Nature’s mid-century palms rose early without caffeine’s jolt. The quartet whisked breakfast into curls of golden cotton candy best consumed in a wondrous hush.
Perched on sprinkled pavement and slanted roofs, a mix of mourning doves, misplaced pigeons, and I marveled at December’s delight beyond distant flurries.
***
To enjoy more of my poetry, buy my latest book–A Path I Might Have Missed–on Amazon.
Today in the United States we celebrate Thanksgiving. It is easy to become consumed by the preparations for this holiday. To focus on the feast we will consume, while many in the world aren’t as fortunate.
But there is greater meaning–in our bodies, hearts, and minds–when we pause and recount what makes life satisfying beyond the things that adorn our days.
I am thankful every day for the love of family past and present, friends and neighbors near and far, good health and the ability to write and sing, gorgeous trees and furry critters that grace our lives, and most definitely the world Tom and I have discovered and created together inside and outside our Arizona home.
Wherever you live, thank you for joining me on this journey. I am thankful for the ability to connect with you–for this opportunity to share my voice through words, images, ideas and memories–every day.
Grief is a strange, but reliable, motivator.
With Thanksgiving 2013 approaching, Tom and I knew we needed to change things up after my mother’s slow-and-painful exit the previous January. We decided to escape our suburban Chicago home.
In the wake of our significant loss, we wanted to create a new tradition and plan a week-long Thanksgiving holiday in the desert (in our cozy Scottsdale condo) with my twenty-something sons Kirk and Nick, and Nick’s girlfriend Stephanie.
Early November came. Each of us cleared our schedules. About ten days before our flight from Chicago to Phoenix, Tom developed pneumonia. He was hospitalized for a few days, but insisted he would be well enough to make the trip.
Remarkably, Tom recovered enough for his doctor to clear us for take-off. When we landed at Sky Harbor Airport in Phoenix just west of the Papago buttes, I felt relief.
Over the next few days, Tom’s health continued to improve. We even climbed a portion of “A” Mountain in Tempe near the ASU (Arizona State University) campus.
On Thanksgiving Day 2013, Tom, Nick, Stephanie, Kirk and I dined outside under an orange tree on the patio of Mission Palms hotel, also in Tempe.
In those cool-but-sun-soaked moments–still a year before Tom and I would marry and four before we would move to Arizona permanently–I realized that the space created by my mother’s passing would mean more than a horizon shrouded in tears.
It would mean new possibilities … new chapters … for all of us.
The longer, hotter summer of 2023 in the Valley of the Sun claimed countless trees and plants–not to mention hundreds of human lives.
Now that November has settled in, we are reminded that cooler mornings and evenings–with warm, sunny afternoons sandwiched in between–actually exist in central Arizona from October through May. This is why we live here.
Unlike most of the United States, fall is a time of renewal in the Sonoran Desert. It is more like spring with an autumnal twist–minus the crunch of rotting leaves underfoot.
We desert rats can now focus on revitalizing our gardens and spirits. Perhaps a Barbara Karst or Torch Glow bougainvillea here–or a crested cactus there–to dress up the back patio in time for Thanksgiving.
Whatever your potting preference, it is growing season despite the advancing darkness. While old plants and trees lick their wounds, new ones pose with the promise of buds to endure winter–a foreign concept for most of the Northern Hemisphere reconciled to the shiver of ice and cold.
In October 2019, I puttered in my garden as I often do.
I had already begun to assemble tongue-in-cheek and serious stories about life in the Grand Canyon State. But I needed a creative hook to link the essays and my desert fantasies to the wide-open experience of living in Arizona.
Strangely, sagging citrus tree branches provided the stimulus for my book title. While they impeded our sidewalk, identifying the obstacle cleared a path in my brain. Tom stood by as seven words flew from my mouth and tumbled into the arid Arizona air: “I Think I’ll Prune the Lemon Tree.”
***
Nearly four years have passed. In early 2021, I completed and published my book. Folks near and far have told me how much they’ve enjoyed reading it.
Of course, I hope more will discover it and find meaning in the essays, including those I wrote about living in a global community we never imagined–a place I call Coronaville.
This afternoon I found myself in the same space outside my front door, examining the same tree, realizing it needed another haircut. I grabbed the loppers, pulled on my gardening gloves, and pruned only the most problematic branches that hung low.
Sadly, there were a few lemon casualties that fell to the earth looking more like green limes than the fully matured lemons they might have become in December.
Still, I think I did a good thing for Tom and me … and our neighbors and delivery people, who pass daily on the sidewalk of our mid-twentieth-century condo community and go about their lives under the radar.
And the lemon tree? It’s now shapelier than before and has inspired me to write yet another story about the possibilities at play in nature.
Nearly half drained, September–in the valley of fiery light where tiny lizards scurry–cues the hiss of early morning sprinklers.
They spray precious droplets that pool, surround, and saturate parched succulents, palms, and citrus trees.
The latter wonder if the fruits of their labors will prove less luscious when snowbirds return to snatch and gather golden orbs from sagging January branches.
***
To read more of my poetry, purchase A Path I Might Have Missed on Amazon.
Whenever the opportunity presents itself, I enjoy talking about the discipline of writing. Honestly, it doesn’t happen that often. But when it does, it’s generally in the course of an ordinary day.
For instance, last Friday–on the way out the door of the gym I frequent–I stopped to talk with the manager. He asked me about my latest writing project for the Phoenix Gay Men’s Chorus.
“It’s fun,” I told him. But then I went on to explain that creating a full-blown musical libretto is also draining. Such is the case for anything that pushes us beyond our comfort zones.
What does writing a libretto feel like? Well, I’ve never been a clothing designer or tailor. But it’s as if I’m sorting through a world of potential fabrics … selecting the right one … weaving it into a fictionalized story with smart dialogue and an emotional arc … and stitching it to music (which the chorus’ artistic director has selected).
Back near the entrance to the gym, another person joined the conversation. It morphed quickly into a discussion about the motivations and pitfalls of writing. She–a technical writer, who has dreamed about writing a childrens’ book–asked me about my creative commitment and impulses.
That’s when I felt my energy swell as I became creative mentor and cheerleader on the fly. I told her writing is like any discipline–exercise, yoga, boxing, for instance.
I told her I write something nearly every day. That–strangely–after my mother died ten years ago, a new door opened. I decided to take a leap. To write stories that were important to me, not some corporation.
Along the way–I told her–I discovered my true calling as an independent writer. It’s something I’m passionate about, though sometimes the creative process can be lonely.
I told her you have to make it a priority. You have to make the time for it. I told her that the childrens’ book she wanted to write was inside her, waiting to be written.
As I left the gym and walked to my car in the heat of the desert sun, I felt happy … content in the knowledge that I had encouraged one other person to step beyond their creative comfort zone.
***
In this world of raging fires, heat waves, social upheaval, and constant noise produced by snake oil salesmen, I believe the best thing we can do is to put down our phones and turn off our TVs more often.
To take back our lives. To talk with one another face to face–or at least voice to voice. To offer encouragement when opportunities present themselves. To write and read more books and poetry. To make time and room for practices and people who make our hearts sing.
If we do, maybe we can begin to restitch the underlying fabric of our society … one thread at a time.
In a world of distractions, scoundrels and deceit, nature casts a sliver of shade away from the heat.
On August 16, 2023, Poly–our community cat–reappeared and inspired this brief verse and montage. To read more of my poetry, purchase A Path I Might Have Missed on Amazon.
For the first time in a month in the Phoenix area, the high temperature failed to reach 110 degrees yesterday. (Unrelated, the kids –reluctantly or not–returned to school for a fresh start. Not my kids, but somebody’s kids.)
108 or 109 isn’t exactly pumpkin-spice latte weather, but it represents a clean-and-slightly-cooler slate for all of us Sonoran Desert rats, though the mercury is due to rise again later this week.
Coincidentally, the first day of this new month (not yet spoiled by the trauma of breaking news) is also the major league baseball (MLB) trading deadline.
MLB teams that feel they have a chance to advance to the playoffs and contend for the World Series title are adding players to their slates, who they hope will get them there.
Others (like my beloved St. Louis Cardinals who have bungled their way through the 2023 season and uncharacteristically reside in last place in their division as August begins) have decided to retool.
They have opted to prepare for a 2024 clean slate, by trading players whose contracts are about to expire for up-and-coming pitching talent that might trigger a positive outcome in the future.
Beyond the ball fields, I feel a sense of relief emotionally as we turn the page to August.
July’s heat–plus the grief of saying goodbye to my aunt, supporting my sister from afar as she recovers from surgery, and remembering the loss of my mother on her 100th birthday–has left me reeling like a rag doll cast into the corner.
While I’m healthy and vital, I think the malaise I’m feeling is probably common for those in my age range. It’s the realization that the world I once knew is shrinking and unfamiliar. Or worse yet, evaporating. That includes the people I love and the institutions I once knew.
For instance, I saw in the news that Yellow (a long-standing trucking company) has filed for bankruptcy. 30,000 employees will lose their jobs. I have no special allegiance to Yellow, but they were a client of mine when I was a consultant for Towers Perrin in the 1990s.
In 1995 and 1996, I caught a flight once a week from Chicago (where I lived) to Kansas City (near their headquarters). I met with the company’s human resources management and helped strategize their employee benefits and pay communication.
It wasn’t rocket science, but I felt I was helping people understand the options before them. Anyway, those workers that remain with the company in 2023 will now begin with a clean slate, too … whether they like it or not … as they work to parlay their pink slips into something of value that has nothing to do with Barbie-mania.
Of course, I’m thankful to be done with the traditional workforce. For Tom and me, we are fortunate to pursue our passions–the appreciation and preservation of classic films for him, the exploration of creative writing and poetry for me–on our own terms.
To close out the month of July, we manufactured our own clean slates by traveling to Flagstaff, Arizona, last week for three days and nights.
It helped me to retreat to cooler temperatures (highs in the upper eighties, lows in the upper fifties) to regain my energy.
We stayed at a lovely and contemporary B&B there: the Bespoke Inn Flagstaff.
Samantha, the manager, surprised us with a complimentary bottle of champagne (when she learned we were commemorating my mother’s milestone birthday).
I surprised her with a complimentary copy of my book of poetry as a parting gift.
Tom and I discovered a fabulous cafe in town–Tourist Home–where we did some reading and writing. The proprietors bake and sell phenomenal gluten-free crullers with sprinkles.
To counteract the calories, we also enjoyed hiking Buffalo Park in Flagstaff. It’s positioned on a plateau just a few miles from the base of the San Francisco Peaks.
Walking the path there with my husband helped me regain my creative footing as I attempt to reignite a fictionalized story that continues to rattle through my brain.
I started to write it last year, but then got derailed. It’s about a young gay man struggling to find his way and write his story in the high altitude of northern Arizona.
For now, that’s all I’ll say, but I’m open to any positive creative vibes you choose to send my way.
Two weeks and counting.
I hear you moan and sigh.
You scurry in sunglasses and sandals.
You hide away from July’s heat.
But nothing ruffles my fur.
I pad place to place.
I pause in the shade of cool tile.
I curl and twirl.
I inch closer to appease you.
I take what you leave me.
I move on to the next door.
Don’t worry about me.
I’ll get by.
The sun and stars are my home.
It’s no big deal.
It’s just who I am.
***
To read more of my poetry, look for my latest book, A Path I Might Have Missed, on Amazon.
