Oak Creek Canyon, Vortex Of Fabulosity

As Ernie and I drove south toward Sedona on HWY 89, I mused about all of the years I've been visiting that spot. No doubt about it – Sedona, in its pre-vortex, pre-nouveau-riche, semi-old-west-town incarnation was a lot more fun than it is now. But Oak Creek Canyon, Sedona's raison d'etre, remains beautiful, magical, and delightful. There is no place like it on Earth, and the not-so-simple reason for that is its geology.

It's a small canyon – at least, compared to its giant cousin up North. Yet it shares a lot of the same layers you see exposed in the Grand Canyon. The mnemonic to remember with that chunk of the Colorado Plateau is this one: Know The Canyon's History – Study Rocks That're Made By Time.

Know – Kaibab: sandy limestone, greyish-white

The – Toroweap: also sandy limestone, a bit darker

Canyon's – Coconino: cross-bedded sandstone

History – Hermit: shale

Study – Supai: it's complicated

Rocks – Redwall: limestone (gray, but stained red by      hematite)

That're – Temple Butte: sandy dolomite, sandstone, mudstone, and limestone

Made – Muav: limestone

By – Bright Angel: shale

Time – Tapeats: sandstone

All of those layers, starting with the Tapeats at the bottom and ending with the Kaibab on top, are Paleozoic. In Northern and Eastern Arizona you can find at least a few Mesozoic layers too (from the Age of Dinosaurs): Moenkopi, Moenavi, the Chinle layer of Petrified Forest National Park, the Navajo Sandstone of Monument Valley, etc. It gets complicated, depending on how far North and East you go. Arizona was at the edge of the continent when a lot of this stuff formed, so you see layers from shallow seas, sandy shores, dune-y deserts, and river floodplains.

Ernie and I observed the whimsical shapes into which the Moenkopi layer likes to erode when we hiked through Wupatki. If we had continued North on HWY 89 (or the equally delightful alternate route, 89A) we would have seen more of this layer in Utah. Heading South on 89, we dropped in elevation, losing any hint of the dinosaur age, but discovering some interesting layers in Oak Creek Canyon that are not seen in the Grand Canyon. The east side of the fault that forms Oak Creek Canyon is topped by a thick basalt layer, a lava flow. But the Kaibab, Toroweap, and Coconino layers were eroded on this side of the fault, so the layer under that is the Hermit.

Much of the west side (1000 feet higher than the east) is topped with the Kaibab limestone. The basement rock is the Redwall layer – a lot of Sedona is built on that layer. Above that is the Supai, which is actually a group of layers, mostly sandstone and mudstone. The Hermit shale layer sits on top of that; despite its name, it is a complicated mix of sandstone, mudstone, and conglomerate. And on top of that is an 800 to 1000-foot-thick layer unique to the area: the Schnebly Hill formation, a series of gold and rust-red layers of sandstone, mudstone, and limestone. The sandy parts were were once coastal dunes.

Another layer pinches out inside the Schnebly Hill formation, a greyish band of Fort Apache Limestone. Coconino sandstone tops many of the formations on the south side, but it merges in places with the Schnebly Hill formation, giving the rocks a nifty striped appearance.

Like the Grand Canyon, Oak Creek Canyon can surprise you as it suddenly appears out of the landscape. This is particularly true if you approach from Flagstaff. The North end of the canyon is hidden among trees. Then you get to drive down the niftiest switchbacks on Earth, observing some spots where the layers have literally been pulverized by the fault. Invariably, when I'm driving through oak Creek Canyon, I have to pull over to let impatient motorists pass. For some reason, they like to zoom through this paradise, as if they could actually be bored by the sight. Poor, doomed souls. I hope my spirit will take this route to the Great Beyond, once I've left this mortal form behind.

In the meantime, this mortal form is very happy to hike various spots in the canyon (after having eaten a delightful lunch at the Galaxy Diner in Flagstaff). The first spot I wanted to hit was the trail near the West Fork of the Creek. You have to pay to get into this spot – it's not a State Park or a National Park. But it deserves to get a little moolah for its upkeep, and I'm grateful it never draws the same sort of crowd you would see at Slide Rock State Park. (Try visiting Slide Rock in January if you just want to hike and don't care about swimming – hardly anyone is there and it's spectacular.)

After that, we headed for Midgely Bridge (or as the locals call it, Midgely Bridgely). The climb down to the trail that begins under the bridge is a little heart-stopping, but you get an amazing view of the fork in the creek and of the Supai rocks. You can hike all the way down to the creek from there, a hot proposition if it's summer and the sun is shining. Fortunately for us, it was a cloudy spring day, so down we went. Wildflowers and rock formations caught my eye on the way down, and I saw some evidence of ancient hot spring activity in some of the rocks that had eroded from higher spots.

Hiking back up was much more of a challenge (for me, at least – Ernie is a mountain goat), but we still had enough energy to explore a part of the road (now a trail blocked to motor traffic) where the old bridge used to be. It was mysterious, and hinted at other spots not often accessed by casual hikers in the canyon. Some day, Ernie and I will spend a season there, exploring the general area. This is my fond ambition . . .

But the day was waning, so we stopped at our favorite coffee joint on HWY 89, before looping back to do the spectacular drive along HWY 179. Some of the niftiest formations reside there, and at one point the setting sun set the rocks ablaze. I had to pull over to one of the overlooks and snap some photos. I just managed to catch the sunset lighting up the rocks before the light shifted and the moment passed. My heart brimmed with satisfaction.

Sipping iced mochas, we headed back to Phoenix on I-17. I would rather have lingered and extended our day trip into days, weeks, months. But I comfort myself by considering the fact that Oak Creek Canyon, Walnut Canyon, Sunset Crater, Wupatki, Montezuma Castle, and dozens of other wonderful spots are in my backyard.

I just need to venture there from time to time.

Into The Great Semi-Known

At mondoernesto, my husband, Ernie, wrote about our recent trip up North to Sunset Crater and Wupatki National Monument. This was one of those trips we needed to take to feed our souls. Money is tight right now, and these trips are much less frequent than they used to be. So we packed as much fun as we possibly could into one day, starting the trip at 6:00 a.m. and ending it at 8:00 p.m.

If I could, I would live on the road. Granted, I've never had to do that, and maybe you get sick of it pretty past. But in my opinion, you get a lot less sick of it if you can take your time (and if the money doesn't run out). After we got up in the wee hours and fed the hungry cannibals (both feline and canine), we got into our truck and hit the road. My heart was flying.

About an hour-and-a-half up I-17, off Exit 289, there's a turn-around that can take you in three different directions. If you go right, you'll get to Cliff Castle Casino. If you go straight forward(ish), you'll get to the cliff dwellings of Montezuma Castle. And if you go left, you'll end up at a combo gas station/fast food joint. I've come to love that odd little hybrid at the end of the left-hand turn. We always stop to get coffee there, get gas, and make a pit stop. It has come to symbolize the beginning of all journeys (or at least, the ones that go up I-17).

Montezuma Castle and Montezuma Well are both fascinating and beautiful destinations. A peacefulness pervades the scene in both places that leads visitors to assume an idyllic life for the people who actually lived there, which was probably true at least part of the time. Likewise, Walnut Canyon, which eroded out of the same top layers that compose the walls of the Grand Canyon, is also a happy destination. But we were bound for Sunset Crater and Wupatki, places where life could sometimes be less than idyllic.

For one thing, around 1045 AD, a volcano went off. It was a small one, a cinder cone, but on the human scale that's plenty big enough. Sunset Crater is part of the San Francisco Volcanic field – the San Francisco Peaks are what's left of a composite/stratovolcano that blew itself up pretty much the way geologists would expect a stratovolcano to blow – out one side, like Mount Saint Helen's or Vesuvius. But the mix of magma in that general area is a little more complicated than that. The stratovolcano squirted out mostly intermediate volcanic rocks and pyroclastic flows, but Sunset Crater started as a rift eruption, and its magma was the low-silica kind you might expect to see on Hawaii, from one of its shield volcanoes. This low-silica magma had a high gas content, so it created a curtain of fire, blowing the runny lava high into the air, where it got whipped into cinders.

The eruption eventually became concentrated at one end and built a cinder cone. Near the end of the eruption, two types of mafic (low silica-high Fe & Mg) lava flows burst through the cone at the bottom: runny pahoehoe lava and chunky Aa. And for the grand (semi-)finalé, The volcano blew more gassy, mafic lava into the air, out of the top, and rained cinders down on the landscape. (Those darker cinders, higher in Fe & Mg, are called scoria.)

I say semi-finalé, because apparently hot magma continued to rise underground for a while, and this stuff melted enough of the surrounding rocks to be higher in silica. When it oozed through cracks in lava that was already cool, it acted kind of like toothpaste. You can see examples of this squeeze-y stuff in one of the cracks near the Lava Flow trail head.

It's convenient to generalize about geological processes, partly to avoid confusing people and partly to paint a broader picture. But when you're actually confronted with the landforms in this part of Arizona, you have to admit there's a lot we don't know. The shallow subduction of the Farallon Plate near the end of the Mesozoic Era seems to have drawn volcanic activity farther inland than you would normally see it, which is why a stratovolcano ended up in Arizona. But something even more interesting may have happened. Arizona may have actually over-ridden the hot upwelling that was creating the rift in the first place.

If you look at the Atlantic Ridge System, you'll see it lies pretty much in the middle of that ocean. It's a classic opening basin. But the Pacific Ridge System in messier. The plates are moving apart at a faster rate, and most of the volcanic activity in the world is happening at the edges of those plates. Right in the middle of the Pacific Plate, a mantle plume is steadily blasting through, creating the Hawaiian island chain. Another plume created the Yellowstone Caldera. And if you look at New Mexico and Southern Colorado, you'll see that an ongoing continental rift has created the Rio Grande River Valley. The Colorado Plateau continues to rise. So geologists think we must be still moving over that hot, upwelling spot.

Since peridotite and basalt have been found in Arizona and New Mexico, some of that hot stuff has to have come from the mantle. These are the nerdy thoughts that run through my mind as Ernie and I hike all over the Sunset Crater and Wupatki trails. In Wupatki, people used the little box canyons to divert water to their gardens. And though there's a lot of talk these days about how hot and dry it is there, 1000 years ago there was probably more ground water, simply because there weren't any gigantic communities nearby draining it. The cinders that lie on top of the soil keep rainwater from running off – they filter down into the aquifer, and emerge as springs.

The stones used to build the dwellings were carved out of the Moenkopi formation, a wonderful mix of sandstone and shale that erodes into whimsical shapes.

As Ernie and I hiked through the sites, I noticed that the sacred mountains could be seen from all directions.  Any argument about why people settled in the area must include those mountains.  
The day was only half gone.  More adventures loomed on the horizon, like storm clouds . . .

COMING NEXT – OAK CREEK CANYON, VORTEX OF FABULOSITY

Why Don't People Read More?

The other day, Lance Polingyouma, my coworker at the Heard Museum Book Store, was dismayed to discover a printing error in the book he was reading, a collection of essays from a gathering of Grand Canyon historians. A large chunk of text was missing, and other chunks of text had been duplicated. This book is on Lance's Top Ten list for the bookstore, and he had been pushing it like crazy. He sold the other two copies we had and was thinking about buying the third, himself. Now we'll have to send that copy back to the publisher and get a replacement. At some point, the customers who bought the other two books could come in and demand their money back, if their books are also defective. We had to shrug and say, “Oh well. We'll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

But as I was driving to work this morning, I began to wonder if we ever will get to it. Lance is a gifted bookseller – my old employer, Borders, would have drooled over his ability to pitch a book. And because Lance is of Hopi, many Anglo visitors to the Heard Museum hang on his every word. If he recommends a book, they tend to buy it. But that doesn't mean they'll ever read it.

When you're a bookseller, it's usually because you really like books. You like to think that people are going to read what you've sold them. But what we booksellers often forget is that dreaded thing, a thing from which we also cringe: the TBR pile. All of us have a mountain of books at home that are designated To Be Read. We're really interested in those books, we really intend to read them some day – but it's going to be a while before we read many of them, and some of them will never get read.

The problem is not-enough-time-in-the-day-itis. If you're fascinated with a lot of things, and you buy books about those things, the time eventually comes when you have to admit that you could read ten hours a day and not finish all of those books. And let's face it – you're not going to read ten hours a day, for all sorts of good reasons. You've got family and friends, a day job, maybe a garden, a household to run – maybe you're even afflicted with the writing bug yourself, and boy, does that cut into your reading time. So your TBR pile grows and grows. Eventually it can look more like a chore than a pleasure. Once that happens, your reading really slows down.

When books were first invented, readers didn't have this problem. The library at Alexandria burned down, another library at Herculanium was buried in volcanic ash, and Irish priests were sitting on most of what was left. So average readers didn't have as many titles they could buy. They had a shelf of favorite books (or scrolls) they could read over and over again. This may sound odd, but there's something to envy about that. Your other chores may have piled up back in those early days, but your book stack just couldn't get that ponderous.

Sill, anyone who enjoys reading would rather have our TBR piles. And now that young people enjoy reading more than ever, those stacks can only grow larger. When I first started working in a bookstore (back in the Dark Ages), adults pushed what few books were written for young people as if they were spinach. “Here, hold your nose and swallow this – it's good for you.” When kids discovered they liked a book, it was completely by accident. And if they wanted another book like it, they didn't have that much to choose from. The YA section in that store I worked in all those years ago had only two small shelves dedicated to YA books.

Now, thanks to J.K Rowling, Stephanie Meyer, Suzanne Collins, and other pioneering authors, you could fill an entire store just with YA titles. Kids are reading them, and so are adults. E-readers give people an even wider selection, at lower prices, so the virtual TBR stack is also growing.

Let's face it. We're doomed. We can only sit and stare into space, thinking, So many books, so little time. And that's the real reason why people don't read more. Lance and I can probably relax – even if those two books turned out to have printing errors, it may take those customers a couple of years to figure it out.

And if it doesn't, Lance will probably just sell them more books.

H.M.S. Donovan

Anyone who worked in a music store back in the Days of Yore (when we could actually play what we wanted instead of suffering through the programmed stuff) will tell you that one of the great pleasures of that job was introducing customers to great albums they would not have otherwise known. When I worked in the music department at Borders, many years ago, HMS Donovan was one of the albums I loved to promote.

Most people only knew the Donovan who sang “Mellow Yellow,” a delightful song, but hardly the full range of Donovan's repertoire. And very few people may recall his cameo appearance in the movie, If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Belgium, in which he sings “Lord Of The Reedy River.” That this incredibly romantic song is included on HMS Donovan is a testament to the emotional range represented by the album. It was produced as a present to his young daughter. But, though it contains children's songs and poems, there is nothing tame about them. You have only to listen closely to the song of “The Walrus and the Carpenter” (from Alice In Wonderland) to know that.

A tantalizing rumor that has persisted for many decades is that at least Paul McCartney and possibly also John Lennon did backup vocals (as the doomed Oysters) for “The Walrus and the Carpenter.” This is hard to confirm, because the vocals were altered, probably mechanically or (my own whimsical theory) possibly by having the performers inhale helium. This theoretical collaboration is hard to dismiss, considering that a version of “The Walrus and the Carpenter” is on a Beatles bootleg album. Donovan isn't credited for singing on that bootleg, but he did work with the Beatles from time to time. McCartney did backup vocals for Donovan's song, “Atlantis.” And Donovan helped McCartney finish writing the song, “Yellow Submarine” by coming up with the lyrics, “. . . Sky of blue, and sea of green, in our yellow submarine . . . “ When the Beatles traveled to India to visit the Maharishi, Donovan went along.

Another interesting thing about the album is the artist who did the cover and the interior art (in the earlier printing, a bonus poster was included) – a fellow who simply called himself Patrick. Patrick also did the art that was supposed to appear on the Beatles album that eventually became the White album. Needless to say, this did not happen, and the art was eventually used for The Beatles Ballads and the EMI Dutch release of a love songs album, De Mooiste Songs.

My brother, David, researched Patrick some more and discovered that he is the Scottish artist and playwright, John Patrick Byrne. He is well known in Scotland and has published a children's book, Donald And Benoit. Mr. Byrne doesn't seem to play up his connection with the Beatles, so a fan set up a website for him. To quote from the bottom of the home page: "This is a website dedicated to the paintings of the Scottish artist John Byrne, the true renaissance man from Paisley. I thought about calling it 'ohforgodssakewhycan'tIfindJohnByrnes paintingsonthenet.com,' but, sadly, the domain name was already taken."

One last bit of trivia about Mr. Byrne -- his significant other is Tilda Swinton.

As for the other album whose cover Mr. Byrne painted, YouTube lists many of the songs on HMS Donovan. Unfortunately, the one for “The Walrus and the Carpenter” seems to have been recorded with a hand-held microphone off of someone's turntable, using a scratched LP. This version of “Jabberwocky” is much better.

And one of my all-time favorites, “Henry Martin,” is also well represented.

There are 28 songs on the album, and most of them can be sampled on YouTube. Once you've heard them, you may decide to download the songs from itunes. If so, it's an investment you won't regret.

The Heard Museum Book Store

In Phoenix, At Central Avenue and Encanto, you'll find one of the last surviving bookstores, The Heard Museum Bookstore. We specialize in books by and about Native Americans, and about Arizona travel, geology, and history. We have also have children's books and cookbooks. People often ask me which books are my favorites, so here are my (current) top ten.

EM'S FAVES (In No Particular Order):

Grand Canyon: Vault Of Heaven, by the Grand Canyon Association

Magnificent photographs and a very informative text, at a bargain price!

Grand Canyon's Long-Eared Taxi, by Karen L. Taylor

Find out why mules are the only animals that can ferry people into the Great Unknown.

Roadside Geology Of Arizona, by Halka Chronic

Learn more about the Geology Capital of the World – from your car!

Gem Trails Of Arizona, by James R. Mitchell

Catch gem fever and go looking for not-so-buried treasure.

Talking Mysteries, by Tony Hillerman and Ernie Bulow

Read what Hillerman and Bulow have to say about their lives and about writing.

The Arizona Cookbook, by Al Fischer & Mildred Fischer

Authentic Indian, Western, and campfire recipes

Forest Cats, by Jerry Kobalenko (photographs by Thomas Kitchin & Victoria Hurst)

An informative text with breath-taking photographs

Frequently Asked Questions About The Saguaro, by Janice Emily Bowers

Find out why the saguaro is truly the movie star of the desert.

Sheep In A Jeep, by Nancy Shaw & Margot Apple

A wild and wooly expedition!

Brighty Of The Grand Canyon, by Marguerite Henry

The adventures of a beloved burro, with delightful illustrations

Belly-Button Rocks, Volcanic Tortoises, And Blue-Eyed Baboons

My husband and I just hiked one of our favorite trails: Peralta Canyon Trail in the Superstition Mountains. Each time we do this, the trail presents challenges, but also allows us to visit some old “friends.”

Take the Volcanic Tortoise. About the size of a Volkswagen Minibus, he is frozen in the act of climbing one side of the canyon. He may be the product of Caldera-type volcanic explosions that occurred between 8 and 15 million years ago, producing hundreds of feet of volcanic tuff (fused volcanic ash and breccia). If you've ever been to Frijoles Canyon to visit Bandelier National Monument, you've seen similar deposits. The holes in the deposits are from gas bubbles that were present as the ash fused and cooled. At Bandolier, the ash is Rhyolitic (it has a higher ratio of silica-to-Fe & Mg and tends to be colored tan to pink); in the Superstitions, the tuff mostly runs from Rhyolitic to Intermediate – though you can also find basalt there, suggesting that some of the magma in the original or subsequent volcanic activity was mantle rock.

The tortoise looks almost black, though that may be from desert varnish. His jaws are open – maybe he was reaching for some yummy vegetation when he froze. He's at the lower end of the canyon, surrounded by thick desert scrub and saguaros. The vegetation and rock debris make it very difficult to venture from the trail (though some intrepid teenagers climb the hoodoos alongside it from time to time). That tortoise could munch down all day and still not make much of a dent in the brittlebush, creosote, and jojoba bushes.

Ernie and I find it challenging enough just to hike to the end of the trail and back. Ernie could go much faster if I weren't holding him back with my camera and my less-than-buff muscles. But what I lack in speed, I make up for in stamina – I can hike for about 7 hours, if I must, and if I get regular breaks. That's what I keep telling myself as every single person on the trail, young to old, passes me by. Alas. Good thing I'm not competitive, or I'd probably hurt myself trying to keep up with them. The situation also has its benefits; my SF-writer's brain thinks up gizmos that could help hikers with physical challenges (most of us, I suspect). Maybe a sort of body framework for hikers, with boots, knee-pads, elbow pads, and gloves? Something that would absorb the shock of each footfall, and maybe give us a boost as we're climbing? Imagine how far we could go, what we might see! Heck, some folks might even want to wear them when they're doing housework. Fashion could change drastically – we'd all end up looking like robots.

I long for this gizmo as I labor up steps that make my knees creak. People in their 60s and 70s smile at me as I step aside to let them pass. They've got hiking poles – I'm hoping that's why they're faster than me. And in the meantime, Ernie the Mountain Goat is forced to stop regularly, to wait for me to catch up. I also stop to take some photos, but I wish there was some way I could convey the wonderful smells of the desert in the spring. Some of the plants are fragrant even though they aren't currently blooming. A cool breeze blows, helping to alleviate the hot sun. And I can't help but ponder the hoodoos.

The most famous hoodoos in the Southwest are in Bryce Canyon, in Utah. They're composed of a mixture of silt, sand, mud, clay, and limestone that has seeped into the lower layers from above. The limestone caps on the formations keep the columns from immediately melting away from the top down – the sides erode first. Figures seem to be emerging from the monocline and marching into the valley. As moisture erodes them, they end up with a coating that looks almost like stucco.

But the hoodoos in the Superstitions are different creatures. They're composed of that volcanic tuff, so their sides are harder and straighter. Sometimes they almost look as if they were carved with a knife. Yet, they still have that characteristic hoodoo look, as if they were rock creatures who are engaged in an incredibly slow march.

They line the top of the canyon on either side of the trail. Periodically, I stop to look at them, even talk to them (in polite tones). But I'm really looking forward to seeing one creature in particular, a goddess I call Belly Button Rock. I must thank her for letting me visit her enchanted valley, and hope for her blessing. I point her out to other hikers on the trail, who exclaim with wonder – they had never noticed her before, despite her profound presence (not to mention her fabulous midriff). Perhaps, in the future, they'll point her out to other hikers.

I stop to photograph some rocks that look like basin-and-range faulting in miniature. And I can't resist trying to capture a window of bright light shining through a formation. The last time I was here, I took hundreds of photographs – I was a budding geologist full of wonder. I still feel that way this time, but I don't need to snap as many pictures. Just as well, since we took 7 hours to complete the trail on the last visit, and it should only take 4 to 5.

Labor up the switchbacks at the West end of the canyon, and eventually you'll wind your way around to the point where you can see the Blue-Eyed Baboon, a cheerful sentinel whose head pokes above the Northern side of the trail. Blue sky peers through a hole in the formation. Yes, the hills have eyes, and they are blue.

The end of the trail is Weaver's Needle, and you get to walk among some of the hoodoos. If you were intrepid, you could keep hiking until you reached the petroglyphs of the Hieroglyphic Trail. But that's a long time between restroom breaks, so Ernie and I turn around and face the challenges of the downhill walk, actually more painful than the uphill climb. That's when the knees, hips, and feet really begin to complain as your full weight comes down on them, step after step. I'm REALLY longing for that sci-fi hiking-framework gizmo now. But still happy with beautiful Peralta Canyon Trail.

Still ready to go back again, every chance I get.

Powerhouse Knocks Your Socks Off

Recently we celebrated the 50th Anniversary of John Glenn's flight into orbit around the Earth, a feat that still fills me with pride. Though I also celebrate the fact that Yuri Gagarin and Valentina Tereshkova were the first man and woman in space, that flight was one of the great American achievements of the 20^th century. But another great achievement celebrated its 75^th Anniversary on that same date: the debut of Raymond Scott's best known composition, “Powerhouse.”

If you've ever seen an automated assembly line in action, you can't help but imagine “Powerhouse” playing in the background – it is truly the music of the Jazz/Machine Age. In a way, that technology is as Victorian as anything you'd find in a Steampunk novel, with its gears and perfectly calibrated interlocking parts. I can remember one Warner Brothers cartoon where a couple of ultra-polite chipmunks accidentally get transported to a canning plant inside a load of vegetables. Carl Stalling's arrangement of “Powerhouse” plays while these little guys try to avoid the machinery that processes and cans the veggies. When you listen to that rendition, you don't just hear the machines working – time itself seems to be marching off to some dazzling, relentless future.

Stalling's renditions of Raymond Scott's work are beefier than Scott's, since they're arranged for full orchestra. And the Warner Brothers orchestra recorded on one of the best sound stages in Hollywood. I grew up watching those cartoons (on the Wallace & Ladmo Show), and I ended up getting thoroughly spoiled by the high-quality animation and scoring. The wretched, canned music that accompanied cartoons in later eras is like fingernails on a blackboard to my ears. Fortunately, I can still get CDs with the good stuff on them.

My favorite Raymond Scott album is Reckless Nights And Turkish Twilights. If you look on Amazon, you'll notice that most of the reviews for it are 5 stars. It's a perfect collection. Some would say the sound quality isn't up to par with the great recordings of the 20th century, and that's true. But this album made me realize something about the music of Raymond Scott – it was actually written with that poor sound reproduction in mind. When this music is recorded in high fidelity, it's almost too much (though Carl Stalling certainly did a magnificent job with his arrangements.) I think the lower fidelity of this recording protects the listener from the full "manic" impact, giving you a chance to enjoy the performances and the composition.

And if you'd like the Warner Brothers/Stalling take on the subject, try The Carl Stalling Project. It will make you long for the days of those old big-band orchestras. If only there were nightclubs that still offered dinner, a big orchestra, dance performances by the likes of Fred & Ginger . . .

So I salute John Glenn on the anniversary of his flight into orbit. And I salute Raymond Scott for sending me into orbit. Here's to you, fellas.

The "Baby State" Turns 1.7 Billion

The state of Arizona is now officially 100 years old, semi-officially 1.7 billion years old (recent findings at the bottom of the Grand Canyon suggest that at least a few chunks of it are far older). There are many places in Arizona where that birthday can be happily celebrated, and one of them is the book store where I work.

The Heard Museum Book Store is located in the courtyard of the museum, right next to the Coffee Cantina, at Encanto and Central Avenue. It is one of the last surviving book stores in Central Phoenix. We specialize in books about the Southwest, Native Americans, and Arizona travel and history. Our courtyard is full of tables that sit under Ironwood trees, right next to a splashing fountain, where people who have just purchased books can sit, sip coffee, and enjoy the serenity. And you don't have to pay the entrance fee to shop there. It's the perfect place to explore the subject of Arizona's Centennial. In honor of that birthday, several books have been published about our history, and we carry them all.

My favorite is Jim Turner's Arizona: A Celebration of the Grand Canyon State. Whether you're an Arizona resident, a sometime visitor, or a fan of ARIZONA HIGHWAYS magazine, this is a book you must have in your collection. Though a lot of people in the world know a little bit about Arizona, Jim Turner knows a lot more, and what he knows is fascinating. He's put a wealth of interesting details into one handy book.

Arizona is the last of the territories in the contiguous United States to become a state. Our history is as unique as our geology – a point not lost on Turner, because he begins the first chapter with, “Eons ago, huge chunks of the Earth's crust called tectonic plates rammed into each other . . .” Beginning a book about Arizona's history with the tale of its geology is not a whimsical choice. We are what we are because of those tectonic plates – because of our latitude, our basin-and-range mountains, our volcanic history, and the inland seas that laid down the sedimentary rock that was eventually carved into the Grand Canyon by the Colorado River. That landscape of canyons, plateaus, mountains, valleys, and deserts is the setting for our “Wild West” history, peopled by Native Americans, cowboys, miners, adventurers, farmers, ranchers, soldiers, yahoos, scoundrels, scientists, and dreamers. Turner has stories to relate about all of them.

But don't get the idea this is a thick, dry tome of facts. The book is lavishly illustrated with photographs, maps, and illustrations. It is divided into chapters about each successive wave of populations, from the ancient ancestors of Native Americans to the post-war immigrants who drove here on route 66. The sections are accessible, more like magazine articles. You can peruse the text any way you like, from start to finish, or just by looking up the tidbits that interest you. Some may prefer to keep it on their coffee table, others will shelve it with their history or travel books.

I keep it where I can reach it easily. Like Arizona, this book is a treasure.

Heaven, Hell, And Other Devices

I've published a new ebook, titled Pale Lady, (cover art by Ernest Hogan) and this is the freebee coupon code for Smashwords: EG36Y. Just apply it when you're checking out, and it will reduce the price to $0.00.

Now that I've made the pitch, I have to make a confession. I can be very naïve when I decide what books and stories to write. Or maybe I should say I'm oblivious. I never consider how people may react, except to hope that they'll enjoy reading my work. In the case of Pale Lady, the novelette I just published on Smashwords and Amazon as an ebook, I didn't worry that people may assume the story is overtly religious until I was getting ready to publish it. Pretty funny when you consider that it's a story about a bunch of dead people whose souls have gone to Purgatory. Yep – I'm a pretty big dope.

I'm also an Agnostic. I have spiritual inclinations, but I don't want to belong to a church or a particular religion. I don't disagree with religious folk, and I don't disagree with atheists, either. I think they all make good points, but I'm happy to discover the mystery of the cosmos as I encounter it. Yet as a writer, I have to admit that Heaven and Hell make wonderful literary devices.

Especially Hell. I have a feeling that the less you say about Heaven, the more accurate you're going to be. And God seems too complex a being to really capture as a character. The Devil, on the other hand, is a fairly down-to-earth kinda guy. And the ruined grandeur of Hell is irresistible. Dante's Inferno is much more readable than Purgatorio and Paradiso. Or at least, I think it is, because I only made it halfway through Purgatorio and couldn't finish it. The same is true of Milton's Paradise Lost. His description of Pandaemonium kicks butt, and I was fascinated when Adam asked an Archangel why the universe is so big if Mankind is the only intelligent race in it, and the angel told him that he just doesn't need to know the answer to that (apparently the mysteries of the cosmos are revealed on a Need To Know basis). I suppose I should read Paradise Regained some day, but should and will are two very different things. Besides, sequels hardly ever live up to the original.

I don't write about the Devil in Pale Lady. But I think he's a great character. Subtle he must needs be, who could seduce angels, writes Milton, in Paradise Lost.

On the one hand, it's interesting to ponder the fallen Angel, Lucifer, a grand and beautiful super-being who felt confident enough to challenge the Almighty for supremacy (although I often wonder if he was just trying to show God that He was wrong rather than take over). High Fantasy writers use this sort of Devil to represent absolute evil, characters like Sauron from The Lord Of The Rings. Even in The Hobbit, the dragon Smaug has some of the Devil in his personality – Tolkien warns that talking to a dragon too long can get you into trouble.

I think it's the Devil's human qualities that end up intriguing us the most. He took that fall because of his hubris, and that's a flaw we all share to one degree or another. The characters in Pale Lady also get into trouble because of their flaws. But you can say that about any book.

So it's probably my setting that could cause the most misunderstanding. The concept of Purgatory is that you're seeking redemption – you blew it, but maybe you can fix it. Some might see that as an attempt to proselytise. But religious instruction is not my bag – if I'm going to preach, it's more likely to be about conservation. I wrote about these characters in Purgatory for only one reason: I dreamed they were there.

Dreams aren't the inspiration for every single novel or story I write, but most of the time they're at least a factor. In the case of the dream that inspired Pale Lady, I wasn't remotely aware that I was dreaming – the place I found myself and the problems I had were quite daunting. Once I woke up, I knew I had to write the story.

I find the concept of being perched between two extremes irresistible, maybe because I think it's the human condition. We're edging toward Heaven or Hell in our lives – not so much spiritually, but in terms of how we're managing things, how happy we make ourselves and others, what we do in the world and what we suffer. I often feel compelled to write about characters who are trying to escape difficult situations and find some measure of freedom and self empowerment. My personal experience is that escape from metaphorical Hell or Purgatory takes a certain measure of self sacrifice and courage. I suspect that if those metaphysical places actually exist, that rule could only be magnified.

So that's my shtick. I'm not pushing Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha, or any other prophet, and I'm not one myself. I'm just a writer who has odd dreams. I hope you'll find them entertaining.

One last thing – it was my intention to publish Pale Lady as a free ebook and to use it to promote my other books. But because of the way I published the Amazon version, I'm not allowed to offer it for free on Amazon. Since I have a contract with them not to offer the book at a lower price on any other site, I have to charge $.99 as the list price. That's why I'm publishing this freebee coupon. Please use it and pass it on to anyone else who may be interested. You'll only be helping me if you do so.

Plus you're more likely to go to Heaven. (Kidding.)