We had a nice mountain bike ride in the historical Helvetia mining area, due east of the giant Pima mine. Since this blog can't afford to keep to keep a geologist on staff, you'll have to settle for my guess that this is probably copper oxide.
Blue metal oxide?
Here on the east side of the valley are the digs of history and rockhounding. Over on the west side, at the Pima mine, are digs of a completely different kind. The contrast and comparison made an impact on me.
And then the RV Frig Debacle hit and I spent three sub-human days in Lowe's and Walmart parking lots replacing a dead RV refrigerator with a homemade, super-insulated ice chest. The final indignity was getting busted at Lowe's.
Cities are full of frantic creatures living a sub-human lifestyle, so in a way I fit right in. It wasn't for nothing that Thoreau once walked across Manhattan and announced that he hadn't met one man who was actually alive.
I felt insulted, but the project was almost done. So we fled to sacred ground, the grasslands of Patagonia and Sonoita, which I visit every year. Full time RVers are supposed to rootless vagabonds. How then can you explain my sappy sentimentalism when I revisit one of my little valentines, like Patagonia?
The first sunset I took the dogs out for their first real walk in four days. They were dying back there in the megalopolis. I think they love it here as much as I do.
Why do I love Patagonia when it is of full of yoga classes, birders in ugly hats, greens, lefties, artsie-fartsies, and One-Worlders dreaming of World Peace by planting butterfly gardens. For some reason I overlook all that. Patagonia makes me feel human, and this can be felt most sweetly after a few days in Tucson. Maybe it is the same feeling that I had rockhounding close to that huge mine.
