I have traveled this road many times. Too many to recount. I measure them by my adventures and misadventures upon this stretch of life line. The route is from the foot of the Sacred Mountain of the West to the California coast. I am once again riding the rhythms of the road west into the San Francisco Bay. I have no flower in my hair, just the West Coast wind. I am musing on this magical passage where angels and ghosts weave themselves into the tapestry of these journeys. The fading signs and dilapidated structures of the Mojave Desert give way to the verdant promises of the Central Valley. The first whiff of the coastal fragrance is my welcome mat.
I first traveled this highway in the early 1970s when I thumbed my way around the American West, protected by innocence and confidence. Cadillacs and groovily refurbished school buses, semi-trucks and middle-class RVs were my mode of motion back then. It seemed like a time of great collective innocence; I felt the angel’s protection. I was dressed in youth and enthusiasm. A sheep camp full of kids did not need an extra mouth to feed so I thumbed out.
I pointed my hood ornament west again in the mid-1970s to become a student at art college. I drove my turquoise 1964 Ford Comet with a lifted body and a killer eight-track sound system. My eight-track burned up the blacktop from my familiar life on the Dineh’ Rez to the abstract geometry alien to my senses. I came to embrace the city after an initial “culture shock” experience—the San Francisco Bay Area.
In the late-1970s, I was at my best being a father and husband hurtling across the moonlit desert in a 1970 VW Bus, with our two young daughters. The Joshua trees eerily dancing by like spiky, feathered chiefs of old. By the dim light of the dashboard, we sang silly songs. Twice a year, we reconnected the two worlds bringing a eucalyptus fragrance to the welcoming arms of the piñon and juniper. With our children, the road was more than a stretch of asphalt. It was the lifeline between two worlds we treasure.
More than just experiences in geographical transitions, it was getting back on the sacred pollen path for me. It was vision I awaited: the first glimpse of Do’ ko’ ops liid, the peaks. It was coming home.
This well-worn path has seen me running to or from something or someone many times. At times, the road and I needed no reason. Many mornings, before sunrise, I left my loves, radiant, dressed in mist, receding in a rearview mirror. I often find these bittersweet memories embedded in the lyrics of a song. Before trips I feed my path, my strength and my truck with corn pollen and a road prayer. These earnest longings seem to be a blessing that always brings me home safely into the center of the Sacred Mountains.
In the 1990s my friends and I made the annual pilgrimage to the Stanford University’s Powwow. It was mostly an excuse for a wild-but-safe road trip and party—a group of guys getting a break from the dry Kayenta dust devils. We hydrated all around but always with a designated driver.
Our later travels were guided by love, resulting in the most beautiful stories. Leaving the Bay, kissed by her lingering silky fog, our peaks remained a beacon for our returns. Matters of the heart are very much a part of the road’s stories. I know the heart is the true guide to these road musings. Love made imprints of us in the desert’s sandy soil. Yes, love seethes along with anger, quietly upon this road, next to me. Oh no, not again. Cheers and the tears bead the length of the road … Yes, ghosts are very much alive upon this road I know. Now I am on this road again, alone with my thoughts. That is how I like to travel, alone and undisturbed. My friends and relations await my arrival in the city. Today I am bringing offerings to the great sea. My sacrament of corn pollen and blessings are for the journey and homage to our great Maternal Dineh Goddess, White Shell Woman. I am also bringing gifts for human hands—awareness and prayers. I also bring strife and stuff I need to leave for the rhythmic pounding of the surf to wash away, such as the stress and negativity I carry and my weaknesses and ills.
Today I drive west, fueled by that expectation, and as I drive I’m listening to Keith Richards’ autobiography “Life” for the second time. Everything is and will be OK.
