This week’s guest columnist is Naima Schuller.
I grew up in Show Low in the 1980s when the population hovered somewhere around 5,500. I felt like I lived in the backwaters of some social wilderness area, designated just for Mormons, Jack Mormons, rednecks and assorted hermits and hippies. Going to Stake Center dances and snipe hunting definitely wasn’t fulfilling. My heart was full when I played my flute. I also fed my brain at the library with everything by Beverly Cleary, Madeleine L’Engle, and Tom Robbins, books about Zen Buddhism and Pearl Bailey’s autobiography, The Raw Pearl. Flagstaff, on the other hand, called to me, as the closest cultural mecca, with a university, a shopping mall and tourists from every country in the world.
I made it to Flagstaff for the first time my eighth grade year to attend Northern Arizona University’s summer music camp. I remember hearing the train horns from my camp dorm room. I remember the long hours of practice, practice, and more practice during that week at camp, and how it was completely worth it. I was only seventh chair out of 12 flutes in the lowest level band, but I was in love with the huge sound of that band, which was three times the size of the middle school honor band back in Show Low. Also that summer, at the insistence of my camp roommate, I smoked my first clove cigarette the night before camp ended. She seemed really confident and worldly, and I didn’t want to be thought a prude, so I tried it. We opened the window of our room on the fourth floor of Reilly Hall and smoked that stinky cigarette, coughing, laughing and bonding over how much smoking sucked.
The next time I came to Flagstaff was in 1988, to audition for a music scholarship to get into NAU. My boyfriend drove me from Show Low to my audition in his parents’ beige, beat up sedan, my palms sweating the whole time. I lost an earring in that car, but that’s another story. The audition didn’t go well. My cassette tape, with recorded piano accompaniment, malfunctioned during my first attempt. I got so flustered that it wasn’t until my third attempt that I got the notes right and somehow kept going. Heading back to Show Low I was so disappointed in myself. The descent from Flagstaff to the lowlands near the Little Colorado River in Holbrook that day mirrored my spirits as I wondered how I would ever make it out of that small town. I didn’t get that music scholarship, but I did secure enough funding from the White Mountains Women’s Club and the Show Low Elks and Rotary organizations to attend NAU for two years.
During that time I went home every other weekend. Traveling that route quickly became one of my favorite rituals—one that helped me deal with the stress of being in college. Leaving Show Low, I would roll north through the dry, grassy hills along State Route 77. The juniper forest and wide vistas surrounding the towns of Snowflake and Taylor had been the edge of my previously known world. As I descended a steep hill a few miles west of Snowflake, I scanned the wide horizon, and I felt my shoulders drop and relaxation creep in. I passed the trickle of the Little Colorado River near Holbrook and Winslow, and turned west onto I-40. Then, I entered the prairie east of Flagstaff with the Hopi mesas in the distance. The prairie eventually gave way to piñon and juniper trees, then gently transformed into a majestic ponderosa forest starting just past the Cosnino exit. I always made sure to find the first ponderosa, rising above the shorter piñon and juniper trees, signaling my return to the mountain.
The next phase of my life found me living in San Francisco. I worked hard on two vocational degrees: massage and graphic design. Also during that time, I started painting. Not surprisingly, I painted many landscapes of the high desert of the American Southwest. Although I had created a family with my friends in the San Francisco Bay Area, I found myself homesick for the wide open spaces and sunny mesas of my home. Finally, after a short foray to Show Low to have my first son, I made it back to Flagstaff in 2000.
Fate found a way for me to continue my road trip ritual—this time, on a daily basis. For the last three years, I’ve traveled into Flagstaff every day from Cosnino Road. I always search out the first ponderosa, even on my quick trips into town. It’s a sentinel declaring I’m home.
Naima Schuller has lived in Flagstaff for 17 years, cumulatively. She is passionate about all types of artistic expression, civics and books. You can find occasional posts on her blog at www.householderyoga.net.