TAKING INVENTORY....

As I look around here at the place where I'm soon leaving, I suppose I should be taking stock of things. What I will miss when I leave here. I've been a tad emotional for the last couple of months so I'm trying to avoid stepping into piles of emotion as I navigate my way through the next few weeks, but there are moments of reflection that one can't help when one is moving away from a location.... you know?

I've been in the desert since 2001. That's fairly respectable. Eight years is long enough to get a sense or a feel of a place. I really want to do this post justice, but I know when I finish, I'll have wished I would have written more....or possibly less.

I came to this desert with one husband and I'm leaving with another. I arrived with four children and I'm leaving with seven! I arrived with two grandchildren and leaving with 10...and I'm counting my Sammy-kins. I arrived with a high-school diploma and am leaving pursuing two graduate degrees. Came PC, leaving Mac.

The winters here are paradise. Ask any snowbird. And good luck finding a parking space at Costco. The summers are hell. Ask any snowbird. July and August-Costco is your oyster, sorta. But I will admit to loving the summer nights. I have posted this before and I will say it again; the human body is made for desert summer nights. The temperature outside is the same as the temperature of the surface of the skin. If you can lay still and quiet while outside on a summer night, you can lose your boundaries and if you can lie in a swimming pool, well...you're just gone.....that's a recipe for a mystical experience if I've ever known one....and I've known one...or two or three...

I will not miss the dust. I will not miss the dirt. I will not miss the brown. I will not miss the dry.
I will not miss the irresponsible misuse of water and over-arching need to make this arid, desert region look like a tropical paradise when in fact, it is a desert. Stop over-watering! Stop with the fountains, stop with the gardening, stop with the un-naturalness of it. If you want Hawaii, go there. This is a desert with cacti and succulents, which are beautiful in their own right. Save the water. Enjoy the rocks.

I still have a couple of weeks. I'll say good-bye then.