Not Jerome

Pro tip: If you’re ever thinking of going to Jerome, AZ: DON’T.  

 

1. It’s not actually haunted, despite what the tour guides might tell you. 
2. And you probably won’t have an exciting preternatural experience.
3. If you must go, just get some fudge, and then 
4. Drive to Sedona instead because:

Point taken? 

Yesterday we celebrated George Washington and Abe Lincoln by traipsing around our lovely state, which did nothing less than impress me with her staggering views and breathless red-rock vistas.  

The longer I stay in Arizona, the longer she convinces me I don’t need to move anywhere else (right now).  Here you have your desert, but also your forests, your cacti, but also your pine trees, your mountains, but also your canyons.  AND YOUR SUNSETS.  

There’s a line from “You’ve Got Mail” when Kathleen Kelly muses,"So much of what I see reminds me of something I read in a book, when shouldn't it be the other way around?"

In experiences like this day trip, I kept marveling that these panoramic views of the magnificent striated sandstone cliffs reminded me of a photo or a movie or a calendar, when shouldn't I watch a movie or see a photo and think about how that image reminds me of an experience I've had instead? 

As we sat at the bottom of Oak Creek Canyon, the sun having already dipped behind the mountains but the surrounding sky still duskily lit, the Oak Creek river coursing at our feet, I felt so small and insignificant and unimportant, but in a beautifully connected way.  I was mesmerized by the motion and sound of the swiftly flowing water, a sensation similar to gazing on a bonfire, the water frothy like a root beer float.  

My friend took me to a secluded and unpopulated little outlook down a hidden set of stairs that opened up to a small grassy patch adjacent to a large square wooden deck, or what was quite possibly a dance floor.  We sat in a pair of chairs unobtrusively set off to the side from where we reveled in the majesty of the mountains before us, the scene perfectly quiet, breezy, and calm.  As someone who is constantly on her phone or listening to music and podcasts or rewatching Parenthood on her ipad in the background, to sit still without any kind of distraction disguised as entertainment garnering my attention felt so liberating.  Almost spiritual, even.  To take a break from other people, from following their updates, from even knowing what time it was just to BE.  And SEE.  And sit.  And feel.  It was quixotically peaceful. 

(We also communed with Mother Nature by eating rattlesnake because #yolo.)