So How Was Your Fourth?
This big national holiday seems to have safely passed. And the world still seems to be spinning safely on its axis. The usual pleas for people not to shoot off fireworks went mostly unheeded. At least around here in California. There were so many violations in Los Angeles that officials had to plead on TV for aggrieved residents to just quit calling 911 as there were so many calls that they had paralyzed the system. Several little fires and accidents did happen anyway including eight families made homeless when their apartment building burned down. Up at the Sequoia National Park where Pat and I spent the 4th with Ron and other family members we had ourselves a picnic.
Well, yes. It was high up in the mountains beneath the shade of trees about a city block high and it was about 75 degrees and, yes, the sandwiches and stuff were delicious. We had lots of signs around us about where not to smoke (here) and where not to even think about lighting a fire (also here) when a carload of people squatted next to us and lit a roaring campfire and fixed their meal. I was surprised to see this and wondered if I (as a responsible citizen) should wander over and tell them to put it out. Point out the signs. Or perhaps just let it go. I let it go. They did not speak English, so I used that as an excuse. Besides, I had not had my own rear beat up all day, so I just minded my own business. And I am still in one piece. After that I noticed a few others happily building fires. Hope they do not burn the 3,000-year-old tree down.
Sometimes loose talk catches up with us and that is partly what caused me to be celebrating my 4th in this historic National Park. I had been talking of going to California for several weeks—just as soon as this COVID-19 dies down—and just in general enjoy the glory of driving long distances and seeing different things as those who know me know I am likely to do. So finally, pandemic or no pandemic I grabbed my masks and some family (Lesli, Meegan and my wife) and one bright and recent Saturday morning I set out. My compass was pointed West.
We enjoyed viewing, as least parts of, the Painted Desert after spending the night at Albuquerque and finding the tram lift to the top of the nearby ski mountains was closed. COVID-19 won again. After we left the Painted Desert, I tightened up my fresh new mask and proceeded to Sedona, Arizona. Beautiful and cool spot. We camped at a real nice hotel there, enjoyed good food and rest before going to Jerome, a sort of ghost town way up in some desolate mountains whose promise of precious metals lured men of all sorts until 1946. It lost it lure. The gold ran out and so did the mines leaving the 2nd largest city in Arizona just sitting. We enjoyed our visit to this, another historical site in America.
In Williams, Arizona we lodged at the Railroad Hotel. Yes, the same one Pat and I stayed in a few years ago with some other Allen adventurist we journeyed with a few years ago. It was a guided tour then, guided by a great western adventurist by the name of Donnie Johnson.
The next day we caught the Grand Canyon train to the canyon and enjoyed a few hours being surprised, again at how beautiful it is. It is awe-inspiring. The Canyon’s facilities (such as its big restaurants) were closed. Again—COVID-19. We grabbed a snack off a suspicious looking food truck. And of course, I got extremely sick. Food poisoning of the worse sort. I was the only one stricken. I did survive somehow (with a lot of compassion and care from my travel mates) and made it on to Ron’s home in Bakersfield. And if you see me bouncing around my beloved hometown of Allen on my golf cart, you can assume I survived the trip.
I did not get to see everything I wanted to see, nor see some people I had planned on visiting with, but l am glad to be home. And alive. Pray for our country and be sure to go to church Sunday.
Wayne Bullard, DPh