Road Trip!

[Nazz]

Thursday Notes (7-16-09)

You cannot, I repeat, cannot appreciate traveling 480 miles unless you do it on wheels. On feet would be better. Even captured by dashed line fever—“trying to get somewhere”—you can’t help but notice countless bluffs, creeks and peaks, the odd small world vastness of it.

First night: Burns, Oregon. Dig the 76-degree high desert heat at 11 o’clock. It got near a hundred on the way down. I'm sun burning my toes in crescent moonlight. No, you can’t just get on a plane and fly 480 miles, or 10, 480 miles to a summit conference and expect to have any sense of the ups and downs of rock and space. You have to do it where rubber meets road, for better or worse.

Starting up from John Day into the Blue Mountains I tuned a country station on the AM band. It began with a cowboy crooner who told me what America is about—beautiful children selling lemonade, a Springsteen song, a ride in Chevy. Undeniable images. And then a darker song—something about the Eagle flying and shit raining down on your head, courtesy of the Red, White and Blue. That song irritated the shit out of me, but twenty miles later (no longer full of shit), I thought I’d take a different approach—maybe something akin to “balance.”

Sweet, tenuous balance. Someone has to go out and protect that small world vastness, no? For all you pacifist morons (like me), what do you think would happen if the military disbanded? Face it. Pacifists need warriors and warriors need pacifists. But I don’t want my Eagle flying songs duped by bald-faced lies and corporate-owned war. I don’t care how thick the cow shit on your boots, none of us want that.

I haven’t had TV in a while. Someone stole it. And now, TV in a hot motel room. Maybe that’s why I’m fired up. Something about that first night away from home in unfamiliar digs, you need that wire, some sort of tie in. But Jeezus those commercials—a pill and piece of machinery for every ill. No, you can’t simply dismiss the military nor how sold (out) everything could become. Both aspects have validity.

The weather chick just said, “the air you can wear,” referring to the South. I like what she’s wearing. Hey I just tuned in to see if there’s a thunderstorm predicted in the bare hills. Rumbling. Shit the lawyer ads are starting; I must be in the middle of nowhere. Why is the damn box still on? The Weather Channel is soothing when it sticks to a satellite; it’s always peaceful up there. Now the sexy weather chick says, “some temperatures are going up, some down.” Wisdom.

Tomorrow: 97 degrees. No tornadoes in the forecast. The moon is new—good for stars of choice, though darker. Everyone on the Weather Channel is a “meteorologist.” Do they all put on reading glasses and pore over isobars every day? My room has 1920s door casings, a 1930s radiator, 1950s tile work, tired carpeting, splintered furniture and the weather chick. Not a bad place to sleep.


Saturday Notes (7-18-09)

Back in Black Rock Desert country—realm of space and light, elemental landforms of indeterminate span, subjective scale. Add your interpretation. On the rim of Kumiva Valley, ears ringing, vista shimmering, fifty miles out—all things strangely in order. Black Rock country sits lower than most of Nevada, a little more haggard and dry. You can find a ranch here and there in a few offshoot canyons, and in time you learn some of the landmarks, yet a feeling of lost-ness remains.

Left Gerlach at nine this morning. Gerlach, Nevada (pop. 250) is the only patch of civilization for a hundred miles in any direction—unless you count the gypsum operation six miles south. Gerlach is best known as the town closest to Burning Man—that yearly cosmic freak art storm splatter on the wide-open parched flat desert canvas. Never been to Burning Man. It costs like $400 and a Scooby Doo van or something to get in. Yeah I know it’s cool and all but screw it, I saw the place first. Well actually they saw it first, but I was close, dammit.

Stayed at Bruno’s Motel last night. Bruno came from the old country in 1946—Tuscany. He got a job at the gypsum plant when it opened, and 63 years later owns two ranches and most of Gerlach. He is 86 years old and cusses a lot and tends bar every night, a man of short stature with a full head of white hair, a little hunched at the shoulders, tireless, thorough, shrewd and tough, teller of a thousand animated stories. He wanted to know what the hell I’m doing on the Black Rock Desert in a hundred degree heat.

Theory One: Scrub ripples leap off the page, sandy ones in particular. Ripple and boil. I know my old truck will do the right thing and start up again. Sure beats a fifty mile walk in the desert, though I could try that ranch twenty miles back. Why am I here? For the rock sculpture, what about you? Alternate theory: Maybe it’s the lurching, dichotomous wind. Generally I watch rippling scrub in peace—just me, the heat, and my own whooshing arteries. But every so often a rogue draft pounds the truck, rocks it slightly for twenty seconds or so—then nothing except maybe whish of air through scrub fifty, sixty yards distant.

Tale of a compound mirage: On Kumiva Valley floor, under the Blue Wing Mountains, I approach a deep blue lake—an image strong enough to overrule rational thought for miles. I see a lake, not a mirage. My blue lake slowly, stubbornly recedes to white, leaving room for speculation at each point. Perhaps rare late-season rain filled part of the playa. Now I see vehicles making dust on the playa. No, just dust devils. Closer now. No, one of them must be a truck—slender plume sent up from a black object. Closer. No, it was a dust devil. The black object is a rock, no longer so absurdly showcased.

[Barry]

I hope you managed to get through Paisley and Plush and out into the Rabbit Hills where the Sunstone collecting areas are.

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Peace,
Barry

[Nazz]

I came down 205 from Burns, about thirty miles, then off onto a series of dirt roads into the sage (and cows), starting with Jackass Mountain Rd., then through Hart Mountain Antelope Refuge and eventually, Plush. Not familiar with the Rabbit Hills. I should check into that. Thanks Barry.

[goldenmyst]

Nazz, your Lopezian narrative rocks. I've crossed Nevada Black Rock at night. So I missed the scenery. This is the kind of writing which scintillates. You took me there man and then some.

John

[Nazz]

Thanks John. There's something about that landscape, that part of the world... something like mindblowin'... Gerlach's pretty cool, too. Some of those small towns can give ya "the willies," but Gerlach is pretty relaxed, generally.

[mtmynd]

you can lose things and stuff in environments like that, where space consumes land like an oyster leaving a flat shell to dry out under the merciless rays of the sun beating down like a laser. your perceptions, like the mirage (exactly!) prove that life really is illusory and nothing is truly as it appears. but that is metaphysical headiness and who needs that shit when your out there where even the eagles retire from hunting while the sun dominates all else.. it's useless to fight it, even with air conditioning that prays the water will hold out long enough to appease the face, the neck and hopefully the sweating chest just long enough to make you feel a tad bit more hu'man before the sacred water disappears from the once wet pads that make AC a temporal treasure.

thanks, Mark, for this 'travelonymous' writing that i can so relate to in so many ways that inspiration, like perspiration, runs quickly, rather than soaks in, for a long night of contemplation and i find myself smiling and glad you were able to once again find that spot that burns into your very soul all that means all things wondrous to you.

((didja get any new pictures?))

[Arcadia]

enjoyed reading, nazz!!!!! (it made me laugh and smiled a lot until the two theories, I got a bit lost at that point! ). Great you had a good time!, and yeah..., photos please! (if you want to post them, of course! )

[Nazz]

Yeah Cecil. In two full days out on the back roads of Black Rock country I saw antelope, wild burros, deer, even a mustang (feral horse)-- and just one other human-- so it was pure adventure, exploration and reflection. Hard to get a sense of scale in those landscapes-- one reason they fascinate me. The wildlife sightings and occasional tree affix small bits of scale here and there, but it's a land of longing and imagination, like a different planet at times... Photos will follow at some point, if the heat didn't ruin the film. Yes, I still use film. Can you believe it?

Arcadia-- glad you enjoyed. The "two theories" bit is just some silly "irony." No one in their right mind "chooses a vacation spot" for such odd, rough-edged reasons. Ha.

[SmileGRL]

it was pure adventure, exploration and reflection.

that sounds like the best kind of vacation to me, mr. nazzy. (next to lounging on the beach of course )

thanks for the trip

[revolutionrabbit]

where's that Superstition Mountain?