The desert don't quit

more of her in all her glory

We left the desert for a few days at the end of February for my birthday. Matt and I were thinking about how sad it is leaving the desert. Sure, a lot of it could be leaving the cats. But as much as we love seeing our favorite old stomping grounds and friends, or experiencing something totally new, it’s hard to leave. Our house has become a home. I look out my windows every day and smile at San Gorgonio and the Palo Verde tree in the front yard that looks like a giant upright bunch of dill. I feel hugged by the mountain range and hills all around us. I was making our bed yesterday, having a little chat with myself (as one is wont to do while completing chores) and thinking about how Lucy, my Arizona-native, appreciated how I self identify as a desert rat. Despite only now living here full time, I think I have always been a desert rat. I bury myself in dirt and sand. “Well yes, I have always been meant to be here,” I said aloud with the final fluff of a pillow. And part of me thinks it’s because of the challenges the desert loves to provide us. We saw a couple of them the past week, and my love only grows through how we always get to the other side of them.

When we were in Austin, the high desert had its first larger snow of the winter. According to folks who have been here for a few years, this winter has been wetter and colder than prior. We came back to a wet and cold Joshua Tree for sure. We also came back to a windy Joshua Tree - a couple days later, my aforementioned favorite tree (a refuge for birds and bats, her long frilly limbs food for rabbits) was uprooted by winds. Some parts of the desert had 50mph gusts.

She fell over while I had a 24 hour stomach bug and could barely walk around the house let alone go out and tend to her. I felt hopeless in so many ways. I was sick, it was cold, I didn’t know the first thing about tree care. Should we have kept her branches shorter? I thought native plants took care of themselves? Will my nausea pass within the next minute, the next 5?

We don’t know if she’s salvageable. She is a staple to our home - I collect feathers from under her, I watch her dance and sway in the wind. And most of all, she had always seemed so resilient. Did I let her down?

The ennui continued into the next few days of heavy snowfall (enough for there to be an avalanche in Palm Springs, on San Jacinto). The snow and wet made her branches even heavier. Snow in the desert is a strange thing. It’s not just because you expect it to be warm here or something (which is objectively false, we still have a winter), but because it gets incredibly quiet. The sky turns grey and heavy. It becomes a rare day where the sun isn’t even attempting to peek out like she does in a rain. She’s just gone for a while.

After the second day of snow, we ventured into the park to see the effects at a higher elevation. We went late in the day, and the lighting made it look even more eerie. Most of the Joshua trees had snow only on one side from the wind. After our tree situation, I was expecting mayhem in the park. I started thinking more about Joshua trees in a way I hadn’t in a couple years, because they’ve always sort of been around. But of course, the Joshua trees stood perfectly still in the snow with so few casualties. Stoic, strong.

While Joshua trees are typically hop heavy, they have extensive root systems. I didn’t know this until a bit of research, but Joshua tree flowers need a freeze in order for them to bloom. Other important Joshua tree facts: their seeds were initially spread by the giant Shasta ground sloth (9 ft long), and Gavin Newsom just proposed the Western Joshua Tree Conservation Act in February of this year to further protect the species.

I’ll hold my mourning of our Palo Verde until we know her official prognosis, so in the meantime, I’m learning from and inspired by the Joshua tree. Her root system. Her wintering. And despite needing the freeze to flower, she still shows up all the same.

What did I learn from this wintering period, the past few cold months and start of the year? What is the freeze allowing next for me? What is yours allowing for you? One can’t question the learnings from one’s environment without provoking the end of “Lucky Life” by Gerald Stern:

Dear waves, what will you do for me this year?
Will you drown out my scream?
Will you let me rise through the fog?
Will you fill me with that old salt feeling?
Will you let me take my long steps in the cold sand?
Will you let me lie on the white bedspread and study
the black clouds with the blue holes in them?
Will you let me see the rusty trees and the old monoplanes one more year?
Will you still let me draw my sacred figures
and move the kites and the birds around with my dark mind?

Lucky life is like this. Lucky there is an ocean to come to.
Lucky you can judge yourself in this water.
Lucky the waves are cold enough to wash out the meanness.
Lucky you can be purified over and over again.
Lucky there is the same cleanliness for everyone.
Lucky life is like that. Lucky life. Oh lucky life.
Oh lucky lucky life. Lucky life.

Love and warmth,
Lily

Snowperson not by me