Adamana Road Part One: The Desert For Real
The beautiful distractions of people and places are gone. We are in the middle of two reservations. An algae plant and a few true desert people for neighbors. A yard strewn with petrified wood, cow pies and the debris of a former construction type hoarder; a beautiful sky punctuated by cell towers. A long road and a vast desert. Not even a Joshua Tree in sight, BLM living gave us a taste of Desert, but Holbrook Arizona catered a whole dining experience.
Sharing a few stories from the Adamana Road days in the coming ruminations, first up, a water appetizer.
The across the highway neighbor is a veteran. He is short and very fat. He reminds me of all the old man vets I worked for back in Greensboro. He likes to talk and tell stories. But anecdotal ones so you end up hearing a few on rotation each encounter. One about a good movie he likes, something about war jet engines, and some story about a shooting and a run in with the cops in Colorado.
He makes us those survival bracelets out of Paracord after the first time he passes us while we are having an evening walk with Atlas. Mine is hot pink and Rasta color, Emmett’s is also Rasta color but with solid red. I think to myself two things; we must give a beautiful wandering hippie vibe to be interpreted as
“Rasta color liking people''
and these desert people are either very bored or incredibly giving. His girlfriend is named Theresa, she has horses and goats and like five dogs in kennels. They used to have ducks, but something about how mean they were didn’t work out. A desert farm, but real low budget. She makes her own goat cheese and brings us some. It is creamy. I didn’t ever spread it on bread, which would’ve been delicious. I think we both were a little like,
“but for real, is this safe to eat?”
“our right next-door neighbor Joe gifted us some of his apocalypse food from around the 80’s”
Mostly because our right next-door neighbor Joe gifted us some of his apocalypse food from around the 80’s and I left the bag of white rice he had out on the table. Next thing I know the kernels are squirming and writhing around, turns out those were maggots. It is the thought that counts.
Holbrook is a special place.
What I am trying to get around to saying is that the first time Mark drove past us while we were evening walking Atlas, because it is devilishly hot during the day and the sand burns his little puppy padded feet and his fur gets too burning hot, he was bringing some well water to his neighbor for his horses. Because the mans been sick with cancer or something and his wife is doing the best she can but Mark is a nice guy and he gets purpose from being helpful.
“I can bring you all some water too, if you need it.”
Emmett tells him,
“We are good, we just fill up our 5 gallons at the Petrified National Forest.”
Mark sputters,
“How long have you been drinking that?”
We laugh,
“Since we got here, I guess. There is a faucet at a picnic area.”
Mark replies,
“Well suit yourselves but I’d be careful drinking that water, lots of heavy metals and god knows what else.”
I stand there kind of like waking up from a dream, my head slowly cocking to the side. My mouth parting and my brow furrowing in thought. Hands on hips, we had already been there for around 3 weeks. I hadn’t noticed it before but I was so dazy those three weeks.
What did we do in those three weeks? Almost bought an ostrich egg from a rock shop, spent full days digging for petrified wood, binged Game of Thrones, smacked sprouted potatoes into the desert with a lacrosse stick. Real heady stuff.
How long are we going to be in the desert? Quite a while more it turns out, will share more later.
In the meantime, we started buying our water in town and my head cleared right up.
Time made sense again, kind of. Well the most sense that time can make. Desert water will make you crazy. Or maybe it’s just the desert. Turns you into a special kind of weird. The kind of weird that gets good stories to share further down the road.