weren't going to hear 500 times from other people? When I got home, called friend. Cried. Couldn't sleep. Eyes wide. Drank lots of water, upon advice of said friend. Heat oppressive. Air conditioning the same. I looked the next day but there was no news...I thought about going to the police station, but didn't.
The kitty next door was named Brewskie. A terrible name for a cat, but he was loved and seemed to think it was OK. He was grey and skinny, a good cat. Hiding in the desert plants, coming out for kibble...occasionally freaking me out by playing with black widows. He would follow me to the pool at night. I would always head out at dusk to swim for hours. A lovely older German woman would be swimming each night as well, and compliment me on my energy to which I had nothing to say. It's hard to explain that this time last year you were much heavier, slower, and still think of yourself that way. I became friends with her over time - she made some lovely artwork and had traveled everywhere. Her advice to me was to keep traveling and experience the world. She said with my smile I could get away with just about anything. Brewskie would sit by the pool and watch the laps for a while before he became bored and wandered off. But he'd always be there to greet me as I got back.
An amazing number of insects would gather at the pool. No WAY could you walk in bare feet out there. They were calling it the "Year of the Widow", black widows ran rampant everywhere. Huge; blood clot colored. They would hang upside down from their schizophrenic webs daring you to come closer. They crawled in the dirt at night, along with centipedes, solpugids, scorpions...a few solpugids got in the house and fucking terrified me. I'm an arachnid lover. I have voluntarily had many tarantulas in my home. But these are too alien. And fast. And strong! I couldn't comprehend them, and did little dances of fear when releasing them outside. One night I thought that I'd released one ON me, and adrenaline was pumping as I swirled around trying to find it. Haven't been that scared of anything in a while. Big lazy cockroaches, crickets and cicadas would find their way to the pool. One week, a wind storm blew in at 85-90mph....the next day the pool was filled with detritus. And with a bunch of mimic moths that looked like hornets. I forget what they're called. Was sorry to see them all floating there. But then cleaned the pool. Made a game of it for the day, diving for sticks and pine needles and shingles.
There was a gent who lived down the street, a Vietnam vet. He would come by the pool and chit-chat, and I think he was flirting in his own way. Very blunt discussions about functionality of equipment and the like. He liked to talk about his musicianship and also his guns. He made some comments about the war that I found abhorrent even after reading nearly everything abhorrent there was to read about it, seeing more than I needed to and knowing other vets. The day after the wind storm he came down and wondered what I was doing in the pool. I wondered too, even then. But the answer comes quickly enough. Cleaning the pool by hand kept me busy and preoccupied, thus keeping me from woolgathering and sitting in the house.
I would go to Palm Springs on occasion. It was sweltering, and had the delightful side attribute of being hellishly humid as well. Two minutes there and your shirt was stuck to you. Palm Springs seemed to mainly be inhabited by people with too much money and their spoiled idle children; a California tradition (I recently visited another town like this, north of San Diego). Lots of shops filled with expensive bric-a-brac. Little expensive cafes. A lot of Europeans in the area, so that helped a bit.
One day, sitting in the fly-filled Starbucks, an Italian man tried to become my sugar daddy. May I mention I don't look the part. He offered me money, wanted to take me out gambling, and get some food...the invoice was never mentioned. He started to say I should get a nice dress that showed my legs, a manicure...and so it began before it began. I went to lunch with him for amusement's sake (calling a friend first to let them know what I was doing and where I was going). At lunch he attempted to pay for a $20 meal with a hundred. He pulled about three grand out of his pocket, and I asked him if he was really that stupid. And such was the end of that short-lived friendship. I blocked his calls.
I liked to go to Trader Joe's and get their ginger soda - isn't it the best? Chill it and drink during the hot days while ripping LPs and EPs from my friends' collections. I'd purchased a USB turntable and was figuring out the Audigy program, soda sitting next to me, albums very carefully placed on other side away from potential mishap. Occasionally a random insect would make its way into the house...crickets mainly, with eardrum-shattering chirps made all the more loud by the immense silence of the desert. They'd hide in nooks and crannies that acted as megaphones; some nights I couldn't scare them out. At this point the insomnia started. My sleep, if I got any, became erratic. Up all night, sleep in the morning, exercise/swim, sleep again, go out at night for groceries, and then stare at the walls.
I became edgy and needed to get out more and more; traveled to Joshua Tree a few times, going in the pitch blackness of night, knowing I was asking for trouble but not getting it. I planned a trip to Arizona and New Mexico again, and had great fun. Although as the summer wore on, the need to have someone with me on these trips took away from the joy. At least a little. I'd dated someone very unsuitable the year before, and then fell for a line in the spring. I'd been involved with someone else, but they had too much fun disappearing and reappearing and it was becoming too painful to put up with. I was meeting other people who were real and liked me and confusion was running rampant. I would sit out on the cliffs at Malpais and wonder about my life and where it was heading...who might be in it and when. But luckily, many of the places I visit are so mind-blowingly gorgeous, this bullshit didn't take up all my time.
The summer wore on. I was slimmer and tanned, muscled...I'd gotten my hair chopped and was quite pleased. Was becoming a very confident traveler. Listened to new music every day and enjoying a delightful ongoing conversation and project with a friend overseas. On the other hand, I couldn't sleep. I would linger for hours not doing anything, no motivation to do more than stare at the floor, the sink, the tub. Started taking a lot of baths. I hadn't resolved the other relationship, which was tearing me up. I'd do the backstroke in the pool staring at the stars and wonder what had happened, where exactly I had misstepped and driven him off. This alternated with new love interests and friends, and wondering about them. Or just thinking about travel and where I might like to go. Those were good nights, when I imagined this grassy plain or that island. Around 11pm, I would stop my swim, pet Brewskie and head inside...maybe write an e-mail or find more music. No word yet from work about the next project.
Shazbott Kat died sometime during the summer. I'd felt great guilt about farming my cats out to friends, originally believing I was good for the responsibility of a cat's life. She died in Yucaipa, with loving friends....found her under a bush with her mouth full of dirt. She reeked of rosemary. Was she eating it? What happened? Will never know. But that was a long drive, and even longer coming back, everything smelling of rosemary. She had fans around the world and was missed. When I arrived at the veterinarian's, I pretended I wasn't upset for the benefit of the other patrons. No need to upset anyone. Was difficult under this pretext to get the assistant to understand what I needed. Would have been comical if circumstances were different.
I went out and watched the Perseid meteor shower in early August, which was one of the best moments of my life. I tried to call a friend, but they were away. Hard to share something like that over the phone anyway. So I hung up the cell and stared at all the flashes and blurs above me. I plan on going again this year, hopefully with a telescope. Joshua Tree was more than adequate stomping grounds for amateur astronomers. Was there for hours until my eyes started to hurt from the strain...and stayed a bit past that.
A few weeks before the LA project (had finally gotten word) I was driving back from LA to the desert. People drive very fast out there and so do I. This night, on a stretch of nothing leading nowhere, someone in a black car doing about 90mph didn't see me in their rear view mirror and was going to hit me. So instead, I hit the guardrail. I never got their license plate, and they never stopped. I was lucky - so lucky - for being unhurt. I laughed when I realized my laptop was really in my lap, that everything in the car had flown forward in a blur during the collision. The car still drove, although I wondered if I should move it. But was so tired, and so done in by the summer, I just wanted to get home. Drove back. My door wouldn't open. Whole left side smashed in. I called the insurance company. Looked at my car, and wept a bit. This being the final memorable event before leaving.
The summer was hot, depressing, meandering, sleepless. It introduced me to many new people, a few who've become some of the more important people in my life. It signaled the end of a love affair that shouldn't have happened. It flickered the potential for other affairs. I walked away stronger, healthier..perhaps not happier, but not unhappy either. There were many extremes on both sides. The recession means that half the houses there are for sale or abandoned now. The artist who's work hung next to mine in the desert house died of an OD while I was in London. My former lover wants no part of me. Brewskie cat was found dead the other day. Poison, they think. There are beginnings and ends.
You would think this was all bad, but I'm realizing that it's an ongoing play. At this point I neither applaud nor boo, I simply wait for the next act.
So, let's get some actual travel reporting in and solidify this sucker!
I've been on Santa Catalina Island since Friday afternoon. If you aren't quite sure where that is (and honestly, they are quite modest about their popularity, self-describing themselves as a "lesser-known island"), here is an illuminating link: Santa Catalina Island, California
Am presently staying at the Glenmore Plaza Hotel. Firstly, let me be clear here: I booked the hotel through hotels.com, which is usually pretty good for cheap rates and didn't disappoint this time. It is the oldest hotel on the island, and also the least expensive. An old Victorian style building, yellow, hard to miss - in fact, I'd forgotten to print out my confirmation and indeed had forgotten the hotel's name with nothing other than a vague recollection of where it was, and I still found it. Leading me to mention that Catalina's town of Avalon is not very large. The rooms in the hotel are quite cozy in a sort of non-Euclidian way.
Avalon itself is hyper-tourism incarnate, at least near the docks. I've heard that it costs $10K a year to have a private boat mooring here. Hm-mmm. Just investigated, and mooring fees cost $20 to $80 per night based on boat length...so watch out, all you size queens! If you had a yacht (and the likelihood is great, of course) and were moored for a year, it would be a little over $29K. Gosh. Lucky you. The town is jam-packed with restaurants and specialty shops, although this time of year they open and close rather whimsically. Tonight I went to a place called The Landing, which was nice enough...salads and steaks, a full bar, nothing exotic. The best part of the room (to me) was the fireplace, which I sat so close to my eyes began to water. Has been a cold day.
Out on boats all day. I'd wanted to rent a bike and explore the island, unwittingly assuming you could ride out and around the coast. However, for those who may have the same ambition, the bikes are relegated to Avalon Proper. So I nixed that idea, and went in search of other fare. Was surprised to discover that whales are already migrating - the gray whales are passing by. And so are orcas, since they like to eat the grey whale calves...a bit of info I'm less than pleased with. The gent in the whale watch booth insisted that the orcas only eat the gray whales' tongues. I have not been able to verify this grisly piece of information, nor am I sure I want to. Signed up for a trip (with a small prayer that no orcas would show up). I've been on a few whale-watching sojourns, and they always go out on large ferry-style boats. The set-up here is a little different. I arrived at the assigned meeting place and was told to head to Gate 5 and "look for the yellow dinghy". And sure enough, it was a tiny yellow dinghy. Thrilling really - I like more personal adventures, so this was a good sign. 5 other people arrived, and off we went. I wore four layers, plus a hat and scarf, which was far too hot for the general weather, but once out on the water, damn! Freezing!!! We went to the south and west around the lower tip of the island past "Lover's Cove", past the quarry...eyebrows raised a little at the sight of a quarry on what seems like a very finite amount of land. "Iron and silver used to be mined here, but now only granite is exported." (we asked)
As for fauna, there were many sea lions (discovery: the Catalina sea lion is smarter than the average bear and is the specific animal used in circus shows and the like); one very fidgety bald eagle (whose eggs are finally hatching on their own after a very long recovery from exposure to DDT); a mass of pelicans on poo-splattered rocks; and finally, the show-stopper(s).
We bounced and jounced our way toward sea a bit to locate sea mammals of any stripe or color...seemed pretty barren until one little white wake appeared in the distance. The captain announced, "We might have a dolphin!"; as it got closer, it looked to be more. But when they arrived, oh my god. Hundreds and hundreds of dolphins!! Who decided they might like to play for a bit. Lots of flipping, jumping and slapping, and riding the boat's wake. Wonderful! The trip was more than worth it before, but this event kind of made the entire New Year feel right. These were Common dolphins. And so many of them! ^^ While enjoying many (perceived as) benificent playful aquatic mammals, we also had the slightly less fun experience of seeing a waterspout form. But a unique trip, that I'll grant! Was great fun and just what I was looking for. Got back to land soaked through (the boat bounced and splashed quite a bit once we headed away from the coast), my glasses spotted with saltwater, and my camera lens (protected by a filter) as well. Didn't realize how numb my extremities were until I tried to write. Entertaining results. But, not being able to give up on a good thing, I dashed off and signed up for a "nighttime underwater tour" of the coast.
The nighttime tour was a bit of a letdown - was hoping for sharks, rays, octopus, something terribly dramatic...the underwater tours at night are to find predators and scavengers, and they tend to hide. The company had gone out and placed 75 pounds of bait on the ocean floor. By the time we started making the rounds, the bait was covered with hundreds of lobsters. These were different from east coast lobsters, no giant claws. And lobsters would be almost all there was to see, other than the occasional garibaldi glaring out flourescently from its domain; also a few bass and sardines. And the kelp forest. Giant strands of bladder kelp, so thick in the water they covered the front of the boat. Amazing. I fancy I saw an eel as well. The best part of the trip for me was when all lights were shut off and we watched the bioluminescence (its light activating because it is scared, supposedly), millions of little particles streaming by. The crew informed us that since the island's plumbing is 75% salt water, we might want to shut off our lights and flush the toilet if we wished to see more of the bioluminescent organisms...! Poor little guys.
And so the night ended. After that, was frozen to the bone...no more adventures. Went to the aforementioned Landing, had a coffee with a shot of amaretto and a salad, then called it a night. There have been more exciting endings to a day, but it will do :)
Addendum: found this YouTube vid and it is nigh-exactly what I saw (was looking for my captain's video, didn't find it). "My" dolphins were more frisky though, leaping in the air and flipping outrageously. Give it a minute. All those little white wakes in the distance? Watch as they catch up to the boat :)
My younger life was somewhat transitory. It is only recently, as my brother pointed out one night in a rather pompous wine bar (redundant), that I realized when my parents said we were "going camping" it might well mean something else! The fact that I never noticed nor cared is a loving wave to my folks. But it must be admitted that we were fairly gypsy-ish. From this early lifestyle I gained a love for travel, a fear of settling down, a tendency to cut ties and a lack of responsibility. There were flush times and hard times...times when we were so broke other poor people were stealing food for us, and times when all seemed dandy. Again, as a kid, it's hard to relate....I was very intuitive in some ways, noticing every degree of fluctuation in my parents' emotional relationship, and yet not understanding the ramifications of having Spam for Thanksgiving.
We traveled from home to home...I have also gained a very selective memory. Part of the "cutting ties" bit, I think. I couldn't begin to describe most of the houses I lived in. There was one that had a late 60's motif in the bathroom with purple floral wallpaper and bright green shag carpeting....I remember the "haunted house" in Whitesboro, which deserves a blog entry all its own....the various terrible college apartments, but then we're past the beginning and into the middle.
I lived with my grandparents quite often, and now assume this was during times of separation between my parents, or when we simply could not afford to live elsewhere. I still have bad dreams about my grandparents' home, which is a shame. I loved that house, and remember it down to nearly every detail. Another segment that deserves its own telling.
But mainly what it comes down to is an early life that formed the later; a need to keep on the move, to feel slightly displaced, and to easily meet others and just as easily lose them again. It has been a marvel to me that many old friends have recently reinstated contact of a sort.
So now you have the building blocks, the Lincoln Log framework - and we can move forward.
Before I forget, here are two songs that I must have heard 5000 times as a kid. One terrified me as I lay at night under the covers while my parents were in the living room smoking pot with friends....the other remains a fond memory of many bluegrass concerts with the smell of cut grass and beer on the air, blankets on the ground and gnats hanging around our heads. They've stuck with me all these years and still send shivers up my spine. Perhaps no one else's...but mine.
So. It is the year 2009. I already have a sickly blog out there, blindly groping its way around the internet, occasionally entering my friends' homes and begging for attention...and for some reason I've decided to begin another, perhaps hoping it will be a heartier waif than the last.
I adore music, but there are so many glorious music-filled blogs out there already...I can (and will) certainly point them out to you. This batch of typed folderol may include music, but what it really will be (supposedly) is a travelogue. Not of the usual kind, maybe, but hopefully informative and entertaining...and if my navel-gazing once in a while assists you in some way, do let me know! Am always keen to help.
Meandering has been a part of my life for, well...forever, really. If by "forever" we understand it to mean "since my birth". But recently it has hit a fever pitch, and it occurs to me that someone else doesn't need to make the same mistakes if I've made them already! These mistakes could relate to any facet of life. This may be about traveling, but will incorporate all things (i.e., I get to write about whatever the hell I like and you will have to cope). And this exercise won't be entirely about mistakes; it will be about choices and experience, life-love-laughter-tears, all that jazz. So in two paragraphs we've gone from music to travel to mistakes to life. Some of my favorite things! Wondering if Julie Andrews would sing that song?
Finally, the blog's title comes from my favorite decadent snack I usually enjoy when writing romantic notes about where I've been and what I've been doing...so expect a plum wine flavored kiss to be blown on the air to you shortly.
Many of my photos from this trip are askew; there wasn't any way to keep the camera level. At one point I took note of two hook-beaked hoary ravens cuddling up on a fence. They were amazing! And huge. They let me get abnormally close for a shot - I'm sure this is because of hundreds of tourists tossing crumbs each day. I was glad for the luck to see them and drove on. 
