Some Thoughts on the Southwest
Essay Posted March 6, 2007 by James E. Nelson
We have just returned from a trip to Flagstaff, AZ for some family business. I’ve never been to Flagstaff and have only made a couple of small forays into the southwest, so the trip was full of new adventures for me. It was my first trip across I-40 from Oklahoma City to Flagstaff. We went home via Phoenix and I-10. It was my first trip to Phoenix, Tucson, and El Paso as well. What is most remarkable to me is how different the countryside is, not just from region to region, but mile to mile along the highway.
Traveling north to south through Arizona, after we left the mountains around Sedona, we entered an area that is technically desert (less than 10" of annual rainfall) but was lush with vegetation. I recognized the saguaro cactus but there were a couple of other types of bushy trees that filled the land. I was told they were mesquite and palo verde. South of Phoenix the ground turned more sandy and the lush trees were replaced by sage and salt brushes with a scattering of grasses. Every time we got into high country, such as when we crossed over mountain passes, there were typically acres of fairly tall grasses, beautifully yellow and waving in the February wind.
Some places, Sedona being the most famous, were primarily red sandstone. Other areas were dominated by dull yellows and grays. We saw the occasional black volcanic rock rising mountain-like out of the dirt and sand. In the cotton country of Texas the soil was so red that it was almost neon in the high sun. The mountains around Phoenix were especially purple near sunrise and sunset.
New Mexico was primarily angular with mesas in the north but flat and dusty with a sandy wind constantly blowing in the south. Towns such as Deming and Lordsburg looked like they came out of a western movie set. And yet, suddenly and without notice that landscape could change. The Sandia Mountains rise suddenly and quite remarkably out of the desert around Albuquerque. Just to the east of Las Cruces the Organ Mountains suddenly sprang toward the heavens, separating this gentle university town from the White Sands Missile Range on the other side of the mountains.
Maybe it’s the 75 mph speed limit, and maybe it’s the stark vegetation that allows the observer to see the shape of the hills and color of the soil, but it seemed that there was more variety in that part of the country than I had observed elsewhere. The official Nebraska highway map colors the different regions of the state so they can be easily distinguished. Those regions are quite accurate as to what one will see, with the grassy hills of northeast Nebraska being easily distinguished from the sand hills to the West. Similarly, the butte country (what’s a mesa to a New Mexican is a butte to a Nebraskan) is a distinct region. But these regions overlap and there is a gentle change of scenery as one drives east to west or north to south. These are also large regions and the each region is relatively consistent, so without the state map, the driver would probably be unaware of the changes taking place all around.
In contrast it seemed that Arizona, New Mexico and West Texas had a number of “micro-regions”—small areas that had a unique look. A few miles later the driver abruptly entered a different micro-region that was often remarkably different than the landscape of a few miles ago. I have no idea what causes this, but it made the region endlessly fascinating.
While the landscape was endlessly varied and interesting, the roadside culture was surprisingly banal. While in New Mexico we went to the Grand Canyon and the Cameron Trading Post. Both have active Navajo and Hopi arts and crafts industries. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised, but it was pretty much the same (and often exactly the same) stuff one could find in other native American trinket hot spots around the country. I examined the bottom of several pieces of “genuine Navajo pottery” looking to see if it was “made in Singapore.” I was suspicious because the “genuine Navajo pottery” was indistinguishable from the “genuine Lakota Sioux pottery” found farther north and east.
I have always assumed that the desert southwest pretty much looked the same—red sandy mesas—while the local culture—Navajo/Hopi/Mexican/American—would be unique and quite different than elsewhere in the United States. It turns out I was wrong on both counts. Southwest culture, both Indian and White, have been homogenized, no doubt because the overpowering influence of television and mass marketing. The landscape, on the other hand, we every bit as unique as a Santa Rosa shop keeper ought to be. But that’s the great thing about this vast land of ours. It always seems to overturn one’s expectations. This trip was no exception.
Copyright © 2007 James E. Nelson (Just Another Jim). All Rights Reserved.
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