… and into the Canyon
One week ago I returned from an eight days backpacking trip with the Grand Canyon Field Institute for which Christa is a founding instructor some fifteen years ago.

I cannot fully describe the intense learning experience coupled with the phenomenal beauty of the north rim of the Grand Canyon where we carried heavy packs through more than 12,000 feet elevation loss and gain. It is the sharp contrasts from rim to river, the rich, exposed geologic and dynamic human histories that create such a compelling, raw story.

An Open Book
Nowhere else on this planet can one witness such an open book to so many years of history, from the ruins of mining expeditions just decades past to the bedrock formations 1.7 billion years old. In this place Christa wove a story eight days and at the same time 4.6 billions years long as we hiked from the rim down through limestone, sandstone, shale, and confusing mixtures of all three that tell an incomplete story of mountains rising and falling, rivers flowing east and then west only to be temporarily blocked by volcanic eruptions. Ultimately, the Grand Canyon was formed, yet even today the full story remains elusive.

I grasp what I saw through the magnifying lens, the shapes of ancient trilobite tracks, crinoids, worms, and brachiopods, but even after three years of exploring the Southwest with Christa, whose profession it is to teach geology, archeology, and paleontology, my brain struggles to fathom the one variable that makes all things possible—time. I am overwhelmed by consideration for the quantity of creatures that must have lived and died in the ancient oceans to build a thousand feet or more of the standing limestone cliffs, now painted red in flood by the overlying, frozen sand dunes and river floodplains.

To Thunder River, Tapeats, and Deer Creek
Out of the limestone comes rivers. Not just seeps, trickles or flows, but rivers that pour from slits and mouths and gaping caves of limestone walls, rain water filtered through overlying layers reaches an impasse and moves instead horizontally. These rivers gain volume, momentum and pressure, and—with time—emerge from underground caverns and caves to refract the rays of the high noon desert sun. At the base of the falls are cottonwoods, juniper, maidenhair ferns, grasses, and pools of water that have not for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years run dry.

We found refuge there, as did the Native Americans in decades and centuries past, for our needs have not changed so much in the intervening generations that we cannot appreciate something so incredible, authentic, and rare. It is good that our inventions have not replaced in us the basic appreciation of pure water and cool air.

We hiked beneath Thunder Falls and up Tapeats Creek where we found a living cave rich with stalagmites, stalactites, and an underground river thirty feet wide and a few deep; to the muddy brown Colorado River and to Deer Creek where the Piute dead pass back into the underworld through the narrow, winding water way. We came back up more than six thousand feet by way of Surprise Valley and a sandstone plateau where driving rains drove those of us without a tent to the shelter of the sandstone ledges.

Each evening Christa read to us—stories from the river, the Hopi, the Mormon settlers, and those not of books but of the rocks and stones themselves for they have recorded the coming and going of entire continents afloat on a semi-molten goo. If only I could learn the Latin names of plants, the age of the rocks, and the lineage of the peoples who have made this place their home as easily as I memorize the speed of a new processor or interconnect fabric, I could tell you a more complete story. For now, my photos will have to do.

Sadly, only for a few days each year do I go without cell phone or internet connection. But these days I cherish most, for my mind is no longer concerned with the timing of things, the overlapping conference calls, nor the financial health of my company. It seems then, during these brief, true vacations, that if every microwave oven, cell phone and TV, if every embedded CPU and laptop on the planet would spontaneously disappear, the world would be a slightly better place.

Thank you Hank, Midge, Steve, David, and Christa for a most educational, light hearted, and enjoyable time.

A Celebration of Life
My grandfather, the father of my mother, died this past Sunday, his heart no longer desiring to contract and expand. We had believed (or hoped) he was recovering, for he had readily beaten two years of cancer by way of a combination of the simplest of treatments (a positive, can-do attitude and ultra-high doses of vitamin C injected directly into the blood stream, the resulting hydrogen peroxide toxic to cancer cells) and the most modern of technological weapons (a real-time CaT scan coupled with an electron beam generator to perfectly target and destroy cancerous cells with minimal damage to surrounding, healthy tissue). But in the end, when traditional chemo therapy was applied, it was pneumonia that reduced his heart’s capacity to a bare minimum, eventually non-functional state.

Just three or four months prior Grandpa had climbed ladders to patch the roofs of twenty, thirty, and forty foot tall barns by day, rebuilding the engine and transmission of an antique tractor by evening in the old hog house. His life had been an active one; his body, strength, and spry humor portrayed a man of many, many years less than ninety for he remained handsome, strong, and as quick on his feet as he was with his wit.

My grandfather taught me more about how to lead a meaningful life than any other person I have known. He died with no enemies and no one who would not claim to be his friend. He could fix anything, and without a high school eduction was one of the smartest men I will ever know. Taking his lead, every morning that I am able, I eat oatmeal for breakfast; my body, like a tractor engine, needs proper fuel and care.

I must admit that I dreaded the funeral — for the complexity it added to my already insane schedule, and for what I assumed would be a time of mourning in a fairly conservative church in a very small, mid-western town. But I was pleasantly surprised, my judgment incorrect, for those two days were indeed a celebration of life more than clinging to the loss. Two hundred and fifty people gathered to eat, tell stories, laugh, and yes Mama Wekesa, to clap. These Lutherans did clap and the spirit did fill them (and the spirit was mighty hungry for they ate an incredible amount of food!).

Following the funeral, the family drove to the farm. Christa, my cousin Andy and I spent the afternoon driving the old Ford tractor down through the timber, chasing sheep (and being chased by the llama). We climbed to the top of the silo and to the hay loft of the big red barn. We talked, laughed, and ate more food. When the sun set, my aunt, uncle, cousins, parents and grandmother gathered between the farm house and the artesian well to shoot all the fireworks that remained in storage. With each explosion of light and crack of black powder against the even darker sky, our hearts lifted just a bit, and we knew it would be ok.

The next morning, Christa and I woke well before the sun touched the shimmering, moisture laden fields. As we drove away I accepted that it is time for the next generations to find solace in those beautiful hundreds of acres along the Raccoon River where the Pride of the Valley Farm yet grows healthy soy beans and tall corn. The mulberry, apple, and walnut trees continue to feed those who know when to reach into the branches. Great blue herons and sand hill cranes glide swiftly over the brown water while deer, raccoons, turtles, snakes, and foxes leave tracks on the sandy, river bars. Without computer nor even cell phone reception, this is my heritage, the one place that I feel most at home. This is where my story begins, and some day this is where it may end.

“Goodbye Grandpa, and thank you for everything. You should know that Grandma is still baking cookies. Just a few more for the rest of us now!“

One of the most enjoyable aspects of my life has been directing short films. A 16mm Legomation in grade school, a few Hi-8 oddballs and a claymation in high school, and in the past years just shy of a decade, short films collaboratively produced with my brother Jae. With each film we fall shy of our expectations and full potential on one or more levels, but each has produced a challenge unlike the prior, granting us experience and most importantly, time together in which we just flow. We are always complimented by our actors and crew as being organized, professional, and enjoyable to work with.

Last week we shot the first three minutes of a new short called “Sweet Memory”, produced for a local horror challenge put on by one of the teams that has participated in all three of the Almost Famous Film Festival 48 hour challenges.

Outside of the preparation for the shoot (securing the location, renting lights and additional mic equipment, writing the script, locating the actors), Jae and I were on set for ten hours. Ten hours for just three minutes, to reproduce a scene that unfolds without script or guidance countless thousands of times every day — a man visits a local bar to unload this burden, the bar tender greeting him by name and pouring his favorite drink.

Take one was flawless, but we need four more camera angles in order to cross cuts. The dialog must be perfect with each iterative recording. The glasses emptied or refilled. The wine poured back into the bottle. The soiled towel replaced. The actors returned to their starting places, the scripts rewound in the reels of their heads. And then the camera angle changes and the effort to maintain continuity redoubled as the lighting, sound, eye lines, and every shot detail must match. Is a reflection of the off-camera light showing in glass pane? Is the hi-light on the lead actor’s forehead the same as it was in the previous shot? Was the wine bottle label facing in or out?

Between shots, the scene comes to life as naturally as any real bar. Some of the extras know each other from previous projects, their catch-up banter a reminder of how small the Valley acting scene remains. A relief to my brother and I as we can focus entirely on our work and not worry about keeping them occupied nor content. The food platter prop is slowly reduced by a few pieces of cheese, crackers, and grapes between each shot. Everyone laughs, wondering if they will be missed on the big screen.

Tomorrow night we shoot the second half, roughly six to ten minutes of final footage. Another night time sequence, the conclusion to the film takes place in a multi-million dollar home in the East Valley, just south of the Superstitions. We will have the assistance of a good friend and technical expert in lighting and sound. Even with just two actors and three or four crew, the work ahead remains a daunting task.

Last night, after writing the post “Spirit of the Wind” I drove to Tempe to see “Once”, the Irish musical. A movie well done. Simple, elegant story telling. An art all but lost in American film. I then drove to Arizona on the Rocks at 90th and Frank Lloyd Wright Blvd to climb. When I left the gym an hour later at six in the evening I looked to the North and was thrilled to witness the entrance of the powerful companion to the wind, the feared and cherished desert rain.

Its face was two, maybe three thousand feet tall, cloaked by an omnious hood reaching out and over a mile of its intended path. The leading edge was a translucent mixture of white, blue, falling to gray. The solid mass that fell from the back of the hood to the desert floor was an impenetrable black, momentarily illuminated by strokes of lightning within. The mountains north of Cave Creek and Carefree were completely masked and invisible.

I jumped on the freeway and then off again at Pima just a few exits later. One mile from Carefree highway, the water touched my windshield as counted drops. By the time I turned East on Carefree, the rain drove sideways and the road was overtaken at all but the most subtle crossings, native topsoil mixed with gravel moved as liquid, white and yellow painted boundaries all but obscured.

The rain did not just fall, It came down with bold intent. The aroma of wet creosote entered my car through the vents. There is no smell that touches me like that of the desert in rain. The outside temperature dropped from 103 to 85 in less than ten minutes, and then into the seventies.

At the “Y”, I went to the left and north toward Seven Springs. The temperature continued to drop. Seventy five. Seventy one. Sixty eight. Sixty five. The sun was setting. And the spirit of the wind had handed its torch to the spirit of the rain.

While I continued along the mixed paved and gravel road to Seven Springs, the wall of water moved south. But it never made it past Camelback Mountain nor the McDowells nor even much beyond Pinnacle Peak, from what I could discern the next morning through my exploration by vehicle and by foot. My brother confirmed that not a drop fell in the heart of Phoenix less than thirty miles south of where I Carefree was overwhelmed, the concrete and blacktop and pool decks once again the victor in the battle for supremacy in this drying, dying place.

At the Seven Springs camp ground I moved to the passenger side of my car, dropping the seat back and the windows open to allow a few drops to fall on my arms and face. I fell to sleep quickly and slept well, the sound of the rain upon the metal roof of my mobile shelter slowing to a mist well after midnight.

This morning I awoke as the sun rose to the green that only a recently wetted desert can paint. Not forest green nor apple green, but a florescent green that appears to glow from inside of the creosote, prickly pear, sage, and grasses.

I entered the gravel road on the far side of the park and headed north and east for a little over twenty miles, reminded of how much incredible beauty exists just outside the reach of the Phoenix wasteland. High desert plateaus and deep, heavily wooded canyons bounded by distant, purple peaks that rise and fall. Four Peaks to the immediate south. Weaver’s Needle beyond that.

With the choice of east to I-17 or west to the Verde river, I returned to Seven Springs, Cave Creek, and then Bartlett Reservoir to swim before driving into the only remaining portion of the desert north of the McDowells not converted to a “desert lifestyle” by Troon or Del Webb.

I recalled Pinnacle Peak as it was when I was in college, where I often slept for a few hours atop spires of decomposing granite between long, intense days in the studio of my Industrial Design program at ASU. I recall one night clearly where I lay on my stomach and peered over the edge of one such rock to observe a half dozen coyotes feasting on the night’s kill. Their barking was intoxicating, the excitement of the feast echoing across the then, mostly unaltered desert floor.

I reached the saddle of the McDowells by foot just as the sun broke through the final remnants of the previous night’s storm and the temperature rose from the low nineties to the low hundreds. Back down the rolling double track to Jomax and Dynamite roads, across the reservation, to the 202, and Tempe where I now sip an iced tea, wishing I was again being tested by the spirit of the rain.

When I lived in Phoenix my final two years of high school and subsequent five years of college, I recall once or twice a storm of such incredible proportions that it invoked a sense of superstition, anthropomorphism giving voice to the wall of red sand that came in from the West.

photos by Dan Heim

This one thousand foot high curtain covered the Valley with intent, an ominous creature who year after year attempted to remove the pollution of this man-made anomaly. First the blasting sand to scour the buildings, cars, streets and manicured lawns. And then a torrential downpour to wash away the exfoliated skin of human creation, flooding streets, gullies, canals, and what remained of the natural washes and otherwise dry basins.

The evening news made victims of the people rescued by helicopter from the roof tops of their cars, having attempted to drive across a flooded roadway; and heroes of those who conducted the rescues. No one gave credit to this desert of ten thousand years whose implicit right it is to replenish herself not in subtlety, but in bold, dynamic flood.

It is a natural part of the ecosystem, an anticipated and joyous event that all but the modern city dwellers celebrate. Instead, they attempt to control it, ignoring that replacement of the original, fragmented and porous skin with concrete focuses and amplifies the run-off into unnatural channels ill equipped to deal with the volume. Two college degrees rendered useless in a single night as both civil engineers and weatherman Valley wide lowered their heads in shame, realizing they knew very little and could control even less.

In the subsequent years, however, the average, ambient night time temperature has increased by nearly ten degrees and the perpetual column of rising, hot air literally obliterates the moisture bearing clouds.

Two nights ago the desert unexpectedly came to life. I could smell the dust rising and an excited electrical charge. In the distance, beyond South Mountain, a few lightning strikes confirmed my body’s response to a childhood recollection. The spirit of the wind had returned.

In a matter of minutes, the visibility dropped to less than one hundred feet. I could not discern the color of the house across the street and traffic at the end of the block was visible only by the halo of head lamps emitted from cautious cars. My brother was nearly lost coming home from just one mile away, the corner street signs invisible.

I ran out to close the windows of my car and enjoyed the rocking motion for a few minutes as the wind erupted in seemingly random gusts. Back inside my parent’s home, the single pane, steel framed windows were no match for the fine particles which coated floor, furniture, and lungs.

Queen Creek, to the south of the Superstition Mountains was hammered with rain, the temperature dropping from 108F to seventy-something in just twenty minutes. Beyond South Mountain, just fifteen miles from downtown, it rained for an hour. But in downtown Phoenix the rain never came, void of the smell of moisture which usually accompanies this monsoon wind. The column of amplified heat was an impenetrable barrier that even ten thousand years of wisdom could not defeat.

Every year it gets hotter. Every summer, the average night time low and the number of nights which remain above 90F increase. Every year the rain moves further away from the heart of this place, depriving the residents of the very reason they moved here, a place of stark contrast and harsh, surprising beauty.

Only the ghosts of generations prior recall the cooler nights in the desert and smile for they know that some day, by subtlety or by bold flood, this place will be reclaimed and the rains restored.