Deserts, Interstices, and New Life

“Dryness promotes the formation of flower buds . . . [f]lowering is, after all, not an aesthetic contribution, but a survival mechanism.” – Ann Haymond Zwinger, The Mysterious Lands (New York: Dutton, 1989), 127. “‘You can’t repeat the past.’ ‘Can’t repeat the past?’ he cried incredulously. ‘Why of course you can!'” – F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2003), 110.  This, my friends, is what we call an autobiographical post. Philosophy-cum-introspection: theoria-via-experience. Ordinarily I prefer intertexuality, engaging a recently-read chapter or article, to the daunting expanse of the tabula rasa on which one ‘free styles’ their way into writing. Ordinarily, however, I am not getting married, moving to a new (old) country, and driving up and down the coast for family events before the start of a doctoral program. (Ordinarily, I am just plain undisciplined). We have moved—literally and figuratively—to the desert. Our beachside locale reaches temperatures unthinkable to the PacNoWest mind this time of year, and the sunshine is unceasing. It is fantastic, but the contrarian...