Learning a new language
When I lived in Turkey I learned a saying which captures how I felt when I traveled to the American desert for the first time, Dilimin sınırları, dünyamın sınırlarıdır - The limits of my language are the limits of my world. When I first entered the world of the desert, I might as well have gone to a new country because the landscape was as foreign to me as Turkey’s Taurus mountains had been when I first arrived there.
In our first few months of travel in the West I felt like a toddler, pointing out every new shape and exclaiming with excitement, “There’s another cactus!” This vast new space provided more questions than answers. How did the desert work? How did animals survive or plants bloom? Why were washes given names? As for cacti, I could only label every pointy plant a “cactus” and I even had to look up the plural—cactuses or cacti. Either is fine, by the way.
On our way out of Oregon, we visited our first one, a “cold desert,” the Alvord Desert in Eastern Oregon. Alvord is so dry it looks like a chalky white dried lake bed. It is an anomaly to the alpine land just west of it, but Alvord is in a rain shadow created by mountain ranges: Coastal, Cascade, and the adjacent Steens Mountains. As we were driving alongside this dry desert basin to the Alvord Hot Springs were we were camping, countless yellow flowers inexplicably lined the road. How did they get here? We both came up with all kinds of crazy theories. Someone planted them? Rain runoff from the road? Little did we know that these little flowers would be everywhere we went.
Brittlebush Yellow Desert Flower
We first saw this yellow wildflower growing along roads and paths in the Alvord Desert, a place so dry we both had bloody noses. The earth felt like a desiccant, yet these beauties were thriving. They also bloom in the Sonoran and Mojave deserts.
The Brittlebush is a common, widespread desert plant
They survive because of their long roots and also they compete for space and limited water because germination-inhibiting chemicals leach out of their leaves and into the soil so that few species of annual wildflowers can grow under them. I found this one in Cochise Stronghold in Arizona’s Dragoon Mountains where Chief Cochise is buried.
Native American biologist and author, Robin Wall Kimmerer, wrote in her book Braiding Sweetgrass “Paying attention is a form of reciprocity with the living world, receiving the gifts with open eyes and open heart.” I wanted to connect more deeply and to understand this strange land. The desert endures. In it I feel impermanent, a visitor who wants to interact, but the desert is too sleepy in the winter to care about me. I wondered if, by knowing more, I could belong.
Here I feel a silence I’ve only ever experienced after a snowfall in New England. The snow muffles sound in a cozy way, as if I were snuggled beneath a blanket. But in the desert, I feel just the opposite. I am open wide, at the center of all things. Sometimes scents arise, mysterious to me because I can’t always see blooms. I rub leaves trying to find the source. Lots of sage, of course, but other scents too. One shrub actually smells like cheddar and I learned it is called cheesebush. Sometimes the birds are plentiful and other times I have to look carefully. The only constant has been the raven. No wonder they figure into so many indigenous stories. Stay here long enough and you begin to talk back to them. Longer still and you will understand the raven’s response.
“When one of us says, ‘Look, there’s nothing out there,’ what we are really saying is, ‘I cannot see.’”
In the first month, as we drove in and out of desert landscapes, a tough looking dark green bush caught my eye. I was finally able to identify it while on an interpretive walk in the Valley of the Ancients, the creosote bush. Even more ubiquitous than the yellow brittlebush, the creosote sometimes takes over an area and is the only obvious plant. As a New Englander who admires grit, this scrappy bush has earned the title of one of my favorite desert plants.
Creosote Bush
In much the same way as the brittlebush, it also secures water by inhibiting the growth of nearby plants. I can’t help but admire this evergreen shrub and respect its tenacity for we’ve seen it in every kind of desert. Here it is in the Sedona red rocks.
We hope to visit the "King Clone" creosote ring in the Mojave Desert. An estimated 11,700 years old, it is one of the oldest living organisms on Earth.
Fuzzy Seeds with an Earthy scent
The creosote’s fuzzy seeds remind me of round pussy willows and the smell from the dark creosote leaves is unique—an earthy scent, like monsoon. I like it, but I guess its not for everyone because hediondilla, the Spanish name, means little stinker.
Another Turkish language saying is also appropriate for this journey. Başka bir dile sahip olmak, ikinci bir ruha sahip olmaktır - To have another language is to possess a second soul. When we stayed in Hovenweep National Monument we both felt the soul of that land. Here man-made ruins stand in stark contrast to the immortal feel of the land. The sky, canyons, and space surround you and it’s so quiet. At night it’s just sky and stars. Here, ancestral Puebloans built homes into the land fifteen hundred years ago. Empty facades are all that is left of man, but this wonderful, stoic land remains.
Hovenweep National Monument
On one of our first long desert hikes, we walked along the valley where the only sounds were from the taunting ravens and the sporadic and sudden rustle of leaves, like ancient rattling bones, in nearby trees. Walking with the sun pressing down on us, this poem came to me.
About a month later, Dwayne and I camped northwest of Tucson on BLM land, in what felt like the heart of the Sonoran Desert. We decided that the only way to truly understand this soulful space was to speak back. So when we drove to the nearby Saguaro National Park, we bought a little picture dictionary of the most common desert plants.
Our evening walk in the Sonoran Desert around our camp north west of Tucson
Like travelers in a new land, we took our dictionary with us each evening on our sunset walk, identifying and naming plants as we explored. In this way, the desert opened up in a whole new way. One evening I recorded a meditation trying out my new words. You can hear how I trip over a couple of them because they were still so new!
Dwayne pretending to hug a saguaro cactus.
Exploring, naming, learning about these plants brought us closer to the desert. In Dwayne’s case, I think he may have gotten a little too close.
Fish Hook Barrel Cactus
This barrel cactus squatted right next to our campsite. This one is called a fish hook barrel because native people used the spines for fish hooks. Its genus name is Ferocactus, Latin for “fierce cactus.” Another cool fact is that they can be used for emergency water if you’re ever lost in the desert. Not that we tried!
Saguaro Cactus
This iconic cactus is common in the Sonoran Desert. Birds and other animals take refuge inside. Near our camper we saw a Gila Woodpecker living inside a saguaro. I know this may be cliche, but they are another favorite. They are stunning and otherworldly.
Saguaro Spines
This is a closeup I took of saguaro spines. These spines protect the cactus from being eaten and actually shade the cactus! They look like something from Star Wars.
There were so many saguaro in Saguaro National Park. We’ve learned that most national parks, while not dog friendly, have a dirt road somewhere where we are allowed to walk with Neo. These spots are often quiet wonders. We took this photo on our walk, and you can see how with their arms outstretched the saguaro can easily be anthropomorphized.
“Caring is not abstract. The circle of ecological compassion we feel is enlarged by direct experience of the living world, and shrunken by its lack.”
Teddy B
ear Cholla, or Jumping Cholla
There are many kinds of cholla cacti, pronounced chohl-yah. This variety is the most striking. Their thick spines glow in the sun! Neo wants me to warn you not to touch them because they hurt!
Another Teddy Bear Cholla
I took this photo in Joshua Tree National Park in California. There we walked through a beautiful cholla garden. I got on my hands and knees to take photos from different angles much to the amusement of others. Well, it might also have been because I was talking to the beautiful cholla.
Ocotillo
Dwayne’s favorite desert plant is the ocotillo. I did not take this photo by Ryan Arnst on Unsplash, but we’ve mostly seen dormant ocotillos and I wanted to show the green and red colors. Availability of rain, more than seasons, determine the number of times an ocotillo changes, and it can change several times a year.
Larger Ocotillo
The ocotillo is actually not a cactus but a plant. Here is Marianne standing near an ocotillo to give you a sense of how large they can grow—ranging from 10 to 20 feet. Its fun to call out “ocotillo” when we see one, especially if it is silhouetted against the horizon like a tuft of troll hair.
With each desert we visit, we grow more intimate with this land. We begin to understand that as enduring as the desert seems, it is fragile too.
Joshua National Park is roughly the size of Rhode Island so we decided to visit it in segments. In the northern part, from the town of Joshua Tree, it is easy to find the plant this park is named after. However, when we entered from the south, yucca plants were only a couple feet. We drove for nearly an hour before spotting even one Joshua Tree. We learned that this is because they are threatened by two climate change’s threats of increasing wildfires and rising average temperatures. Outside the park, they are going away even more rapidly because they are losing their habitats to development.
Joshua Tree
The early Morman pioneers named this plant a Joshua Tree after their prophet, Joshua, who they saw guiding them westward. The Joshua Tree is actually not a tree but a Yucca genus that happens to resemble the size and growth pattern of a tree.
Dwayne standing beneath a Joshua Tree
As a U2 fan from the 80’s, I had to see the “tree” that was the name of the band’s iconic 1987 album. Okay, yes, I did play the album all the way through the first time we rode through the park.
In her gorgeous book, Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert, author and conservationist, Terry Tempest Willams calls the desert “our natural heritage.” I get that now. So many of us live and play here. About 30 percent of the US is desert. In fact, about 12 million people call the Sonoran desert—where we are now—home. This complex, fragile system is much, much more than dirt and sun. I am beginning to share Williams’ love of this nationally important landscape. Even in my short time here, I’ve learned that the desert opens to anyone willing to learn her language. I will never be the same, for as the Turks say, this second soul is within me.
