Crushed Expectations

Sunrise near Valley of the Gods in Mexican Hat, Utah

It’s basically a day like so many others before it: I wake before the sun nudges me from sleep, except on this occasion, my head rises alone for the last time before I get home later today and snuggle in next to the person I love. Carlos and I are bringing to an end our brief five-day excursion that took us to places new to him but mostly familiar to me.

One never knows what might be shared when traveling with a young person, nor does one go on adventures knowing what can be learned about oneself. I anticipated prior to our departure that I’d have my stamina challenged as this 20-year-old young man would have boundless energy, but here, at the cusp of 60 years old, I’ve found the exact opposite. My day started more than an hour ago; I’m showered, packed, and sitting in the dark writing as I’ve already learned to let him sleep because he can fall asleep at the breakfast table, in the car while chatting, listening to music, exploring an environment he’s never seen. Sunrises are not his thing.

We surprisingly leave Mexican Hat, Utah, before the sun has risen, one of the rare opportunities for Carlos to witness the phenomenon for himself, hopefully not the last. While there are rough ideas for how this day might progress, there’s nothing fixed aside from the certainty that we will be traveling south.

We’ll cross over the San Juan River and find the Valley of the Gods in sight before stopping to stare at the sun, looking for the best way to capture its image. I have my ideas of how to photograph our star, but Carlos is new to this experience, which will force him to practice this type of portraiture. As is typical with my method of travel, it’s not long before we are pulling over again for me to learn if I can see something with new eyes in a way that will allow me to bring an experience of the senses home with me I’d not previously encountered. It’s all an experiment, even if I’ve traveled this way a dozen or more times before.

Sunrise near Valley of the Gods in Mexican Hat, Utah

I know we have options regarding how this early part of the day might unfold, but as has been true the previous days, Carlos is along for the ride and has had no input regarding what comes next as this has all been an unfolding surprise of discovery for him.

If, from the title of today’s missive, you think I’m ending our journey on a negative note (Crushed Expectations could imply just that, couldn’t it?), you’d be wrong as the expectations Carlos entertained leading up to this adventure into unknowns proved wrong, well at least one important bit. You see, in order to allay his anticipated boredom due to the long haul across the featureless landscape, Carlos brought nearly a dozen books along with him. My thought was, who brings a dozen books on a road trip other than the person who fears not only becoming bored by the environment but one who becomes bored by the titles he’s attempting to read?

Monument Valley as seen from Utah

Instead, Carlos began falling into what it means to find the art to be seen in all things, and if he’s fortunate, he might discover the love to be found there, too. Like most young Americans brought up on a diet of instant gratification found in being over-stimulated by addictive media that dismiss that which is not consumed through a screen or intense human-created experiences, Carlos wasn’t prepared for the enchantment that awaited him by exploring immense space.

Monument Valley as seen from Utah

But here we are in the resonating throws of an experience that has unfolded in ways unexpected to the mind and imagination of a young man who now wants to continue the journey. By now, I’ve shared one of the secrets that have served Caroline and me so well: from the experiences you love, leave something undone so it will be the thing that draws you back. For Carlos, that draw was a hoped-for visit to the Grand Canyon, but our diversion and distractions that are allowed to happen will slice into the time that might have otherwise been available for a quick visit.

Carlos Guerrero entering Arizona from Utah

The loop is closing, though I hope the road ahead for Carlos will be a divergent one where he’s able to find a path of his own making instead of stumbling into the ruts etched by others following routines that rarely, if ever, change.

Winter on the Navajo Reservation north of Kayenta, Arizona

One cannot always simply go forward; we must yield to impasses, even if we created them ourselves. The road does not go on forever; you have to choose which way you will turn, though crashing into the wall ahead is also an option often chosen.

Winter on the Navajo Reservation north of Kayenta, Arizona

And if you can’t see everything ahead of you, that’s okay; perspective shifts and surprises work to enhance what will have been gained after finding the flexibility and adaptability to work within your situation.

Blue Coffee Pot restaurant in Kayenta, Arizona

To many, maybe a stop at a roadside diner is just another place for a meal, but for me, finding the Blue Coffee Pot Restaurant in Kayenta, Arizona, on the Navajo Reservation open is a treasure. Carlos hadn’t noticed that initially, we were the only two non-Navajo customers in the joint; others passing through town are more likely to stop at the next-door McDonald’s or Burger King as those are the brands they know. Caroline and I have already visited this small restaurant and know that it’s not anything special, but we delight in the knowledge that our money will more directly support the Navajo community instead of some already wealthy executives in faraway Chicago, Illinois.

So, we take up a table, are brought coffee, and await our meal from but a few choices. Normally, I might have dug into writing so I’d have notes allowing me to add granular details to a trip, but over the course of these days, I’ve used my writing time as talking time to iterate and reiterate thoughts and ideas I believe worthy for a young person to at least hear once or twice before finding them at some future date. I’m a bit relentless in pressing these lessons into the ears of Carlos, who doesn’t seem bothered at all by the constant barrage. And so we talk, even at the expense of my breakfast cooling off instead of being eaten.

Comic of John Wise by Morgan Navarro from Grenoble, France

And then breakfast will grow colder as I watch a man wearing headphones enter the restaurant holding a mic in a windscreen and circle the place. It turns out that his name is Jack, and he’s traveling with his friend Morgan; the two Frenchmen are on a pilgrimage to document the path of Hunter S. Thompson, and after getting Jack’s attention, the two of us talk. This traveling journalist/podcaster half-wondered, half-asked, “Why has America seemingly failed to find inspiration from Hunter S. Thompson, and what are my tips for their next destination of Las Vegas?”

I have a tickle in my throat due to all of my talking, and realize that people I enjoy talking to likely believe I talk like this all the time. Little do they understand that there are few people I like talking to, and that’s why I find myself so often before the screen typing, writing in a notebook, reading, or walking around looking at my world and spending time in my own inner dialog. The majority of people which whom I start a conversation only last about 5 to 10 minutes before eyes start rolling, hands fidget, and their body language is a subtle contortion of squirming. When I run into someone with the tiniest spark of curiosity, and I have their attention, I try to dump a sense of passion for knowledge and discovery into them without overwhelming the person or losing them in intertwined examples they typically easily lose track of what thread I’m adding to the tapestry I’m attempting to weave.

Navajo Reservation south of Kayenta, Arizona

This metaphor of creating a cloth is hopefully an apt one because in weaving, complexity and a lot of preparation precede the outcome; similarly, the listener might be confused about the relationship of elements in a conversation being laid down; they cannot yet detect the pattern or value of the way things will be woven into their own experience. We, humans, are often not accustomed to listening to complexities of relationships between unfamiliar ideas and thoughts, finding it difficult to mix them into our own understanding, but this is essentially what the observer witnesses as the weaver throws the weft over the warp, we are not seeing the entire picture or finished form.

Graffiti on the Navajo Reservation in Shonto, Arizona

As the storyteller, I try my best to unravel the image drawn from my experience in a way that makes sense to the listener or reader, but this a fragment spun out of the impossibility of always finding a perfect coherence just as nobody has ever found the perfect alignment of musical notes that create the greatest melody which becomes the definitive song of all time and destroys the need for any new music after this discovery. Nope, we continue throwing contrasting notes into a melange of songs as people enjoy the variety. Sadly, the same cannot be said for stories, especially particularly difficult and possibly obtuse ones.

Graffiti on the Navajo Reservation in Shonto, Arizona

Our vocabulary and experience limit our ability to see beyond the immediacy of self, and through eroding attention spans, we have evolved narratives that have shrunk in much the same manner as moving from Victorian undergarments to g-strings in little more than a generation or two. So now we are left with a society communicating using monosyllabic language that accompanies an equally narrow comprehension. If this brevity is sufficient for operating daily life, then why not apply it to the interpretation of viewing the entirety of what lies ahead? The answer to this is that brevity and simplicity are inadequate for finding knowledge buried in the magnitude of what is before us.

Cow Springs, Arizona

There’s no bridging the chasm from an old-fashioned set of underwear (thoughts) to the other side of the abyss using a g-string (memes). I believe that a comparison could be made by suggesting that Beethoven’s 5th Symphony, comprising four parts lasting 30 to 40 minutes, could be reduced to one note, although in some way, it can be reduced to just the first four. Of the rest of the piece, I suppose it could be claimed that if you heard it once, why does one need to hear it again? Could the answer be found in the fact that humans learn very little to nothing after a single iteration of new information arriving to their senses?

Cow Springs Trading Post in Cow Springs, Arizona

So, we go out to find, see, listen, and hear those things in life we are unfamiliar with, which is precisely what I’m attempting to share with Carlos. When one stops at a friend’s home and listens to a person playing the 5th symphony on piano, they have no real idea of the piece’s complexity if it were being played by a symphony. In our current age, we don’t care. We have the 15-second loop of Beethoven that accompanies the TikTok video with a witty phrase typed over it, and we believe we’ve gained the kind of deep knowledge that has served the sages over millennia. We are whole, we are complete, and we can now face the world with certainty that what was needed to forge a way ahead has been acquired. This is grotesquely untrue; we only thrive when knowledge and wisdom reach deeper into our souls.

Elephant Feet in Tonalea, Arizona

Mind you; this perception is not due to observations made regarding the person I’m traveling with; on the contrary, he’s quite curious, which is also the only reason we went out to share five days of being immersed in what for him are mostly new experiences. It’s precisely his willingness to look, listen, read, and wonder that allowed a basic foundation to be established where I felt that if I took the horse to water, it might likely drink. He supplied the seed, and I provided the sunlight and water.

John_Carlos_Roadtrip

This was the route of our 1,300-mile adventure.

Through the Portal

Jean Pierre Bakery in Durango, Colorado

Get in, get out. Go somewhere to get nowhere. Travel through the space that exists between you and places you’ve never been. Open the door to your cobweb-cluttered mind, welcoming a fresh breeze to disturb the mess within. Try to leave behind the nonsense you’ve been burdened with by expectations that are impossible to satisfy. Then, sit down to a meal of crispy hot knowledge where the shadows of ignorance will come under threat. When we embark on passing into new experiences where nothing is defined, we will likely find ourselves dining alone on the bitter diet of alienation, as who in their right mind would subject themself to introspection and uncertainty after finding cocksurety in the arrogance of all-knowing stupidity?

Southwest Colorado in Winter

We’ve been traveling in a counter-clockwise direction to unwind the spring that is designed to take us forward into expectations. Time is reversing to deny us our orientation with certainty. We revert to a previous mind, the one we carried as children when everything was still new. We are failing to respect convention and custom as we choose to find a new path; I am experiencing familiarity while Carlos travels into a multi-sensorial universe inconceivable just 72 hours earlier. We end up writing and rewriting our internal mappings that drive an operating system running on an auto-pilot setting that helps direct what our future narratives will borrow in order to take form. All the while, the inclination is to believe we are simply following a road that will bring us to something known.

Approaching Utah from Colorado

How could anyone have known the day would start in an authentic French bakery in a mountain town, followed by a slow drive through a snowy environment before being dumped back out in the arid desert? While you might think that, as the planner of this adventure, I would be in possession of that knowledge, the reality is that I considered roads to places separated by reasonable driving distances and then let the pieces fall into place. At any juncture along the way, we may have needed to deviate from the route due to weather, an accident, or even incompatibility between two forces of life that, in an instant found themselves living 24/7 side-by-side.

Carlos Guerrero at Utah State Line

Time to put Colorado behind us for a quick dash to Mexican Hat, Utah, where I hope we can check in early to our motel, dump our bags, and race over to the Navajo Welcome Center at Monument Valley. We have an appointment for 12:30 to meet up with Cody for a guided tour out on the Mystery Valley Trail. This is the reason there are but a few photos representing the first half of the day, though we passed dozens of beautiful snowy landscapes I would have loved to photograph. Believe it or not, this trip has nothing to do with my photography or what I might be looking for; it’s really about what Carlos might discover along the way. This was also a pivotal moment for him. Yesterday, before confirming today’s adventure, I asked him if he was able or willing to pony up his share of the cost for the hike I had in mind. It’s not every day we are confronted with a per-person cost of $180 to be brought into an environment where a good amount of time would be spent walking around through a desert landscape. Strangely enough, he opted to see what the pricey journey might entail.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

We are only slightly southwest of Monument Valley but simultaneously a world away in a place rather isolated. Tire tracks are common, although the sight of the vehicles that left have them will be hard to come by, so we take in the shadows as they stretch over the landscape and will have to imagine the footprints of those Iceage Paleo-Indian hunters that are said to have roamed here starting some 14,000 years before Europeans arrived. As for the shadows, they arrived with the return of the rising sun.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

The Grand Canyon sees about 12,400 visitors a day, and the Great Smoky Mountains National Park sees about 38,600 visitors per day. In this photo we are seeing absolutely nobody, and, should it stay this way, there will be no sad visitors to Mystery Valley today.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

Spoke too soon; here we see John Wayne because John Wayne is always near.

Carlos Guerrero at Mystery Valley in Arizona

In the 192 million years of Monument Valley’s history and with two people standing at this particular point on earth, this is the first time ever that photos were taken of one another. This will never be duplicated due to the impossibility of seeing the exact type and quality of lighting and sky that was rapidly changing here today or even knowing just where it was we were standing.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

On any given day, one might be looking at this scene and, on the very next day, believe they are looking at the same thing, but superposition says this isn’t exactly true. From one day to the next, something changed: a plant grew, grains of sand were blown about, a lizard shifted a thing unseen, and so while the unchanged part is seen, so are the changes though our ability to recall find details might not readily pick up on those differences. You, too, are in a superposition of yourself because you may not perceive how you changed from one day to the next; in the mirror, you will be gazing upon the two versions of yourself, the one that existed yesterday and this new one that gathered something different and has likely changed your trajectory and perception.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

When we are out in unfamiliar places, we are processing a world of differences as we read and learn about the environment. We are, in effect, taking steroids and building muscles, but while our brain becomes swole with the strength of this kind of exercise, we cannot see the bulging pecs of a mind taking on greater definition, and so we discount the value of these experiences.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

Play a videogame, and over time, a person will develop skills that allow the battles and puzzle solving to become easier, but what does one improve upon in their mindscape when considering a tree growing in a bowl of swirly sandstone? What skills are honed or strengths achieved when observing the world around us as an aesthetic body that might be embued with ideas of beauty?

Mystery Valley, Arizona

Prior to the arrival of the Navajo, the Ancestral Puebloans (Anasazi) roamed these lands. I grew up with the ugly manufactured idea that arose out of the Rousseauian concept of the Noble Savage, where white ethnographers romanticized the idea that the Anasazi simply disappeared as a kind of phenomenon. Creating a mystery is more exciting for the imagination than dealing with truths that point to marginalized people forced onto reservations and stripped of their ways of life. In many cases, their children were stolen to ensure they took on the attributes of the dominant culture, though they would never actually become part of that. With a fantasy created, the white inhabitants could reasonably claim that they weren’t corraling authentic people with real history. Those natives were now extinct, and the ones being forced into capitulation were savages intent on destroying opportunities for whites while also threatening our womenfolk. The people who lived on these lands a millennia ago were Ancestral Puebloans who continue to live spread out across the Four Corners Region of the Southwest.

Carlos Guerrero at Mystery Valley in Arizona

Being out here with Cody leading us through these red rocks is amazing in its own right, but I would love the opportunity to camp here for a number of days, leaving the truck behind while we simply walk about, sit for a while, watch and listen to the coming and going of night and day. The reality of our time here is one of a financial equation, a man gets paid so he can continue to exist on land he may have inherited, but the dictates of the modern economy have conditioned him to understand that money equals food and freedom, and if one only has enough for food, his freedom is effectively damned and time made precious and rare.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

The dominant culture of the United States might claim that Americans exist in an egalitarian society, but that’s nothing more than bald-faced lies, similar to those told to people surviving in the straights of poverty by a bourgeoisie protecting the wealth they are afraid could slip away. What happens when not only your inner wealth slips away, but your cultural wealth is torn from the group, and you are left with mythologies that don’t pay for a sack of flour and a hunk of meat? You despair and foment hate with a dose of resentment, or at least I would. I wonder how Americans would feel about their homes being taken in a big roundup while simultaneously forced to acknowledge that Jesus no longer exists and that they’ll be prosecuted and reeducated should they continue to hold on to such primitivism?

Mystery Valley, Arizona

The ironic thing is that the imagination and intellect of the lower socio-economic 2/3rds of the U.S. population have essentially had just that happen to them as they have been stripped of an education that would serve them well in an age of rapidly ascending technology they barely comprehend. Their overlords are creating a complexity using a technological language that relegates this majority to being that of savages and not particularly romanticizable savages. It is as though the modern American masses are becoming an indecipherable bit of rock art that reflects an ancient society lost in time. Humanity is being lost.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

People from between 700 and 2,000 years ago made this pottery, and as it lost its utility, it was left here. When the people of today die, they will leave behind nothing they created with their own hands; they will leave trash, while the memories they gathered from their participation in a media-driven society will leave no signs. Fortunately, these beautiful pieces of pottery that act as reminders of those who came before have so far survived the intrusion of outsiders who sadly, would pay upwards of $1000 for a piece of jewelry made with some of these fragments. We would steal the historical reflections of these ancestors in order to feed our ego and guts, caring not one bit about whose heritage we erase.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

This is a reminder to the future generations that would walk in the Ancestral Puebloan’s footsteps that others learned how to survive here. It is an important history lesson and a challenge for those who follow to learn how to live with less.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

I can’t really say I’ve seen a lot of pottery shards in my lifetime, but I’ve likely seen more than most. This, though, is the first time I’ve seen a piece with a small hole carved into it that I’m going to make the semi-educated guess was there in order to make carrying the vessel a bit easier by using a bit of leather or maybe a twined rope made of yucca. Should you ever find your way out in Mystery Valley, maybe you’ll spot this piece, too, as it’s still lying right where we found it.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

This was home to at least a small handful of Ancestral Puebloans many hundreds of years ago. It was certainly not a dwelling the Navajo would have lived in as their pre-Western contact homes were hogans and sweat houses (sweat lodges) known in Navajo as k’eet’soo’ii.

Carlos Guerrero at Mystery Valley in Arizona

While I was scoping photography opportunities and contemplating silence, Carlos responded to the opportunity of climbing up the cliff face and carefully crawled through the narrow entryway into the long-abandoned cliff dwelling. While I would love to experience the view from above and within, my fear of heights combined with the steep exposure stymied me yet again; well, we can’t do everything, can we?

Mystery Valley, Arizona

Somewhere along the trail, Carlos points out how this is possibly the first time he’s been somewhere so absent of others. This wasn’t a lament; it felt enthusiastic that he should be having such an experience and seeing the world with the eyes of real surprise that might redefine the way he relates to the idea of what a desert is.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

Cherish these moments, Carlos, as over the past 25 years, Caroline and I have found these isolated situations are becoming rarer. The luxury of being in the quiet, open spaces where beauty can be found is disappearing, in large part due to social media and the #doitforthegram crowd. Once Instagram and its influencers take away some of the appeals of pristine places such as what’s happening to Iceland, Pedra do Telégrafo, the Cliffs of Moher, Macchu Picchu, and the Hooker Valley Track, aspiring influencers looking for fame and fortune must discover their own places that will inspire others to be cool like them.

Many Hands Ruin in Mystery Valley, Arizona

To stand here in silence and solitude with no one else present offers the visitor a moment to capture a sense of place taken out of a time prior to the advent of the camera and crowds. We are at The House of Many Hands.

Many Hands Ruin in Mystery Valley, Arizona

A picture is worth a thousand words, except when it’s not. There are four human-looking pictographs on this panel along with more than a few handprints, but I have no facility to decipher them but maybe I don’t really need to. Is it only my desire to solve the mystery that I want to imbue the figures with special meaning, as I think they may contain secrets that were meaningful to the Ancestral Puebloans? What if they were simply art for art’s sake?

Many Hands Ruin in Mystery Valley, Arizona

Hands that touch, hands that hold, hands that love. Hands that write, hands that draw, hands that paint. Hands that steer, hands that give, hands that take.

Mystery Valley, Arizona

Eyes that take, eyes that translate, eyes that wish to never forget.

Chimney Arch at Mystery Valley, Arizona

If a hole in the fabric of reality were able to be opened, would you be afraid to look within? If a gateway into knowledge were to be found in a book, would you read it? If a passageway into your soul was to be discovered in love, would you make the effort to throw off your indifference?

Tear Drop Arch near Gouldings in Monument Valley, Arizona

Everything hangs in the balance between potential and oblivion. The opportunity to gaze through Teardrop Arch near Gouldings Lodge can only happen because one makes oneself available to be here; this is the potential of our senses to find change. A small mound of the earth will someday give way and topple this 200 million-year-old rock perched above it, thus continuing the work of the past 25 million years in shaping Monument Valley. Right here, which was part of my right now while standing here on this late afternoon, I moved my perspective to be witness to a second carved out of a vast history where I’ll blip in and out of existence in the relative blink of an eye. We are afforded this rare opportunity to look through history while history has no interest in looking through us. Will you opt to be present to experience at least some of life with your own eyes, hands, and ears, or is the oblivion of crumbling under the force of time never to have been anywhere good enough for you?

Sunset in Monument Valley, Arizona

Before you know it, another day is gone, another week, month, year, and a life you held dear. That one chance you had to be available for your own life and the lives of others will have slipped by; history will forget you and those who once loved you will also accede to the demands of time, thus erasing your presence like so many clouds capturing the final rays of a setting sun letting go of the intense beauty they inspired upon an observer who happened to be at the right place at the right time to experience such a thing before our star dipped below the horizon.

Transition Zone

Motel 6 in Santa Fe, New Mexico

Nope, not today! We will try our best to offer assistance to the person being human trafficked while we turn a collective blind eye to the masses who are being intellectually trafficked by their lack of meaningful education and addiction to a way of life that keeps the average person nearly in chains of enslavement. These distractions, including news of child abductions, demon possession, drugs in our schools, and mayhem over our borders, are diversions created by marketing geniuses and are designed to lift the burden from individuals to learn, find truths, and consider their options when economic survival priorities dictate the direction and stress people must endure.

At any given moment, there are 580,000 up to 1.5 million people who are homeless, another 325,000 in transitional housing and homeless shelters, and an unknown number of people living in cars. We’re looking at over 1,000,000 Americans facing the grimmest living situations every day, but it was the 2,198 people referred to our justice system for human trafficking offenses that rose to the national stage. The feel-good insipidness that absolves us of real concern for anything is a great indicator of our obsession with the superficial appearance of things. The contradictions that occupy minds with rage is a national disgrace where, on one hand, people are indignant and angry at the government because every day they see the effects of what homelessness means to their community while human trafficking is an invisible crime, and if the government says the situation is improving we have no way of qualifying that. The dichotomy driven by the government that, on one hand, they seem to be doing something and, on the other, appear helpless on big issues helps maintain friction between hope and despair, vacillating in all directions and tearing at the fabric of society. And this is what I had to wake up to this morning instead of being allowed to remain on vacation.

New Mexico

Fortunately for me, the cliffs haven’t yet hoisted neon signs that alert passersby that the weather and erosion have stolen parts of them to traffic the grains to beaches in order for people to luxuriate on the rock-based carcasses carried away by the wind and rain.

Dead animal in New Mexico

Meanwhile, the scavengers of rotting flesh collect their free meal with no judgment as to whether they are stealing. Later, they will return to their trees squatting homelessly while letting their excrement soil our earth below, and while we’re at it, what’s up with treating human fetuses as fully-fledged people and calling abortion murder while those who use their cars to murder these animals are allowed to live free? Is life sacred, or only our own selfish view of what we want to claim is precious is embued with value? Yeah, I know this conversation is absurd, but that’s the point. Most everything is absurd, but we insist the inanities of it all have value, and so we take stupid shit seriously and ignore serious shit because we feel helpless, like a poor animal trying to cross the road, hoping not to be plowed down.

Abandoned gas station in New Mexico

Whoa, what happened to happy observations found on vacation? Look at your decay, America: you are dying but can’t see the rot all around you. If you are even slightly aware, you believe it is somehow the fault of a single individual or party in Washington D.C., but it is the neglect of your own internal (non-existent) dialog where you would ask yourself, what is your own contribution to the culture of not caring? This old gas station and the cafe next door did not close because of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, or Donald Trump. It’s gone because you hate venturing out into your own country unless some level of generic conformist posturing opportunity is on offer, and you’ll gain credibility with your peers for being so fortunate to visit such an in-place that Instagram made popular. Meanwhile, I’ll tourist the corpse of your recent past and grieve your inability to celebrate the fine qualities and unique character of a land that was once held in reverence for the experiences it shared with those willing to traverse its vast spectacle of beauty. Today, we worship at the feet of grotesque wealth while things are supposed to bring us into self-realized entities on the verge of enlightenment, which will never be found in objects or trendy hangouts.

Carlos Guerrero at a Colorado State Line

Alrighty then, I need to leave New Mexico, leave the lament, and move onto new horizons as Carlos and I cross the Colorado State Line into the wintery environment found in the mountains.

Carlos Guerrero at a Colorado State Line

And what’s better upon visiting a new state than dropping into the snow and making a snow angel? We were halfway back to the car when Carlos realized he no longer knew where his phone was. To share with you that I was happy he realized it when he did would be an understatement.

Carlos Guerrero in Colorado

No worries, Carlos, I’ll go back to the gas station and grab a cup of hot coffee to help melt your connection to the folly of having to test your need for certain knowledge.

Snowy Colorado

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forest. When traversing places with someone of unknown quantities, we can lose the ability to read what the eyes are trying to take in as the chatter in our head overwhelms the visual aesthetic, and our inner voice distracts us from deciphering what the gap in communication is whispering at us. It is a distraction, preventing me from gazing as deeply as I might when traveling with Caroline because an inexplicable connectivity creates a symbiosis of sorts, linking the two of us while a telepathic language seems to be blurting out “wow” over and over again. Carlos, on the other hand, is elsewhere, in a place I cannot easily decipher, possibly overwhelmed, underwhelmed, or maybe nowhere. In any case, I find it difficult to understand his version of quiet.

Durango Silverton Train Station in Durango, Colorado

Trains take people places, cars, and bicycles too. When people lead the way, however, the journey is directed by the whims, curiosities, and knowledge of the guide. Giving over the itinerary to someone else absolves one from having to make the important decision regarding the destination. In this case, the journey is a constantly evolving series of impressions without end. We are taking a pause in Durango, Colorado, with my intention of sharing as much about the old steam trains that run through here as possible.

Carlos Guerrero at Durango Silverton Train Station in Durango, Colorado

The last train of the day had already pulled into the station, and tomorrow, we’ll be gone before the first one leaves Durango for its journey to Silverton, so the museum would have to suffice for this brief intro. Fortunately, Jake, the train enthusiast, was at the helm and offered Carlos and me an immersive deep dive into all things regarding the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad, along with his dreams of spending a lifetime exploring trains around the world.

Durango Silverton Train Station in Durango, Colorado

With the whole operation about to shut down for the evening, we were able to gather a better sense of the history without the flighty crowds of cackling tourists. For a moment, it was just your average train station from 100 years ago servicing an outpost at the end of the track in the old west, and it was all ours.

Durango Silverton Train Station in Durango, Colorado

Growing up in places where seemingly everyone lived makes for a stark contrast to what I most love in places at this stage in my life: there should be only a few to no people. A train going to unknown places with no one else aboard, trundling over an infinite landscape day after day with nary a stop, offering an uninterrupted opportunity to read, write, think, and drift into nothing, is the description of a vacation I’d sign up for.

General Palmer Hotel in Durango, Colorado

So, this is how the other half lives? Our more typical accommodations do not feature a lobby, a library, or afternoon coffee and cookies. This is the General Palmer Hotel next door to the Durango & Silverton train station, and it has serious amenities. The deal wasn’t great, but it wasn’t horrible either, so I thought, let’s splurge and bring Carlos into some old-west luxury. Later in the evening, he spent a solid two hours down here reading and writing in the parlor that was his alone.

General Palmer Hotel in Durango, Colorado

The General Palmer was built in 1898 and has some real character compared to the formulaic franchise hotels that have become so popular. The crazy thing about this is that I can book a room for Caroline and me at the 900-year-old (Zum Roten Bären) Red Bear Hotel in Freiburg, Germany, for a cheaper rate (in season even) than this midweek winter rate in the southwest corner of Colorado. I know this is an old song here on my blog, but I feel like I can’t say it enough: America is moving further away from being an egalitarian society in the relative blink of an eye. Years ago, Caroline and I could move around the United States rather inexpensively, but those deals were more and more difficult to find. Sadly, I have to be the first to admit that the lower the socioeconomic status of my fellow travelers, the likelihood of wanting to be in their presence is greatly diminished as the poor are becoming increasingly belligerent, loud, and vulgar. While I didn’t share it following our night in Socorro, New Mexico, the cheap motel we checked into had a drunken party of linemen wrestling and acting the fools in the parking lot. Yeah, I know they were just blowing off steam from some days of hard work after getting paid, and they were hardly a major annoyance, but in general, the type of person booking those lower-end accommodations are no longer young families but the Andrew-Tate-type animals cultivating their inner troglodytes. The implications mean we have to isolate ourselves in progressively more expensive lodgings with a gentrified clientele.

Durango, Colorado

Maybe the sun is not only setting on the day but also setting on me. Was I really so undiscerning 10 and 15 years ago? Have I become more aware of noise when I still remember many a room we’ve left due to shenanigans in a nearby room or the utter depravity of what we checked into without first examining the room? Is this the grump of the old man? Well, at least the sunset found in the sky is still beautiful, while our dinner at Himalayan Kitchen was yummy perfection.

Gianni Coria featured at The Gallery in Durango, Colorado

A walk down Main Street was necessary if I was going to get to my desired step count, and who wants to pop back into a hotel too early? As Carlos went his way, I needed to fetch my fleece as the absence of the sun brought on a chill. Aside from Maria’s Bookshop, where I picked up a copy of Otherlands: A Journey Through Earth’s Extinct Worlds by Thomas Halliday, there wasn’t a lot more on Main Street that interested me until I arrived at The Gallery. Trying to offer you more info on this little treasure has proven impossible as there is nearly no information on the internet regarding it, even being in Durango.

Gianni Coria featured at The Gallery in Durango, Colorado

The pieces I’m sharing are from Gianni Coria and I only know this due to the tiny amount of data I did find on the interwebs. In the shop itself, there was nobody to be found. Had I been a climate activist intent on gluing my hands to a piece, there was little anyone monitoring the cameras in the gallery could do as I could have splashed Gorilla Glue all over my naked body and attached myself to one of these four-foot-tall pieces. Next, you might ask, what was I doing naked in this gallery after I just shared that I grabbed my fleece, and just what is gluing myself to a piece of art when nobody is around to witness it going to accomplish in my fight for climate change awareness? Come on, think about the headline, “Naked Arizona man found cold and hungry and glued to a painting in Durango gallery claims he doesn’t know how he got there.”

Shifting Palette

Socorro, New Mexico

The odd pairing of the 20-year-old and the man with some seriously gray hair continues as we’re about to surpass 24 hours of these two guys traveling to places familiar to one and relatively unknown to the other. We woke in Socorro, and I got to learn how Carlos is a true lover of sleep and wakes only reluctantly. No matter, we were quickly gone and traveling south, though there was a good chance we’d not find what I was hoping for.

Bosque Del Apache in Socorro, New Mexico

People traveling ready to accept that they might not arrive at their expectations are already winning because they know that no matter what is there or not there, they can simply be excited about being there. We have arrived in the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge that hugs the Rio Grande, and while beauty is obviously on hand, the hoped-for large flocks of wintering birds have already fled the coop.

Bosque Del Apache in Socorro, New Mexico

Before reaching a herd of maybe ten deer, we’d seen an eagle, an owl, a couple of hawks, a lot of ducks, and various other birds, but even with my zoom lens, there was no capturing of a worthy photo of any of them.

Bosque Del Apache in Socorro, New Mexico

The main pond is quiet while I try to describe to Carlos what a November day looks like out here when 10’s of thousands of birds are still on the water just before the sun pokes over the horizon.

Bosque Del Apache in Socorro, New Mexico

A small handful of Canadian geese were present; they flew in but weren’t here for long. The snow geese and sandhill cranes apparently just left in the past couple of weeks, according to a local who’s out here frequently. The season is over, and with such low numbers of birds, we skip the south pond and begin our trek north to Santa Fe, New Mexico, after we dip into Sofia’s Kitchen & Burrito Tyme only because El Camino is closed. Breakfast is decent in this little diner, and should you dare try the Two Smothered Breakfast Burritos plate, be prepared and carry a big appetite with you or know that you are leaving with lunch.

Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

Meow Wolf’s House of Eternal Return in Santa Fe is the sole reason I’ve brought Carlos to this city. We’ll spend hours here.

Carlos Guerrero at Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

The curse of foreknowledge was playing its hand here as I struggled not to say a word or offer guidance about which way to travel this maze buried in the carcass of an old bowling alley. Carlos would be left to lead the way and discover the 70-odd rooms that exist here.

Carlos Guerrero at Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

I recommended that he try to leave the camera alone so he might better fall into immersion within the House of Eternal Return. Do not be distracted by documenting your experience; try to dedicate every bit of attention to the ornate and intricate world that’s been crafted here, and I’ll try to provide some worthy memories that will travel with you into your future. This advice might seem to contradict my constant refrain of being a proponent of documenting one’s life, but on occasion, we must allow our senses to be fully captivated.

Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

“What are you willing to risk?” This might be the question Carlos is working on within his head as he explores a wider universe where everything from everywhere is meeting all at once at the crossroads of his imagination and curiosity.

John Wise at Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

Hello, I’m John Wise, your personal guide and knowledgable emissary on this adventure into places unknown. Without the use of drugs, magic, or hyperbole, we will explore the boundaries of potential boredom with the occasional glimpse into the extraordinary, but to get there, we will have to traverse the edge of space and time. Fortunately, for the experienced host, these feats are easily played and delivered because, with 45 years of contemplative thinking and vast amounts of firsthand know-how regarding delving within one’s self, you will effectively be guiding yourself deeper within. From here out I will no longer be known as King Caca Fuego but will go by Captain Potentiator.

Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

Carlos has suited up for his deep dive to continue his laborious journey to discover just who he is and exactly where he’s going.

Carlos Guerrero at Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

Praying to the Yeti God proved a non-starter, but it did tell Carlos of the Central Brain of Meow Wolf that would be found in communing with the all-seeing eye powered by the magic rat.

Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

Carlos, have you been able to connect? The wavelength is not always easy to unite with; yes, the struggle is real, but where the will paves the way, you will find the enlightenment you are seeking.

Carlos Guerrero at Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

“John, is this the cave Socrates spoke of?” No, Carlos, but all the same, don’t look too deeply into the shadows whose siren song will seduce you into taking up residence on that couch from which you may never escape. Remember, always keep moving.

Carlos Guerrero at Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

These iterations are the metaphors for the transitions, stages, and spaces you will inhabit in the coming years. The lesson is to embrace the peculiarities, go with the flow, kick back, and enjoy the ride.

Carlos Guerrero at Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

Is that enlightenment down there?

Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

The partial mask appearing as a silhouetted face is, in actuality, a portal to another dimension through the interior of the fluorescent green half-human/half-alien skull. This secret artifact that was loaned to the creators of Meow Wolf is the reason the old bowling alley is called House of Eternal Return. When one travels into the light, time will cease being linear as you spread out in all directions, connecting with the quantum everywhereness of being. Be careful, though: should you crawl through this membrane intellectually unprepared, you will be simultaneously booted right back, unaware that you’d gone anywhere. The prepared mind is a tricky thing to cultivate; it requires a discipline the universe favors. Most are doomed to look upon all they consider to be reality and never once understand that their myopia is like kryptonite to awareness. Should you find passage into this kind of tractor beam of potential enlightenment, though, you will be slung into contact with the great intelligence before returning to this house, where you may always return to find the unknown.

Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

These are just pretty pulsing lights with a bunch of knitted stuff trying to trick people into thinking this is the secret portal to other dimensions.

Carlos Guerrero at Meow Wolf in Santa Fe, New Mexico

It was at this moment that Carlos realized that the version of himself looking back at himself was in fact, having an expression on his face that was not the expression Carlos was currently making. Quantum-Carlos was signaling earthbound-Carlos to wake up, find the intentionality he knows he’s only now starting to harness, and get busy knowing himself.

Santa Fe, New Mexico

And then we headed into old town Santa Fe, where Carlos picked up a few books, took some photos, and we walked across town to get dinner because that was all that was left to do with this day. Well that and go to sleep.

Changing Perspectives

Carlos Guerrero and John Wise leaving Arizona

These strange fellows are about to cross a vast delta of time between them as this 20-year-old guy and a nearly 60-year-old man leave Phoenix, Arizona, on a road trip that will be all about getting out of routine and expectations. Curiosity is the bridge that connects Carlos and me. When I first spoke with him, he was carrying a copy of Les Fleurs du Mal (The Flowers of Evil) by Charles Baudelaire that I’d read around the time I was his age. This commonality opened a door, and soon we were talking about literature, philosophy, and art. After some months of the occasional chat during his breaks at Starbucks or even while on shift, he quit to take another job, and I was certain our connection would be lost.

Highway 60 in Arizona

As Carlos was about to move on down the proverbial road, he asked for my number which I thought was quaint though a bit silly because we live in America, disconnected, not just from one another but from ourselves. I entertained him by giving him my number and wished him good luck. Obviously, he reached out, which I found peculiar considering I’m three times his age, which would imply a chasm of cultural distance between us. Ah, this must be a one-time anomaly to satisfy his curiosity about cameras (he had spoken about his interest in photography before). When we met, he asked about must-visit places in Los Angeles and enquired about a restaurant recommendation in Phoenix where he might try something out of the ordinary. I sent him to a local Peruvian restaurant, told him of Kinokuniya bookstore in Little Tokyo over in L.A., and suggested he temper his expectations of what he thinks he needs regarding camera gear until he knows if he has a real interest or if it’s a passing fancy.

Carlos Guerrero off Highway 60 in Arizona

After a few of these kinds of meetings, I gave Carlos an old Canon camera body I knew I would never use again and lent him a lens for him to try his hand at capturing his world. Over some weeks, I’d swap out lenses with him so he could experiment with different perspectives. We talked of possibly heading out for a day of photography, maybe even a weekend in Los Angeles. A week or maybe two would pass before I got another text message asking if we could meet up as he had questions about something or other. This continued until a little more than a week ago when he asked if my offer to travel was still open. Five consecutive days had opened up in his work schedule, but I had to let him know that there was no way I was going to L.A. for that period of time: I’d lose my mind – those days in Southern California with the traffic I’ve grown to abhor would pummel me. However, I told him if he were open to somewhere random, we might be able to work something out. His answer surprised me; it was a simple and concise “sure!”

Little Colorado River near Springerville, Arizona

Here we are on the first day of that five-day outing, hoping we might fall into some flow or else we’ll be doomed to end this expedition shortly after its beginning. This inkling of doubt nagged at the back of my head because how in god’s green earth (black & white in this instance) would a 20-year-old deal with hanging out with a potentially grumpy old man stricken with ugly fixed habits and a general intolerance for bullshit? On the other hand, how would I deal with an impatient and possibly petulant young man I only knew from brief encounters at a nearby Starbucks? About the path we’re taking, it was just a dozen hours prior to our departure that I fixed on one of two potential directions: north or east. We are heading east, and at this juncture in our trip, we are crossing the Little Colorado River near Springerville, Arizona, on U.S. Highway 60.

Near Springerville, Arizona

How appropriate, a young buck in nature and a young buck in my car venturing into nature. This deer is looking over his harem, which is off to the right and out of view in this photo; I have no way of knowing what he’s thinking. In one of the images above this, Carlos is walking through tall grass; it was here that he shared his first epiphany of sorts with me: he was struck by the rolling hills, the winds driving the grasses in patterns reflective of the air currents, and how far the horizon stretching beyond his purview. He voiced his wish that he could see what was beyond the hilltops, so I pulled over to a gate without a “No Trespassing” sign, and off he went to the other side. When he returned from looking into the mystery, he expressed a sense of awe. Maybe this guy won’t annoy me into taking him home as soon as tomorrow morning, after all.

Carlos Guerrero at the New Mexico State Line

With his display of potential, we entered into another state, quite literally. Carlos was about to visit New Mexico for the first time and put on a face of excitement. I guess it’s part of the generation gap and will contribute to my own learning experience regarding what modern youth is about. While a polite smile would have sufficed, anyone could wear that, and now this moment will forever be frozen into the story of Carlos as he crossed a barrier to finding himself elsewhere and that this was the appropriate gesture for entering new territory, physically, experientially, and intellectually.

Quemado, New Mexico

His enthusiasm quickly came crashing back to earth when I explained that we were going to squat in this abandoned motel in Quemado, New Mexico, because not only was it free, but there were still a few amenities that would make our stay comfortable.

Quemado, New Mexico

I chose this room for my young companion because I felt the eagle above the bed best represented his potential to lead a life free to soar over the world he’s yet to create for himself. Yet it appeared that Carlos may not really be ready for true adventure because I found it impossible to convince him to enter this liminal space. Was it the threat of what might be hiding around the corner in a bathroom of unknown surprises? Come on, Carlos, I plead, it is this sense of liminality that will have you finding another essential part of who you are. For those who would like to understand this idea without interrupting my riveting tale of personal growth by consulting a search engine, I offer the following:

In anthropology, liminality (from the Latin word for threshold) is the quality of ambiguity or disorientation that occurs in the middle stage of a rite of passage, when participants no longer hold their pre-ritual status but have not yet begun the transition to the status they will hold when the rite is complete. During a rite’s liminal stage, participants “stand at the threshold” between their previous way of structuring their identity, time, or community and a new way (which completing the rite establishes). — from Wikipedia.

Quemado, New Mexico

Hey Carlos, is that the sound of panic creeping into your voice as you ask if I’m really going to take these Dollar Store Christmas Mugs? Of course, I’m going to take these great souvenirs; the alternative is to visit some sickly bright gift shop somewhere and buy stuff neither of us needs. Might as well collect some free things to mark the first day of our adventure together. Hey, you wondering, too what’s through that doorway in the background on the right?

Quemado, New Mexico

There was no phone signal out here, and racing over to the payphone to call home for a rescue proved futile for him. In what crazy universe does one believe payphones are still a thing?

Quemado, New Mexico

Oh drats, the local diner is closed, too! I guess we’ll just have to bag a dog or something for dinner, but don’t worry, Carlos, I know how to prepare just about anything. Heck, I got you out here, didn’t I?

Quemado, New Mexico

With his vacation quickly turning dark and the worries of his mom possibly coming true, Carlos felt he needed to reconnect with the god he’s been neglecting, so off we went to the 24/7 local Catholic Church. Appropriately enough, it was Sunday, and he was able to pray and beg for his salvation. I don’t exactly know where his imagination was going, but he asked me to share the following with his mother:

May this Communion, O Lord, cleanse us of wrongdoing and make us heirs to the joy of heaven through Christ our Lord.

Dead Coyote on Highway 60 in New Mexico

Oh look, we’ve found dinner without having to lift a finger trying to capture something fresh.

Pie Town, New Mexico

We left the alternative dimension of Quemado (translation: burnt) and Carlos’s nightmares behind and headed to Pie Town. Certain that winter spelled NO PIE for us, I was surprised to find the Pie-O-Neer Cafe open. Seriously surprised because I had been certain this place was shuttered after being up for sale for quite some time. Alrighty then, we need to step right in as they were “Open For Our Pleasure.”

Carlos Guerrero in Pie Town, New Mexico

Carlos explained, “Yes, this is, in fact, my face of pleasure. Do you have a problem?”

Datil, New Mexico

It was now time to remind my young travel companion that he had foolishly entered New Mexico with me, the home of Roswell where the aliens be. Just behind that large dark cloud is the mothership about to whisk him away for the kind of probing that will defy his worse fears, even those he was entertaining back in Quemado when he thought I might be serious about staying in an abandoned motel. Strangely, he was calm about the whole thing, telling me he felt nearly complete after enjoying that apple/green chile pie with homemade vanilla ice cream back in Pie Town.

Datil, New Mexico

All that was left was for me to tap into the VLA (Very Large Array) here in Datil to inform my overlords that the initiate was ready and happy to join the aliens for whatever adventure awaited him. Hours earlier I had been thinking I may not get along with Carlos in the long run, but now I’m almost sad to see him go.

Datil, New Mexico

This may not have been a Great Story, but it’s the one I mustered all these days after our road trip into unknown territories. At least as far as Carlos is concerned. Had I been taking notes during our outing, I might have had some factual details that didn’t veer into absurdity, but this is all I have.

Carlos Guerrero in Socorro, New Mexico

Hopefully, dinner at El Camino Restaurant in Socorro will be the elixir to revive me and allow color to return to our world. We’ve driven 376 miles to arrive in the middle of nowhere, which seemed like a great idea to me when planning this trip, but looking at Carlos here holding his head in despair, I have to question my thinking about this itinerary. Maybe it’s just an age-gap thing?

Ethel Cain

Ethel Cain at Valley Bar in Phoenix, Arizona

Closed out our day today with a live performance by Ethel Cain at the sold-out Valley Bar. First up as the opening act was Colyer who turns out to be the co-writer of Ethel’s song American Teenager. During his short 30-minute performance, we didn’t know of his connection to Ethel nor did we know that he’d be playing guitar during her set. Colyer seemed to be channeling Chris Isaak with a bit of Leonard Cohen sprinkled in (according to Caroline) and for me, it was a mix of Teddy Pendergrass and George Michael: slow vibes, and smoky sensuality for the shoegaze crowd.

Ethel took the stage to wild enthusiasm from the audience, and I can’t emphasize enough, seriously wild enthusiasm. The roar in this tiny 500-person venue reminded me of the kind of scream reserved for those who are on their way to superstardom. While I could be mistaken, I think Ethel opened with American Teenager which resonated with many in the crowd who are still a lot closer to their teenage years than us two oldies that were in attendance, probably looking like chaperones for some kids we brought. The rather short set closed with Crush and, as the old proverbial saying goes, “…the crowd went wild.” It was obvious that this was the most popular song of the evening if that is judged by the number of audience members singing along. Sadly, the encore was but one song, likely due to time constraints of this being an all-ages show and the bar needing to get to other business after kicking out the kids

Aaron Coldblood, John Wise, and Caroline Wise at Valley Bar in Phoenix, Arizona

Walking out of the venue we ran into Aaron Coldblood who we’ve not seen in a few years. Nothing has changed with Aaron, well except that his old dog passed away since we last saw him. We learned that Aaron has been wearing the hat of DJ most recently organizing shows here in Phoenix but with the possibility of a gig starting over in Vegas. His shows focus on industrial, Witch House, and something else I can’t recall. While you wouldn’t guess it from Aaron’s gruff exterior he’s quite the sweet guy who seriously loved his old dog, enjoys drives on the Pacific Coast, was brought to tears at a recent Tori Amos show and was nearly moved to tears by Ethel this evening, what a romantic.