Las Cruces, New Mexico

I had hoped to make it past El Paso, but I took a break and visited the Tuscon Art Museum--thus, I only got as far as Las Cruces.

I have been trying all day to think of something illuminating and inspiring to say about the I 10 drive, but there wasn't much.  The road is long, and as you drive it, it gets longer.  I passed the hours listening to an interview with Pat Conroy on the Diane Rehm show--a riveting interview about his latest book, The Death of Santini.  Then I listened to some entertaining podcasts Rone had given me: The Moth.

At the end of the interview with Pat Conroy, Diane Rehm said, "I hope you will keep writing.  Let your glory shine."  I have heard Diane Rehm interview hundreds of writers over the years, but I've never heard her express quite such transparent affection for a writer as she did in this interview.

Except for good listening and a tranquil view of mountains and desert, I kept thinking: this is one boring road!  Nothing edible grows beside the road, only grasses and more grasses, a few patches of Joshua trees, saguaro, some scrubby trees.  When I passed Highway 17 leading north to Sedona, it was all I could do to keep the car in the groove and keep heading for home.  But all good things must end--or so I've heard.

I became acquainted with a song I've never noticed in my iPod library before: "Let Me Fall" by Josh Groban.


Let me fall
Let me climb
There's a moment when fear
And dreams must collide

Someone I am
Is waiting for courage
The one I want
The one I will become
Will catch me

Just as it was playing the third time (I was trying to memorize the lyrics) the parched earth of Arizona and New Mexico alongside the road began to soften.  The sky in my rearview mirror was a brilliant red.  I had to stop--right there on the side of the highway--to take a picture of that western sky.

I love that image: "Someone I am is waiting for courage/The one I will become will catch me...."

I wondered, too, if the same landscape would have been so "boring" if I were setting out instead of ending this adventure.  At the end of a journey, fatigue sets in, the vision dims a bit.  We think we know what's out there in familiar territory, and our looker gets lazy.  How do we keep the freshness of vision in our everyday lives, in places we know so well?  How do we meet the familiar with the eyes of a fascinated stranger?

Before I fall asleep (tomorrow is going to be a LONG day of driving), I'm reading The Holy Man by Susan Trott, a simple and fascinating book that Roné took off her book shelf for me to read on the way home.  All kinds of people approach the "holy" man to solve their problems, and--as we see--the approach has the solution built in, not what the holy man tells them to do.

I read the first half of the book last night and thought about it throughout the day.  Whether the word is "holy" or "enlightened" or whatever, the message is the same: It's not what someone else tells us that transforms us; it's our intention to keep changing from the beginning of any journey to the end.  A journey that doesn't change us or make us bigger is just a vacation.