Way Out West
Because I’m unutterably uninspired and indecisive and overwhelmed with heat exhaustion and summer ennui, I’ve decided, for the time being, to just roll down the comments/Ask Gypsy submissions in order, that way I force myself to write about everything y’all have asked and suggested. And by the way? Thanks so much for pulling through for me like that. My mind is a muddle these days and my muse has fled for cooler climes.
Kimmykins asks:
I’ve always wanted to ask you how long you and Lancelot lived in AZ. Did you live in Phoenix? (I lived in Scottsdale). What took ya’ll out there? Did you love it? Did you hate it? Was it just ok? I know it’s a boring question but since I lived out there too I’m interested.
Ah, the blistering boil that is Arizona. How young we were, how fresh and hopeful when we set out one spring day for the unknown wilds of Scottsdale, that denizen of the desert with strip malls and golf courses and new boobs and lawns full of pristinely raked pink gravel.
We had no idea what to expect, having never been there. I had graduated from college a year or so before with a history degree (not to mention an extra one in English and a double minor in Italian and Italian studies — the attainment of which would mean absolutely nothing for my career). I was working in a bookstore, he was waiting tables. I decided wouldn’t it be nice to be a travel agent? No, no it wouldn’t, but I didn’t know that then, so being an industrious girl who gets what she wants, I, through means I won’t mention (they’re not dubious, just more revelatory than I’d like), got a job in Scottsdale at a travel agency. We thought it would be perfect — I’d be a jetsetting travel agent (shut up with the laughing) and Lancelot would get his culinary degree. The deal was we’d go to Arizona for his schooling — we picked Scottsdale for that express purpose — and then when he was done we’d go where I wanted for graduate school.
So off to Arizona we went in a 20′ Penske truck with my car towed along behind, the cat in her carrier, and my dog clinging for dear life in my lap the whole bajillion miles across the country. As we watched the rolling hills of pines in Florida transition to the vast expanse of nothing in West Texas to the dusty cactus-strewn desert in Arizona, we wondered what the hell we’d gotten ourselves into. But the future was bright, we had high hopes, and we were on our own at last, just us against the world.
At first it was all excitement and exploration. I’d never lived outside of Florida, discounting my semesters abroad. I marveled at how flat, flat, flat the area was, the dryness that sapped the moisture from my skin, the stars that went on for miles and miles in an open sky, the brilliant lightning that flashed across the bowl of the night, brighter and more vibrant than ever I’d seen it. We’d wander the big city of Phoenix, going to used bookstores and antique malls and Mexican joints and just driving and pointing things out, digging into our new town, trying to plant some roots.
But we never took. We were too much beach in too much desert. After the first year, we missed the ocean and trees and deep history. Arizona, to us, just seemed always new. New to us, and new to the world. We were used to stories going back, buildings with historical plaques on their well-worn sides, and people whose people had been in the same spot for generations. Phoenix felt brand spanking new, and her people felt transitory and fleeting. We who never met a stranger were surrounded by them with no idea how to breach the isolation of a big town and a different, more reserved populace. We were hey y’all and friendly nods and please, go ahead in front of me. And it’s not that the people in Arizona were unfriendly. Not really. They just weren’t what we were used to and we were too young and frightened and fish out of water to batter or slither our way in.
We stayed about two years. It’s been a while now, so time has smoothed the edges and buffed the dents from my memory of Scottsdale. There are things about Arizona I loved. I’ve never been in better used bookstores, the food was great, the funky little shops were everywhere. I miss pulling into Los Betos for a burrito at 2 am, high on cheap weed and with my hair in a messy ponytail and Lancelot in the seat next to me shouting his order into the scratchy receiver. I miss the winters, when the weather was perfection, sunny and mild every day, every, every day. I miss the smell of those winter evenings, cool and sweet. I miss driving up to Jerome and Sedona and taking little backroads into nowhere towns. I miss the wide, wide streets, the tiled roofs, the stuccoed walls. I miss Fashion Square and Bookman’s and Camelback Mountain at sunset.
But it didn’t fit. Not for long. We need to hear the ocean in the shells of our ears, and Scottsdale was too far from trees and roots and family.
I’m starting to feel a little bit like you did in AZ. It’s so dry and deserty here, and I’m a swamp boy. Hopefully I can get used to it though, as I don’t have another transcontinental move in me.
A Free Man’s last blog post..I’m the root of all that’s evil, yeah, but you can call me cookie
I live in Scottsdale, what a small world!
flutter’s last blog post..The sound of no silence
I totally also went though the travel agent phase. Awesome.
I don’t think I could live in the desert. I’m also pretty sure I could never live in New York or Paris, Tokyo or Milan, or southern California. Any place that’s associated with elegance, high culture, and beautiful people (in any way) is really not a place I belong.
I like beer and greenness.
Fuck it.
rassles’s last blog post..I Was On Fire This Weekend, Figuratively Speaking.
You are a braver woman than I. Growing up in bumpy WV, there’s no way I could live in a place as flat as AZ. Nope.
Beautiful post darlin’!
Coal Miner’s Granddaughter’s last blog post..Sod Off!
Hey – Thanks for answering! I lived there for 2 years also. I really did enjoy it and liked the experience of being in an element that was completely different from what I had been raised in (I was raised in the south at the beach too). I moved there for work purposes as well. I loved having a view of the McDowell Mtns. from my apt., loved going to Cave Creek and Black Mountain and seeing the sajuaros in the desert driving out there, Old Town and eating at Los Olivos, Scottsdale Fashion Square was definately a fave, downtown Phoenix to party at Jackson’s etc. – and you are right Camelback at Sunset is beautiful. I loved not having to turn the heat on in the winter and being able to swim in an outdoor pool all year long. I did not however, savor the 116 degrees in the summer or the way my nose cracked and bled everyday when I first moved out there until my body adjusted to the dryness. It really wasn’t fun passing out in the Albertsons from the heat and awaking to paramedics sticking smelling salts in my face and asking me if I was diabetic. No, I was just a dumbass who ate nothing and drank 3 cups of coffee before going out into an inferno. I wasn’t real fond of the power bill in the summer either when it cost me around $115 to AC a 2 bedroom apt. I guess that made up for the winter when they were only $40. I made friends but it took a while because as you said – It’s just different. Then after 2 years of living there it was time to come home. I missed my friends and family and I only got home maybe 4 times in 2 years. I have a very good friend that I made out there who I still go to visit. I’ve been back a couple of times. So it sounds like we had similar experiences. I’m so glad I did it.
Well, when someone throws you a bone, you sure can go with it.
Wonderfully written!
I’ve never been to AZ…but I don’t like to sweat much, so I don’t think I’d like it there for the long haul.
Have the T-shirt’s last blog post..Waiting is Hell and a New Baby!
Arizona…no desire whatsoevah to live there.
Sorry to hear the travel agency thing didn’t pan out. I would think that would be a cool job which would include lots of cheap vacations on the side. However, it is probably like anything else that you do for a living: work!
mary’s last blog post..
Chris: I don’t care what they say about a dry heat. I need me some moisture.
Flutter: Scottsdale was a nice place to live, really.
Rassles: Yet another awesomeosity we share. I could live in Paris, and I once lived in Florence, but I’d prefer Amsterdam. Amsterdam has beer and greenness. Of many varieties.
CMGD: Thanks! The lack of trees was an issue. If we’d been in Flagstaff or something we might have stayed longer.
Kimmy: Los Olivos! I remember that place. I do miss the food in Scottsdale. Everything was good it seemed. There was really good antiquing out there, too.
T-shirt: There’s not a lot of sweating going on in AZ — it dries too quickly.
Mary: That’s what you would think, isn’t it? But it’s just not so. The industry was dying even when I joined, and that was back in the late 90s. The perks were falling away almost entirely. And the pay was laughable. Ah well. It was worth a shot.
Gypsy’s last blog post..Way Out West
See? Your writing is amazing, Gypsy. At first I thought, ‘Whatever about Arizona. Whatever.’ And then you took me back to when I was a teen and would have long visits with Aunts and Uncles who lived there. Wonderful.
I was dreaming of living in AZ a few years ago, but couldn’t bring myself to do it. I need the lush, lush, lush of Missouri. Maybe a visit again some day, eh?
Mongoliangirl’s last blog post..Some Days I am Hysterical. Maybe I’m just awful.
What? Did I know you used to live in AZ and just forgot or am I just learning this now? Camelback mountain, Bookman’s, Los Betos. Aww, you went and made me homesick.
Transitory, fleeting. These are some of the reasons I left. In Phoenix, people are too unpredictable there and too willing to pick up and move and leave you stranded with no friends. It’s full of young people who are from somewhere else just trying to get a start and then they realize that they got a start and now they don’t need Phoenix. And then there’s the other side of Phoenix, the people from there who never leave. It’s a weird balance.
God I miss those winters though. And the drives to Jerome and Flag.
Nice post.
blues’s last blog post..London Bridge is Burning Down
Gypsy. Please write a book. I will buy it. You capture things so perfectly and sometimes I feel like I am where you are thinking. It is amazing and you are so talented. Don’t waste it. Go. Right now. And write a book.
Mongo: My writing? Thanks!
Blues: You must have known. I think I’ve mentioned it, but maybe not. I knew you were from there anyway. I couldn’t have stayed long, but I’m glad we lived there.
Carrie: That’s the best compliment ever. Thank you. I’m mulling it over and tossing some ideas around.