#desert time

😊 Hanging Around! 😊

“Desert Time” was a concept I heard often before finally moving to the desert.  I understand that it means things just take longer here.  The plants and trees grow slower.  People’s lives move slower.  I heard it is hard to get things happening here because…well, “desert time”.  I thought, well, I have been living in cities and working in fast paced industries for fifteen years. I am going to keep my usual pace.  

Living in the high desert for just shy one year now, I have lived through all the seasons, the weather changes, the wildlife cycles. I have observed the subtleties of each season.  I have experienced the sun cycles, and how the light changes throughout the year.  I have been shocked at how the position of the sun varies so much from winter versus summer. In the winter, the light shines well into my living room on the south side of the house. Now that we are heading into summer, the sun is so far north that it is on the other side of the house and doesn’t even shine into the living room at all.  I know where the sun sets in the winter, and now it sets miles and miles away to the north for the summer.

Time is funny here.

In the summer, it is easy to naturally wake up at or before sunrise - 4:30 or 5am.  Get up and try to cram as much as you can in before the midday sun forces you indoors to a slow halt.  The animals are out as well, to make the most of the morning.  The roadrunners and Gamble quails scurry around for snacks.  Ground squirrels scramble from bush to bush to avoid becoming one.  A nap in an air conditioned space is the best way to avoid the afternoon heat. The hours from 1 to 6pm are slow. Sluggish. The sun is relentless and I am convinced it will never drop below the mountains to the west.  Four hours that last seemingly forever.   As the sun is about to dip, but there is still light in the sky - turning on the stove or grill to cook dinner doesn’t seem so insane anymore.  While cooking dinner, get some chores done before daylight is totally gone.  Eat dinner al fresco. Take a walk around the neighborhood. The light on the plants  then is magical. Saturated colors make everything look so rich. The bunnies come out to hop around and eat.

In the winter, days look beautiful from inside the house. The sun is shining, but finally not oppressive. Skies are clear and blue.  But, go outside and the winds are maddening.  The winds can last days, weeks.  It is impossible to get much done outside if the winds are going. Everything around your house blows away unless it is heavy or bolted down.  Our old aluminum windows rattle and shake all night. You hope you don’t wake up in the middle of the night during the winds, because if you do you may be kept awake for hours with sleepy anxiety about the winds.  Will the Joshua Tree finally uproot and fall over? Am I safe sleeping under a giant window of glass?  Will the windows break and blow in? We pick up roof shingles around the yard after the big winds.  Nature is slowly taking our house apart.  The view is beautiful, but there are small opportunities of good working time outside.  Then you race against daylight, because once the sun sets at 4:30, it is pretty much time to be inside.  Eat dinner and head to bed.  Desert midnight is around 8-9pm.

An unexpected sabbatical resulted in my most productive writing days ever. Maybe we need to let a "Time Away" find us once in awhile?

How did I spend Tennessee’s recent “Snowmageddon” of January 2024? Walking on the beach every day and spending lots and lots of “alone time” in a little Florida town with one redlight, one great seafood restaurant, and a gas station.  I hadn’t planned on taking a sabbatical last month. But I sure got one. Sometimes spiritual retreats find us, I suppose. I had planned to visit friends, do some…

⌚ Desert Time ⌚