Bonito Campground, Arizona
As simply as I can put it, I want to love God. And I want to love my neighbor, and love myself.
I want to do that by exploring. I want to bring you along in that exploration. In person would be preferred, but if not, I can bring the beloveds along through writing and creating and storytelling.
I want to explore writing and creating and storytelling. I want to bring you along in that exploration too. Friend, we are approaching full circle here.
And I need guides: I need the Holy Spirit, I need professional guides, I need the turnip farmer pointing the way with a turnip, I need the stars and the wind and the glow of the horizon, and I need you. You who I will never fully know, be you stranger or lover or family or friend. I will try to listen and walk at your pace, be you slower or faster.
There, now we are full circle. Here, we will lap and labyrinth each other.
* * *
That felt good to say. I’ve struggled a long time to get to those words. Not just to write the words, but to be in a time and place where those words could find a way out.
I feel like I’ve journeyed a long way just to get to this signpost that announces a new path, twistingly begging to be explored.
* * *
Enough of the abstract, let’s get some good hard nouns and dirt and ground.
Three hours ago I was in Phoenix and it was over 100 degrees, the day after solstice, amidst hundreds of square miles of cement absorbing heat that will not be released until some big rain in October.
I packed my car with gear and a mattress and drove out of town in rush hour. Halfway to Flagstaff, I realized I’d be arriving at camp at sunset, and didn’t want to waste that sunset prepping or eating food. At a quick exit truc kstop in Camp Verde, I bought a kombucha, a chicken Caesar sandwich, a giant garlic pickle floating in a plastic container that fit in my cup holder, a bag of thick salt and pepper chips. These were savored as I climbed the interstate up and over the Mogollon Rim, traveling on tarmac laid down on an old lava flow, out of the desert and into one of the largest ponderosa pine forests on Earth.
I rolled the windows down, listened to podcasts about aliens and the government, skirt the edges of Flagstaff, get gnarled in construction traffic and backtrack on the old Route 66, and climb again into higher pines, arriving at Bonito Campground next to Sunset Crater National Monument. I have a site reserved here.
Elaine the camp host greets me, “You must be 43.” I’m confused because I’m turning 55 in a few days. She laughs and explains, “Campsite 43. That’s the last one open.”
She follows me in her golf cart, checks me in, sells me firewood. I ask what I can explore around here. She says I can’t miss if I take the 35 mile loop of the national monument, which includes lava flows and Indian Ruins and hiking trails. She’s a great host. She’s a great guide, in fact, now that I am invoking and noticing that word.
And now here I sit in the dark surrounded by some great nouns: a crackling fire, a Chimay beer, the last of the pickle and juice in this wonderful container that stands up by itself, my freshly refilled water bottles, a new cold night birthed by the cool evening, cold enough I can put on a puffy jacket and put batteries in my new headlight and watch the sky go from dark blue to be-star-speckled indigo. Sitting here on the standard National Forest poured concrete picnic bench, I hear the mumbles of conversation and outbursts of laughter from the sites around me. Somebody blasts Mama Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys, then a Fleetwood Mac song I don’t know, then Paul Simon’s Cecilia (a song about the muse, I think), then silence. Who’s at that campsite? I want to meet them.
* * *
I think that’s enough. I’m starting to get boring. I’m going to focus on the fire, which I made very poorly at the start, and it almost went out a few times. I pride myself on the quick one-match start, and need to get my fire game back in play.
And I’m going to drink water. I can’t drink enough. Maybe it’s all the pickle juice that’s making me thirsty. Maybe it’s life. I’ll drink water and watch stars and watch fire and start to nod and droop as the last of the logs crumble and droop, and then to bed on the mattress in my Prius with my pee bottle. Final noun, pee bottle. You’re welcome.
