The Long Long Road and Tucumcari

A week ago, I realized that I was stuck in Provo.
I was so bogged down in planning, that I didn't bother acting, and with me, that always leads to a depressed and sluggish feeling. After a call from my friend, now in Moab, I realize my time to act is now. He mentioned a friend who had just left to Salt Lake City and was passing through Moab. I jumped at the opportunity. Sunday came and we rode down to Moab. The town got at my heart quick. We went into my friend's house and we wasted no time in hopping on his bed and waking him up out of his sleeping-bag slumber. We walked out and I was charmed by the red-rock cliffs and fields that I saw off to the north of town. The day ended with a charming sun disappearing behind the ever-prominent cliffs. The next day it snowed and snowed. We met up with a girl and went to hike Arches National Park. As we walked, the snow sprinkled our faces and red-rock dust and fins mixed with the pure white. The sun half appeared from behind a veil of clouds from time to time, enough to bring a smile and sparkle to our eyes. At times it felt heavenly. I share an excerpt from my paper journal:

The next few nights I thought on the lyrics of one of my most-cherished bluegrass albums. Its a Long Long Road by Blue Highway. I could not help but feel it during the bicycle ride from Moab to Monticello, a fifty-five mile journey with an elevation uptake of 2000 feet, along with 200-ft-tall rolling hills. It was subliminal. Red rock, blue skies, robust white clouds, and the lightest-yellow grasses, sometimes for miles to each side, meeting up with more red-rock cliffs.
At one point the snow began to fall, and I rode on, turning to Jim VanCleve's Devil's Courthouse for strength and heated-up blood. The mandolin solo symbolized the snow that poured around me and figuratively through me. This part of the country really is getting under my skin.

It's a long long road to wander alone
It's a cold cold wind hear it moan
Cryin' like a lost child out in the night
Searching for the way, and looking for the light

I think of all the snow, all the red dust, all the rubber residue. It all sort of blends together in your mind. I passed open cattle pastures, rocks that looked like towers, wands, even marks of royalty. I passed Church Rock, next to the turn-off to Utah Rte. 211 and it looked like a Pope's crown. I exulted in it, and after not too much longer, a man pulled off to the side, and offered a ride. He rolled down the window and he had a great pure look in his eyes. I had met him during my first time in Monticello. When I travel I seem to have perfect timing. I landed at the home where I'd visit just as the husband was beginning to split wood. We got it done quick, though I was tiring out. As much as I hated it, he was right, and it was time for me to lay low and recover until I head back out.  

. . . But not before one final southern utah adventure! After some research, I headed down to Home of Truth, and got a ride from a gentleman who actually knew the ghost town's founder, Marie Ogden. So neat. Well I get there, and I check it out. There is a sizable rock to the north, and after seeing the old homes built into the earth, I begin to climb. It was gentle enough to simply walk up and occasionally stair-step up. I was enrapt in the reds and whites and yellows. I got to the small mesa and walked about it for a half-hour, catching a view of the canyon lands  (which really were horizon-to-horizon) looking out to all directions. I began my climb down, I wrapped around the northwest side, gradually hopping down, level by level, when convenient. I came to a double arch, each one actually forming an entrance to a small cave. The arches and cave's depth both measured approx. four feet. By grabbing up a hunk of deadwood, I stepped up and made a hop to a dimple in the rock and grabbed the lip of the arch to climb in. Red dominated the cave's insides but chipped w away to reveal sandstone -- so soft it covered the inside to the depth of an inch with pale powder. I take off my coat and lay upon it, The February sun warm enough to sleep by. I bare my feet and they dry quickly. The sun heats up my waist and legs and toes. The redrock hugs my hips and rib cage. I melt into the rock. My fingers are cooled as I conceal my hand in sand. Pants, arms, hair are covered in red and yellow. I am perfectly and completely serene. I look out and see the quiet mountains in the distance -- the color of the sky in its shaded portions and white in the sun --with a twisted conifer close up, a perfect setting for my surrender to sleep. 

Musical Location of the Day

In all honesty, all I saw of this town was during a midnight greyhound ride. Tucumcari, New Mexico. A town whose name origins are unsure, from stories of a Native American contending with a father for the hand of his daughter to the simple explanation that it is named after the local mountain, Mt. Tucumcari, signifying breast in the native tongue. And how fitting; as from both mountain and mother flow precious fluid, without which is no life. Either way, the song goes as follows:

 

 I was thinkin' 'bout Mary as I left Tucumcari

 Four hours to make Santa Fe

 I know she's been hopin' I'll quit this damn ropin' 

 But that's one thing she'd never say

 It's more than a living it's been my whole life

 It's taking and giving, pleasure and strife

 Well I've known all along this day would come: I guess my ropin' days are done 

The significance of this song is unmistakeable. There are times where we each must put away from ourselves that which seems a complete part of us. For this man, it was the life of a cowboy; and I , my traveling. And soon, I shall take to the road once more as an over-the-road trucker, which will be no less in-my-bones when the time comes to sever it.