You
can get the wrong idea about how Emily and I live from reading this
blog. It looks like we spend all our time on road trips, having fun.
Sorry to say that it is not the case. We wish it could be, but it
just plain ain’t.
We
both have day jobs. Writing far-out imaginative fiction doesn’t pay
much, unless you get hooked up with a corporate entertainment outfit,
then, of course, they want to control everything. Also, writing takes time.
Spare time is an alien concept.
So
when the time came for our 30th anniversary, we decide to steal a
week to go celebrate with a third honeymoon. We couldn’t actually
do it on our anniversary, but then we learned long ago that life is
easier if you don’t beat yourself up over silly details.
We
had to get out of town, out of this crazy state, but Arizona is a big
place. Getting out of it takes a day or so. So we headed for Sedona.
Sedona
is so different from Phoenix that it makes for a good weekend getaway
that we do often. It is the home of Latin Inspired Cuisine, where
brown-skinned citizens and old fashioned Mexican restaurants are
recent additions. I used to feel like part of an affirmative action
program walking among the Anglo tourists, but times have a-changed.
There
was a place called Butterfly Burger. Hmm. Proper exploitation of
insect protein could solve the planet’s hunger problems. How many
butterflies does it take to make one burger? Maybe if could breed
caterpillars to grow to cattle-size . . .
One
of our favorite restaurants offers cactus tacos. I haven’t tried
them. Just can’t make myself order vegetarian when real,
carnivorous tacos are available.
A
sign advertised Salt Rooms. What the hell are Salt Rooms? Probably
something like the expensive crystals that they claim suck the
“negative energy” out of you.
The
next day was Indigenous People’s Day, which, according to the
Surrealists is the day that the Indians discovered Columbus. I woke
to a lot of hypnagogic visions flickering inside my eyelids,
inspiring me to grab my phone and work on my novel. Out our window,
the sun rose over a jagged, silhouetted mountain, and we could see
and hear Oak Creek from the balcony.
On
our way to the Coffee Pot for breakfast, we passed a place that
offered Conscious Meals. I
imagined them screaming as you bit into them.
Then we left Sedona, go onto the 89A, and in Flagstaff, to our horror, discover that the cool gas station with the metal dinosaurs and other statues was abandoned and fenced off. A lot of our favorite places are being closed down. Whither goest thou, Aztlán?
We
did a pit stop in Fredonia, with it’s old school, funky tourist
junk. I was reminded of Freedonia from the Marx brothers movie Duck
Soup.
Groucho’s character, President Rufus T. Firefly has a lot in common
with Trump. That and a hangover from my morning hypnagogia produced a
sci-fi vision. Alien robber barons land, want to convert the entire
earth into liquid assets, people cooperate because they think it’ll
make them rich, only in the end, they get liquefied, too.
There
was a lot of roadkill along the 89A.
Also
new murals on abandoned-looking structured in Navajo country. Outlaw
culture refuses to die!
Finally,
we turned onto Highway 389, where we’ve never been before. Through
the Kiabab Paiute reservation, and onward to Utah.
