It’s the best of time in Arizona! Temperatures are languid and mild, bunnies and squirrels frolic on the lush greens of a recent rain, and the colors pop out of the fragrant earth: wildflowers–it’s spring time. I took pictures on my recent hike to Wind Cave. Which of these flowers do you know?
(Ssh! There is a cheat sheet here at Southwest Desert Flora BUT: test your memory before you peek)
We left on election day, having cast our vote by mail, to escape our civic detachment (disillusionment). In Kerala, India, we enjoyed a tour to paradise. We drove from Dharmathupatti to Munnar, from there to Kumily (Periyar National Forest), and on to Mariar Beach, where we stayed in the Abad Turtle Beach resort on the coast.
We didn’t see wild elephants but we took note of this reclaimed plastic artifact in Munnar.
Along the serpentine ways through the Western Ghats we saw lush tea and cardamom plantations; farther down towards the coast, rubber trees, pineapple, mangoes, coconut, and extensive rice fields in the backwater region. We also took one of the famous houseboat trips on the coastal backwater canals.
Kerala is under communist leadership. From driving through the land, catching fleeting impressions with my tourist eyes, I thought that individuals, even the lowliest street hawkers, feel more like a part of society than any of us in the US of A. People in India know their roles, rights, and entitlements. Participation in the community in Kerala appeared to be much stronger than in the US, where half the population doesn’t even vote. We saw a communist rally march, noticed many campaign posters, and spotted numerous calls for recycling and other public service announcements.
A government can certainly make people feel as a part of the whole. Take for example the Periyar National Park and Tiger Reserve. Since its inception in 1982, the Periyar National Park has enrolled its local villagers as guardians of the preserve. That was a smart move, because now the locals have gained not only a source of income as guides and rangers, they have also dropped what one official brochure called “poaching.”
At the Gavi safari headquarters, at least a dozen guides met up with their tourists in small groups; breakfast and lunch provided at the cafeteria. Vijay, our guide who lives in the ecotourism village of Gavi, took us on a small hike from the ranger station to the top of one of the 18 hills in the park. All hikers had to wear gaiters up to the knee to protect us against leeches.
The hike was short but quite scenic. At the peak of the hill, Vijay directed our attention to the Sabarimala temple, nestled in the valley’s jungle. The famous sanctuary can only be reached on foot via a trail and nevertheless the temple attracts 10–15 million pilgrims annually, although it has restrictive opening seasons. A military station has been built next to it to watch over the ever increasing amount of gold in the sanctuary, as well as to monitor the religious fervor. Holy passions have a history of getting out of hand in a land of many faiths. Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity are all running their strong agendas.
At Periyar National Park, you can’t go hiking on your own. First of all, about 800 elephants live in the area. Although we saw plenty manure on the narrow road, we unfortunately didn’t spot an animal as such. Second, the park is home to an estimated 40 tigers and some hundred leopards, who may be looking for an easy meal. Third, there are few trails and, as anywhere in the wild, you could get lost and bitten by one of the 300 species of poisonous snakes. Dead tourists are no good advert. Bottom line: don’t go hiking without a ranger. Last but not least, tribals live in the forest too. And they also want to be left alone.
Vijay rowed us in a boat to the Gavi waterfall, which also provides the water for the ecotourism center. He pointed out various species of birds and spotted an orchid called Dancing Girl. 
He took us on a walk through the arboretum, where we learned about wild mango, chiku (sapodilla), guava, plantains, and allspice. He lit up 
the resin from the Boswellia serrata tree (frankincense). He was very knowledgeable and proud to share the natural beauties. His forebears may have been poachers, but Vijay now had become an advocate and protector for his paradise.
And there are lots of animals in it. We saw monkeys of several species, herds of gaur (bison), sambar (deer), mongoose, and birds of all kinds on an afternoon boat trip on Lake Periyar. And Vijay and the other rangers had a proud stake in all of this. They enjoyed protecting and sharing the forest at the same time. Of course, we missed out on the tigers, perhaps good so. And we also didn’t spot an elephant. But their droppings were plenty.
Kerala, like all of India, is densely populated. Nothing goes without collaboration because you depend on it. We eventually arrived at our final destination at Abad resort. Even the beach bum dogs of Marari Beach understand this. The packs of mutts wait patiently every morning for the fisher boats to return. The symbiosis between fishermen, dogs, and restaurant trash has deep roots.
Kerala, a true garden state, seems like an ecological paradise. (Duh, close your eyes when there is dust over the tea plantation. Pesticides are are a common practice.) Yes, there is occasional trash, but less so than in other parts of India. Then there are plastic bottle hunters who pile up sacks mile high on their bicycles. Imagine, the cow poop will be dried and serve as fuel for cooking. There are coconuts of which every part can be put to use, even the coir from the husk to make fibers to stuff mattresses. To find out more, visit the Coconut Museum near Marari Beach. There is no part in a coconut that can’t be used.
In the old days, a whole house could be roofed with palm leaves. There is much reuse and recycle going on based on the scarcity of materials but also new inventions such as paper straws have made their way to market. In our resort, Abad Turtle Beach, three miniature bovines were kept on premises, not for milk but for lawn mowing, their manure serving to fertilize the vegetable garden.
Our Kerala trip gave us one of the best flavors of eco-tourism. When the locals are collaborating to preserve their natural treasures, this kind of business is an enrichment for all involved and does (hopefully) the least harm. Tourism will never take off with “no harm” involved. But in the national parks in Kerala the flow of people is strictly controlled. It has to be. With a population of about 1.5 billion plus some tourists, the pristine lands for wildlife are precious and irreplaceable. We don’t want to trample them down.
That’s why I wrote Random Accident in Sector Noah 135/56 or the story of The Last Book on Earth. I can see it coming. Can’t you?
I have been in publishing since Gutenberg invented the printing press. Or rather, I got my hands dirty with linotype and ink. Remember? That’s when the lines of lead type had to be read in reverse? Yes, you can learn to detect typos reading upside down, from right to left, with letters mirrored. And then came the revolution of the photo paste ups. How easy was that! Boy, and now we have the Adobe full page layout programs. It’s magic!
I started daily reporting with linotype in high school (now you can guess how old I am). After college, while working as an editor at a weekly paper, we waxed up the filmsetting paper strips. And eventually, after another master’s degree, I had all the publishing technology at my fingertips with Office and Adobe programs through the Amazon’s “Every man and woman’s press.” It’s called self-publishing. What a revolution!
Books have always been my passion. Since I was ten years old, I had wanted to write a book. Back then I was dreaming of concocting another volume for an Enid Blyton adventure series about twin girls in boarding school. And now I do write books.
With a deluge of social media and self-publishing platforms, everybody is their own printing press and broadcasting station. One question is, how good is that? Another question is, who needs books? I do. Because I still want to write them.
Sandy’s world is shattering–then what?
Are you still with me? It will get easier from here on out: ChatGPT will hammer out my next prompt into a flawless manuscript. This will be put through the Amazon AI machine to publish it in triplicate as paperback, hard bound, and Kindle with a dashing cover. Then all I have to do is sell it. Right!
Yet no matter how much self-publishing keeps Amazon awash, books seem to be doomed. The ones printed on paper for sure. Such was my assumption for my picture book Random Accident.
Now imagine a world without books.
In this ancient (written 20 years ago), far future, retro-story, where everything is under control—except for earthquakes, the weather, and random accidents—a little girl chances upon an old-fashioned book. Sandy has never seen a book in her world of monitors, projections, and mood balancers. She tries to make sense of the pictures and wishes for what’s in it: a garden. Bob, the all-knowing caretaker of this solar system and Sandy’s planet earth, will only go so far to help her.
Sandy has to help herself. And so, she does.
Random Accident, illustrated by my daughter Priyanka Makin, is a humorous, futuristic picture book for all ages. It is built on the exercise of kindness and discovery.
Random accidents never get old because nature always has the magic of surprise.
Now available on AMAZON!
Environmental Day at the Capitol earlier this year, struck my memory chord like a gong chiming in my head. Activists from all corners had gathered on the Arizona Capitol grounds in Phoenix to lobby for water protection measures and have a word with their District reps.
Water rights are a hot topic in Arizona. All the Southwestern states’ livelihoods depend on their secure water resource, mostly the Colorado River share quotas.
The Colorado River is so dammed up that none of its waters reach the Gulf of California any more. Lake Mead, in 2023, was at its lowest since the Hoover Dam (1 of 15 Colorado River dams) was built. 2023 was another heat record year with 50+ days over 110F. It’s a damn’ dry situation. For many Native Americans, Navajos included, water has always been scarce.
My friends took me to Gallup. More precisely, a rural lot outside town on the Navajo reservation. I had been cautioned: there is no running water. So bring a pallet of bottles. For that part, there would also be no royal flush. I got it. Outhouse. No worries there. I had grown up on a farm with a Plumpsklosett.
A couple of miles on the north side of Gallup, my GPS turned me onto a dirt road. I made it across the narrow bridge, but was soon stopped by a curious horse in the middle of the road. Anyways, the rainy spring had made the road rutted, but after I got the hang of it, the tracks became quite passable.
It was a beautiful scene out here in the afternoon. The horizon started to take on an amber glow, the boulder mountains toned into a warm ochre, the blue zenith sky darkened to let the stars out, and the scarce pine trees poked their spiny arms into the fresh air. All was quiet out here, except for the dogs.
My friend’s house had a warm, cuddly, welcoming air to it. It was very much ranch-style in its decor with blankets, Native art, and the occasional antler. This was a much privileged outing for me, because a group of strong Native women shared their time and space with me. And I finally would get to see Window Rock, the Navajo capital, as well.
We had the most comfortable picnic with fine mattresses to sleep on. We were glamping on many things, television included. However, there was no running water. And you feel that right away. The kitchen had two large water containers by the sink, but, unlike rare wine, the water in it had not improved its taste since its delivery. It was only old and best used for washing dishes. And still, it seemed to be too precious for that as well. We used paper plates all the way through.
I learned fast: keep the hand sanitizer and wipes on the cabinet by the entrance for the bathroom trips, don’t drink too much, so you don’t have to go too often, and save your paper plate for the next meal. I learned to brush my teeth with bottled water and spit each mouthful into the desert bush. I had this urge–when preparing breakfast, making a sandwich, getting sticky fingers–to go to the sink. But the sink had no water. A long time ago, when the family still lived here, they carted in their water on a truck to fill the tank outside. But that was the old days.
Many Navajo families have no water lines going to their houses. Imagine, any and all water has to be hauled over long distances and bad roads. Imagine how hard it will be to maintain proper hygiene. Imagine how health-compromised individuals might suffer. Or what about elder and infant care? Staying well and healthy requires a reasonable amount of water.
Yes, on the second day I felt the dearth of water. My armpits got stinky. I wetted a Kleenex and went to work. But what about the long range? How would I keep clean, wash up, brush off the dust? I don’t think there was a creek nearby and many hopes for rain in the Southwest are in vain. All you can do, really, is drive to the next truck stop on IH 40 and use their public showers.
I wasn’t ready to do that just yet, but on the third day I hit the pedal to the metal to get home to my own comfort.
Back to the Environmental Day. One Native organization, Tó Nizhóní Ání (“Sacred Water Speaks”) from the Big Mountain community on the Black Mesa Plateau in NE Arizona, protested the industrial abuse (hydroelectric project) of water: The Black Mesa Pumped Storage Project.
Pumping groundwater to the top of a plateau to make it generate electricity—a questionable project. It would seriously endanger the aquifer. As of this February, three of such proposed pumped storage projects were fortunately denied. A remarkable victory for the Navajo environmentalists.
Native activists are fighting for the Earth and US ALL. Water is so precious. We think we know that. But that’s not enough. Someone needs to make us FEEL its preciousness.
Therefore I propose a universal
Switch off the water main in the evening and see how the next day goes. And touch no faucet at work or school either. Toilet included. Don’t flush. How will you get through the day? You will be allowed to prepare for the water emergency by your own design. But don’t forget: No water will run for you on tap. And why should it? Water needs a break too. It runs all the time.
Photos by Joe Jaworski & Edda Buchner
What’s behind a rock, a root, a shell, or a time-proven fence post? Maybe nothing. But you can always make it “something.” Just by looking and thinking. Art objects are all around us. Nobody knows that better than silversmith and “Macher” (maker) Helmut Buchner from the Bat Cave Ranch by San Antonio.
Helmut has a very deliberate way of talking. Each sentence, no matter how obvious the content, clearly captures a deep thought. And that also applies to the stories behind his sculpture park on his ranch, which grows steadily. I will try my best to do our conversation justice with my English interpretation of some of his new, money-free objet d’art.
“Mona Lisa came together just for fun. There was a river rock laying around for years. It had the shapes of a beautifully formed woman, no relations to the Kardashians (maybe Picasso or Gaugin). And then there was also the tree stump of an old cedar tree. That tree had been in conflict with an oak. Every time when I have to cut down a tree, I leave a stump as a memorial. It could be used for something later. That tree offered itself to install something on it. The other two things had been waiting in the grass for a while. So I put all three together, set the rock on the stump, and installed the metal frame around it. The stone, steel, and wood enhanced each other quite naturally.”
Covid-19 Man: “I made that at the beginning, when we started to realize how threatening and aggressive Covid-19 was. For the first time it happened in my long life that we had such a worldwide epidemic. For me, the woodblock face demonstrates the anguish of a patient screaming from pain and terror. We’ve had the ball made of sea shells for a long time and it offered itself as a Covid virus symbol encompassing the entire globe.”
Bird Happiness: Helmut stands at the bottom of 40-foot-tall bamboo pole. It has a weather vane at the top, a bird with a long ribbon tail. The “Windvogel” sways in all directions, depending on how the wind blows. Unfortunately, storms repeatedly tore the sculpture off its mount. Helmut’s solution? He made a bamboo man to help support the structure. “The golden-haired bamboo guy holds up the pole so that the bird won’t fly away,” Helmut says. So how is this working out? Time will tell.
Himmelsleiter-Stairway to Heaven: A bicycle without a saddle is parked at the bottom of a bamboo ladder leading up into the air to who-knows-where? This sculpture, one of Helmut’s oldest, is thoroughly weathered. Visitors are fascinated by it, a stairway to heaven. “I figured that the ladder alone won’t get you to heaven, but I had a lot of people thinking that it might,” Helmut says with a wry smile on his face.
Nothing is accidental about Helmut’s sculptures. They are built on careful observation, selection, and artistic vision. A lot of thought goes into them. Helmut’s next sculpture could take a while or happen spontaneously. It starts with the idea, then the collection of materials, and finally comes the technical problem solving. The organic part is undeniable. These sculptures, exposed to the elements, change and mature over time—intentionally. They are in constant dialog with the maker and spectator. And nature.
“I don’t want to convert people to anything. Everybody should make up his or her own interpretation. Friends brought visitors over to show them the sculptures. I am always surprised about their comments. Everybody gets to think what they want. And that is the way it should be.”
Another piece is in the works, called Kama Sutra, aka a bunch of large, gnarly cedar roots arranged together. “At this time, I am working on the enlightened lovers,” Helmut says.
What will people think about that?
Whatever they want. Like me. Mea culpa, Helmut! I had thought that man with the sea shells was playing beach volleyball: shells = beach, white ball, get it? Perhaps some wishful thinking there. We all could have done so much better without the Covid.
Maybe some objects are also crying out to you for the art inside of them? Just look around! Elevate your vision for the not-so-ordinary.
There is more. Helmut is also an excellent silversmith-jewelry maker. His life partner Edda Buchner will be showcasing his jewelry together with the sculptures in a book. Helmut has also built a Zen garden, a labyrinth, and a tipi on his Texas home turf.
My idyllic hometown, Ascholding, received a hodge podge of oversized industrial buildings over night. Some structures are large enough to park the whole church inside. Was this necessary? Where will this insanity end?
Im Jahr 2018 hat das idyllische Bachzeilendorf Ascholding ein Gewerbegebiet erhalten. Hier (anklicken) ein Überflug mit den Dohlen vom Kirchturm: Zuerst das wunderbare Alpenpanorama, dann das industrielle Schachtelwerk.
Da haben wir den Salat–ein “Gewerbegebiet.” Die zwei größten “Flugzeughallen”, überdimensionale Fremdkörper, verhindern nach allen Richtungen den Ausblick. Solche Mammutbauten gehören nicht einmal an den Rand des idyllischen Bachzeilendorfes. Bieten die neuen Firmen den Ortsansässigen viele gute Arbeitsplätze an? Die landwirtschaftlichen Felder sind für immer zerstört, die Sozialstruktur verstädtert.
So war es früher einmal: auf dem Feld links unten steht jetzt das Gewerbegebiet.
PHASE II: Geht es jetzt so weiter? Mehr als 80 Parkplätze für den Edeka Markt (insgesamt ca. 120 Stellflächen mit Kindergarten eingerechnet) sollen noch kommen. Aber brauchen doch mehr Grünflächen und weniger Abgase, um das Global Warming zu reduzieren? ABER: Die nächste Bauphase (II).
So viele wie der Holzwirt (40 geteerte, 30 auf Kies)? Oder so viele wie der Netto in Egling? Genau 68, aber Egling ist größer. Oder so viele wie das Kaufland in Geretsried (120, wenn ich mich nicht verzählt habe)? Welcher Parkplatz ist jetzt da am schönsten?
My favorite 2017 Summer Pictures
“Water Is Life” No debate about that. Thousands of people from all over the world gathered last fall 2016 at Standing Rock Reservation for a camp out. The Dakota tribe protested the pipeline because the DAPL violated tribal autonomy, desecrated cultural treasures and gravesite, and put the water resources–above all the Missouri River–in great jeopardy. To no avail. After a short-lived halt of construction by the American Corps of Engineers, the pipeline was finished by executive order and the protesters cleared away in January 2017. There are many stories of camp endurance, nonviolent resistance, and bravery in the harsh Dakota winter. Solidarity and support (such as donated wood-burning stoves from Germany) poured from all over the world.
Listen to this Native American speaker at a Phoenix solidarity protest march.
Nevertheless we humans keep building industrial conundrums. In the process we are soiling & spoiling our water resources. Industries sprout like there is no tomorrow. What kind of tomorrow will it be? The North Dakota Access Pipeline is finished and open for business. Pipelines spill all the time. Only we don’t hear much about it, unless an offshore drill platform bursts into flames–mega disaster. Deep Water Horizon?
People from all over the world joined the Dakota Nation for Thanksgiving 2016. Native Americans are the Greenpeace of our times. We all need clean water. The descendants of Sitting Bull and Red Cloud are still fighting the legal battle for sovereignty and the environment. Let’s stand with Standing Rock. The debate about water is here to stay.
Timbisha, a poem by Beverly Rubik. This was written on a New Year’s trip to Death Valley, California.
When you thought, no stranger things than a “bra” can happen, look at this. Well, I had to protect my miracle tree this year. We have tons of grackles that can empty a whole fig tree in a day. So how could I keep my sweet apricot secret and the fruits for myself?
Don’t take me wrong, I would share the treasures of nature. Here, birdie, have an apricot. We have some “love birds”, itinerant green parrots from central America, that would make for such a nice addition to our backyard zoo. We have squirrels, lizards, stray cats, geckos, quail, pigeons, humming birds–and too many grackles. But our birds are either stupid or greedy. Or bad mannered. Do you think, they would the eat whole thing up? No, they peck a little bite out of each sweet apricot. Just enough to make each fruit unfit for human consumption. Give me apricot bird defense!
Don’t you dare eat my apricots, birds! I came up with a whole arsenal of bird defense. What best to do than conceal the prey? With plastic shopping bags I wrapped the heavy laden branches. Yet more area was to cover. With a 7-yard-long turban I barred the landing spots on the lower ranges. The bird net was harder to install. It got caught at every little nook and cranny. What about up there? OK, these CDs on fish line glisten and reflect. Hopefully the birds hated dancing discos? Finally, a plastic owl, the “super tank” in my armamentarium for the bird defense, took its post on the fence pillar.
I didn’t quite trust my installation. Wait a minute! What about scare crows? An easy fix. I grabbed some themed t-shirts (faces printed on them) from my daughter’s closet. I attached paper plate faces from a school project with cloths pins on the hangers. And then I hung my scare creatures in the most suitable locations.
Voilá! Now don’t dare to come, birds! Or I will sick the stray cat on you.
I SAVED THEM:
Hang in there with me, and read the whole story to see what this means.
One fine spring morning, the doorbell rang unexpectedly. A little aggravated I jumped up from my computer and suspiciously pulled the door open. Could have only been special delivery or preacher guys this time of day.
Francisco stood there smack in the middle of the walkway. “You need clean up,” he says. “Your trees too big.”
“No, if I trim them now, they will only grow faster.” It was April. “Come back in June.”
“Look,” he points to my debris-littered island. “We make it all nice.”
I am not worried yet about my “naturalized” landscape and send Francisco off to other gardens. Mine can wait. Yep, sometimes I need a little help from the pros, especially when I can’t put up with the loads of trimmings.
About two weeks later, in the middle of a household commotion, the bell rings again insistently. It was a really bad time. I thought we had a deal? Come back in June? Apparently, Francisco had jumped a month in his calendar.
Well, turns out, it wasn’t Francisco but Jacinto, his brother. “Your trees, trim?” Maybe. I remembered we had a major party coming up. OK, OK, do clean up! The price was negotiated as usual. Settled halfway. As long as the sum is right, my yard crew goes the extra mile.
My landscapers always show up instantly. At least one magic worker starts with a saw or rake usually within 5 minutes after I call them. Thus Francisco makes sure that I don’t change my mind or hire someone else for the project. He brought Jacinto plus two more helpers along to my “construction site.”
Fine by me. These men work hard, clean up tidy, and try to honor my requests for strange style cuts for my bushes (al mano, no maquina).
This job turned out bigger than expected, because the citrus tree had gone wild and proliferated extensive growth. Towards the end of their assignment, I asked Francisco as usual for horticultural advice in yard maintenance. Sometimes Francisco’s expertise turns out to be helpful, sometimes it’s not working at all (like killing Chinese Elm roots with gasoline), but every time he is eager to come up with some expert idea.
I have this mid-size, really lush apricot tree. In the last three year it had not had any fruit. Quite to the contrary, its little shabby apricot brother on the “desert” side of my backyard had sweet little fruits galore. Was my best tree still pouting since the last trim that I had given it myself? What could I do?
“Usar Ro-pa-mui-yer.”
“I don’t understand, what did you say?”
“Ro-pa-mui-yer.” He said it more slowly.
“Where can I buy that?” What a strange name that was for a fertilizer.
Francisco laughed. “You don’t have to buy it, use your own.”
I was confused. “Like what?” I asked
“Calcetines,” (stockings), he said, grinning all over his face. “O pantaloncitos (underwear slips). O camisa (undershirt).”
Ropa de Mujer! He is saying, “women’s clothing.” Was he serious?
“And how do I use these with the tree?”
“Wrap it around, hang it in there. I don’t know.”
“For how long?”
“A day, a week, as long as you like.”
“Eres chistoso?” (Are you kidding me?)
“No es broma, es un truco.” (No, it is not a joke. It is a trick.)
A trick?
“It will awaken the tree’s desire to produce.”
So I guess, the tree was male.
I tried it out. I hung a bra in that tree for a day. Let’s see about the results next year, Francisco.
INDEED, HERE IS MY APRICOT YEAR ONE YEAR LATER:
It seems strange, but Arizona is a winter paradise. Not only for snowbirds from Wisconsin and North Dakota who flock here to the Valley of the Sun, but also for people who really like snow. We have it good in Phoenix. When El Niño’s clouds move in, we get a heavy rain in the valley. But up in the mountains, Payson, Prescott, Flagstaff, and so forth, it’s another story. They get the flaky stuff.
So we go to see the snow. It’s a real attraction for us. We grab our hiking boots and bundle up. Yes, we use those gloves and hats once a year. And off we drive. We can see the white beauty from afar on Four Peaks Mountain. Let’s go!
Smoky the Bear advises us in Payson that fire danger is low today. No wonder, the snow pile reaches well above his waist. We drive up to the trout farm on the Rim by Horton Creek. Barely a one-lane track is ploughed. What if we get head on traffic! We don’t want to get stuck in the berm. No snow tires, chains or shovels anywhere. Who knows if our T-Mobile will get a call out of here.
But we are driving through a winter wonderland of pristine snow. The pine trees are loaded, bending under the heavy white weight. Is this Narnia? We expect snow creatures, but they are only happy sledders parked by the road.
We get out at the parking for the trailhead. The trout farm is closed, but there is a little trail into the snow-covered forest. We tread gently into the quiet scenery. Sculptured trees of sugar loads decorate the path besides us. Paff, that snowball hit right on my chest. Wait a minute, take this!
We like to see and touch the snow, and then be out of it. We basically know all the coffee shops in Flagstaff, our favorite one Macy’s with its coffee roaster and inspiring photographs. Yeah, we could trying skiing sometime on Mount Humphreys, but we are too lazy. Instead we enjoy the vista across the winter wonderland from up there.
This is Arizona winter wonderland. You may see Prickly Pear cacti covered with snow. They sure look funny that way. Or a white cap on a saguaro, a Santa-guaro. When it snows, we run to catch a whiff of it. And we get out of it just as quick. What a good deal.
Look at our beautiful Arizona snow mountains: Four Peaks, Bell Rock, Mt. Humphreys
So there is no global warming? Huh? Phoenix broke its all time record high this August. The airport thermometer registered 117 F (47 C). Even our conservative, local TV station believes it now. Global warming is here to stay.
But who is to blame? I have heard good people talk a lot of nonsense, such as, “global warming is an invention of the liberals,” or “yeah, the weather is usually getting warmer between two ice ages,” or “aren’t you always looking for a problem?” Meanwhile the permafrost is melting to release its mammoth ivory. We all (and our cars and consumption) are to blame.
Don’t look into the distance. Just cross your doorstep. We in Arizona are 43 Celsius hot on average in August. The poor gnome (above) from the Snow Bowl on Mt. Humphreys worries about the safety of his home. Something is burning in California all the time. Sunset Point on highway 17 closed its restrooms for the lack of water. Darn it!
Global warming is also staring me in the face in Germany. It’s heavy too. When I helped stack the yard-long logs at my old home, nobody denied it: tornadoes are not normal for Germany. They should stay with the Wicked Witch in Kansas or Oklahoma. No, I don’t wish a tornado on anyone. But twisters in Germany are hopefully not the new normal.
The result of Bavarian tornadoes: Wood here, wood there, wood everywhere. My brother’s farm has become a fortress of wooden castle walls. He and his village neighbors don’t know what to do with that much fuel. It will last them perhaps ten years.
Those desperate showers of wood are the consequence of a spring 2015 tornado. It wasn’t convenient that the storm happened right before the hay harvest. It was rather tragic too. Several people, including a young mother of two, died in the tornado. One tree trapped her way, the next one fell on top of her car. That woman was innocent.
But, then, all of us is are innocent. Or are we? We drive cars too often. We use too much energy. Which Newton law is it?
Energy is contained in fossil fuels, but once you release the heat (and exhaust) from the gasoline, it stays around. Energy can’t go away or escape into deep space. It just shifts into different forms. Some of these forms are noxious to life on the planet. The face of the earth has been changed through our exploitations and material consumption. Ditto, the exhaust and motion energy from a machine (car) are here to stay forever. As well as the coolness of the refrigerator, if you keep the door open too long. However it would be a paradoxical exercise to keep all the refrigerator doors open to cool off the global warming. We’d have to worry a few notches higher about the excess of freon eating up the ozone layer. Right, take your pick.
I picked up another stately piece of beech. It would have almost pulled me down. These one-yard split logs were heavy with their sap. They were as heavy as a “wet corpse,” the locals might have said. Too bad, these trees should have had much more time to grow. The tornado mowed them down.
What will we do? Can we change our habits? How?
Lately I have been fascinated with sharks. Who wouldn’t be? I remember recently playing “shark” with a four-year-old boy, clapping my hands flat together as if jaws were gaping widely open to take a huge bite out of each other. I wasn’t very good at the shark game. So Samuel won every time, ate me alive. He had shark books, shark movies, and shark pajamas. How about shark bait and cage? Those were on his list too.
Sharks make our imagination go wild. We attribute them with a devilish insidious intention to shred every catch to pieces. Aren’t sharks bloodthirsty and intriguing, as depicted in the Spielberg movie Jaws? Aren’t they killing machines? How else can it be, since their razor sharp rows of teeth can regrow within 24 hours. Anyhow, that’s what I read. According to a pioneering Austrian ocean explorer, Hans Hass, whose books I devoured in my teenage years, sharks like to follow their acute sense of taste for blood in water and the sonic 
wrestling of a fish in distress. Often sharks like to hang out around fishing boats, similar to seagulls, in hopes to catch a bite. Or sometimes they may just be curious about what’s floating in their territory.
I read in a book titled In unberührte Tiefen that the diver (Hans Hass) was able to shoo away sharks by screaming under water or gesticulating wildly. However, that trick did not work any more where sharks had become “hard of hearing” because of dynamite fishing practices. Nowadays, shark tourism may be almost as common as swimming with the dolphins. Yeah, better go down in an iron cage, because fifty years later these sharks must be really deaf—and careless of (or annoyed with) gawking tourists.
For movies, sharks are always good. They are strong characters, and we think we have figured them out. Moby Dick wasn’t a shark but at least as sinister and cunning. But I keep thinking, wasn’t it Captain Ahab’s obsession that killed him rather than the whale? Of course Disney’s Nemo also featured sharks, by the names of Bruce, Anchor, and Chum. Now, the interesting part was that these sharks were trying to be good by becoming vegetarians. Yet they still could not resist the flavor of blood. Move on to Dreamwork’s Shark Tale. A little fish is mistakenly celebrated as a shark killer and draws the head honcho shark’s revenge on him. Yet in the course of events, a few sharks get reformed. One wayward shark did not like meat anyway. So, the truth remains, only a dead shark is a good shark?
Sharks were the topic in a recent PBS documentary. More and more sharks show up on the Australian coast and put swimmers at jeopardy. Why? Maybe this shark behavior is due to climate change, maybe the sharks were looking for new hunting grounds because they had run out of food (overfishing) in the deep ocean. The conclusion of the documentary was, sharks may be an endangered species. Those ferocious rulers of the ocean have to fear us humans more than we should fear them.
Why do we fear sharks? It’s basic instinct. Sharks can eat us. So before that happens, we try to eat all of them, just in case, if only for shark fin soup. I don’t know what this soup tastes like, but it seems like such a waste to just use only the fins (and why?), and not put the rest of shark protein at least into dog food or fertilizer. Sharks, the buffaloes of the ocean? The sad truth is: In a year sharks eat about ten humans, BUT we humans destroy some 70 millions (maybe 100 million) of these scavengers of the sea in just 365 days. 10 (ten) versus 70 million. What kind of uneven combat is that?
Still, I don’t want any human to fall prey to a hungry shark. When it comes to being eaten, I would rather choose being gulped up by a tiger, not a muscular projectile from the deep with triple rows of meat grinder teeth. What do you think? Because tigers are 
more like us. These furry mammals breathe the same air as we do. And aren’t kittens cute? Not so little sharks. Tiger or shark, I don’t want to be eaten by either one. Luckily, my chances for such an encounter are slim, unless I fall into a tiger cage or a really big aquarium. But I don’t go to the zoo so often any more. People who have been injured and mutilated by sharks carry that trauma as nightmares forward for the rest of their lives. Close your eyes, imagine you are swimming in the ocean, a torpedo takes aim at your silhouette from the depths below towards the middle of your gut. Keep on paddling. Easy catch.
Sharks have almost surround vision, a real wide-angle horizon view, especially towards what floats above them. Duh, they are really good swimmers too. Now imagine you are professional surfer Bethany Hamilton. She survived such a shark attack in Hawaii. The shark devoured her arm and half of her surfboard. Miraculously she survived the life-threatening injury and took up surf-boarding again. She wrote a book called Soul Surfer about her experience. Later, a movie was made. I heard it is quite heart and gut wrenching. Good for the girl, she got on the surfboard again. Would she want to see 10 million sharks dead in exchange for her gruesome experience? The “real criminal” man-eater shark that attacked her apparently was caught the next day.
Now back to beginning. Why Sharks Attack was the title of a NOVA PBS documentary I watched in May. Naturally, the NOVA programs are always well done and informative. However, I had two especially defining moments. One was the fact that Peter Benchley’s (the author of Jaws) widow had become a driving activist for shark preservation. She seemed to resent and atone for the vilification of the ocean “tigers” in her husband’s famous thriller. Sharks are important for the natural balance in the oceans. The other moment was the shock of numbers. Somewhere between 70 million and 100 million sharks are killed every year. I can’t even imagine that this many sharks are out there. Despite a lot of shark tourism lately, I heard somewhere that sharks don’t make such good pets. So I would say, we leave most of them where they are and don’t swim too close to them. Or do we want to accomplish another extinction along such greats as the buffalo? Hasta la vista, Baby!
Ich hätte es mir gleich denken können: der Sommer kommt ja wieder. Zu spät für die Flucht nach drüben. Obwohl—bei uns in Arizona geht der Sommer eigentlich nie ganz weg, auch nicht im Winter. Deswegen kommen dann die Snow Birds aus Iowa, Minnesota und Nebraska. Aber leider ist ihr alter Schnee dann unterwegs schon geschmolzen. Von Rodeln keine Spur, denn in Arizona brodelt der Asphalt.
Jetzt im Juli ist es grad so schön warm, dass du dir auf der Kühlerhaube (welch eine Fehlbenennung) ein Spiegelei braten könntest. Hundert Grad (37 C) sind da nichts, das haben wir mehr als fünf Monate lang. „It’s a dry heat“, eine trockene Hitze, scherzen wir Arizonier dann mit unseren Touristen. Obwohl, wenn das Thermometer auf knusprige 115 (46 C) klettert, dann sind wir gespannt, ob es keinen Knacks kriegt.
Mir bleibt die Luft weg, wenn ich aus dem gekühlten Haus in die kochende Garage geh. Die Spucke ist mir schon längst vertrocknet. Wenigstens habe ich Ofenhandschuhe für die Autotürgriffe dabei, weil die auch schon glühen. So, erst lass ich mal 10 Minuten den Motor und die Kühlung laufen, damit ich das Steuer anfassen kann. Es ist kein Scherz, schon viele Babys und Haustiere sind in solchen Folteröfen gestorben. Und nur Vollidioten bestellen sich in Arizona eine schwarze Innenausstattung fürs Auto. So meschugge bin ich noch nicht. Bloß nichts drin liegen lassen, was schmelzen oder explodieren könnte.
Aber was kannst’ machen? Bei so einem Sauwetter jagt man keinen Hund mehr auf die Straße. Hab ich Fieber? Da lebt man wie im Dämmerzustand und Unfähigkeit zu irgendwas so vor sich hin, wie unter eine Glasglocke. Klimakühlung im Haus, im Auto, im Mall, von der Natur keine Spur, lieber nicht, die ist grausam heiß.
Sculpture by Heloise Crista at Taliesin West
Mein Garten ist schon arg vertrocknet trotz Sprinkleranlage. Die Tomaten sind Dörrobst. Sogar den Kakteen wird es zu heiß. Erst als ich die Schattensegel über den Kaktusfeldern im Botanischen Garten wahrnehme, verstehe ich, warum meine Aloepflanze so traurig aussieht. Da brennt es direkt runter auf den Steingarten, gegrillte Aloe also.
Sogar zum Baden ist es zu warm. Im öffentlichen Pool schwimmt man herum wie ein Wienerwürstel in der Erbsensuppe—und das Wasser sieht auch so aus. Nein, danke. Auf dem Salt River kann man sich in einem Autoreifen treiben lassen, nicht schlecht. Aber am besten mit T-Shirt und Trainingshose bedeckt, sonst gibt’s rote Garnelen zum Abendbrot. Solardach haben wir zwar, aber die Zellen kommen mit dem Strom für die Kühlung nicht mehr nach. Kann man nur hoffen, dass das bisschen extra Schatten unter den Platten die Sonne etwas bremst. Auch dem „Sonnendach“ wird die Hitze zu viel.
Barracks at Goldfield Town
Kurz gesagt, Arizona ist ein Winterparadies. Im Sommer gibt es genau drei verschiedene Temperaturen: „hot“, „hotter“, und „bloody hot.“ Arizona ist der einzige Staat, der keine Sommerzeit hat. Wieso? Weil wir ignorieren den Sommer ganz einfach. Deswegen kriegt er auch keine besondere Zeit. Ganz im Gegenteil sind wir froh, wenn die Sonne abends schnellstens wieder abhaut. Wir haben angeblich auch einen „Monsoon“, aber alles was dabei herauskommt sind Blitze und Staubstürme. 
Trotzdem hat Arizona ganz herrliche Regenbögen—einmalig auf der Welt, weil ganz ohne Regen. Ich glaube wir machen die mit Panavision, oder so ähnlich wie ein Feuerwerk.
Na gut, am Wetter kann ich nichts ändern—aber meine Einstellung schon. Jetzt habe ich folgendes probiert: ich habe mein chinesisches Schneesturmposter anmeditiert und mir vorgestellt, es ist Winter. Und es hat funktioniert. Es war wie Weihnachten. So habe ich nichtsdestotrotz gleich Schmalznudeln und Plätzchen gebacken. Ignorieren ist das Beste, was man tun kann, wenn an der Lage nichts zu ändern ist. Aber manchmal wird’s mir trotzdem ganz “Chihuly.”
I pulled into Buchners’ home-grown patch of Texas ranch turf. Through the ranch gates, I rumbled along the bumpy grooves of a pioneer wagon road into an island of wilderness. Prickly pears, mesquite, live oak, cholla cactus, cedar trees, and other greenery surrounded me.
It was a pleasantly warm, somewhat humid and overcast day, which gave the greens a stronger tint. I halted at the roundabout and shut off the motor. The deer briefly stared at my vehicle then continued grazing unperturbed. I took in the scenery.
There stood a bicycle on my right by a group of trees. That just wasn’t like the Buchners to leave equipment sitting out in the wild. Must have been the boys. They have two very lively grandsons. But the ladder next to the bicycle was a little harder to explain. It wasn’t leaning against a tree or shed, just standing free, reaching up in the air.
“This piece is called Going Nowhere,” Helmut Buchner said. Since he put it up, he has received numerous interpretations. Some have called it Jacob’s Ladder or Stairways to Heaven. But the ladder doesn’t go far enough. It ends in midair. And why does the bicycle not have a seat? Just for fun.
“Imagine someone tried to steal that,” Helmut said raising a slightly mischievous eyebrow. “They wouldn’t get very far.” So, now, what to make of the seat-less bicycle next to such a ladder? “I can’t tell you that,” Helmut said. “It’s all up to the observer.”
Far from a nihilistic approach, the artist created a contemplation device to approach the unknowns in somebody’s life. “This free standing ladder does not mean that there isn’t anything out there. Only that we don’t know what it could be,” Helmut said. The uncertainty of life’s path is in the mind of the beholder.
Helmut and Edda Buchner have lived a down-to-earth life since they settled on the Bat Cave Ranch property some 30 years ago. It is, for the most part, a naturally rugged homestead, as it came with live oaks, cedar trees, and a jumble of prickly growth. The couple—Helmut is an accomplished jewelry maker, Edda a passionate journalist and writer—has pursued numerous artistic endeavors. Some years ago, Helmut started building larger-than-life sculptures with natural or found materials. The Going Nowhere ladder, for example, is made of bamboo that grows behind the house, the bracket connectors are crafted from copper.
But, wait, there is much more. When I drove into the Buchners’ property, transfixed on the country road and grazing deer, I had missed the Friendship Flower Children on my right (see also top picture). Two larger-than-live human figures made from weathered wood pieces, handing each other a bunch of flowers.
“The power of flowers still works,” Helmut explained. “I was reminded of a time when young people stuck flowers into policemen’s barrels of guns.” Peaceful coexistence, right? “Yes, that is possible,” the artist believes. “Offering flowers is a nice gesture of good will to spend a few moments together, or brighten somebody’s day,” he added.
The kids’ favorite sculpture is the Balancing Person, a cedar wood fencepost with slender cedar “arms” stuck through a cutout, balancing with a bamboo stick. That is to say, life is a balance act every day. “We often forget that when caught up in everyday worries and challenges,” Helmut said. “Balance is never complete, but if we invest a little time and effort, we can come closer to it with our mind and inspiration.”
Along the drive, in view of the Flower Children, there stands Senix, an installation of weathered, split mesquite logs. The logs (for firewood) were gifted to the Buchners, who are known throughout the neighborhood to joyfully adopt recycled objects. “But it would have been a pity to burn them,” Helmut said. “Mesquite wood is highly desired by many craftsmen for its amazing texture and broad variety of colors, orange to ebony. You can’t see it now, but the beauty is hidden inside. I will polish a part of a wood block to expose the inner works.” He thought about the similarity to weathered people. You have to see beyond their wrinkles too.
Finally, over by the front yard live oaks Helmut created a labyrinth with Texas sandstone boulders that were collected during land clearings. A labyrinth is not a maze, Helmut says, because you don’t want to lose yourself but find yourself.
“There is no magic or cure in walking the labyrinth,” the artist-philosopher continued. “The key is to walk slowly, disregarding all thoughts of the past and the future, being content with the present moment. The labyrinth just serves as a tool to experience mindfulness.” Perhaps you will discover that the most recent frustrations are not a problem, at least not in life’s grand scheme.
And so friends might leave the Buchner Ranch as soulfully refreshed as the Happy Wanderer aka “Hermit,” who bids them good-bye on their way out. The Hermit, like the Flower Children, is a collage of wood fragments. Tired from the daily chores, he briskly walks back to home and hearth in joyful expectation. Soon there might be a loftier character running up the old oak tree behind the house. This “tree runner” must overcome the technical challenge of a 45 degree incline, but if it can be thought, it might as well be tried.
When you ask Helmut, you can go into a labyrinth to lose your problems and find yourself. Great idea! Helmut has assembled a gallery of appealing artifacts based on his life experience. They are all made from natural materials or found objects. Many such things are ordinarily tossed out or lost or scattered, but here they received a kind regard through an artistic intent. And Helmut is freely sharing his beautiful life assessment tools with anybody for a recalibration of their outlook. Fantastic!
A natural crocodile in an Alpine pond
I love the rainy days, but I would be singing night and day if I were to eulogize this heavenly moisture in Germany. Rain had come down too much on the land of BMW and Nivea cream.
Perhaps Germany’s May and June 2013 had altogether five clearly sunny days. And some of these presented a tropical steam kitchen with 35 degrees Celsius (100 F) and almost 100 percent humidity.
Beach baskets at Travemünde
On one of those rare brilliant days, we sat dazed and mesmerized at a Travemünde beach café. It was too hot to move about. Even the famous beach baskets hunkered down, mouth wide open, gasping for air.
Ya-ha, that was a pretty exceptional day. Otherwise, the heavens poured down water as if pushing us to rebuild Noah’s Arc. On TV, we watched people being washed out of their homes along the Danube River. Many residents tried to sandbag their storefronts in Passau, but to no avail. Scores of farm animals drowned. More dikes could have broken, but people labored ceaselessly to contain the damage.
Rickmers historic ship
Damage it was, however. Gasoline tanks broke, stank up the properties; furniture and merchandise spoiled; water poured from electric outlets. Everything needed to be fixed real bad or be torn down. Ms. Merkel promised emergency help, about $2000 per victim immediately. That aid was for people with nothing else but their clothes on their backs. Damages amounted to hundreds of millions Euros. Diehards along these smitten areas declared they would not only survive the flooding but also recover.
Such courage was admirable. To me, this exceptional flood seemed like New Orleans all over again. However, the Germans were better organized and much less destitute. It might seem, at times, that the clean sweep of New Orleans was intentional.
Really funny, right? The New Orleans disaster “Katrina” was talked about, predicted, so to say, but still nobody was prepared for it. Why is that? Skip, skip, skip across the pond to the rest of the story . . .
Natural reflections
If we can think it, if we can say it, these things will happen. So we must do something about it, right? We know that earthquakes will come in California. But not in our time, we hope. We know that glacial surfaces are melting. But they are so far away. We know that we will run out of mineral oils. But gasoline is still affordable. And on it goes. We like to take a “calculated” risk. Calculate all you will. Some people thought they were smart enough to follow the receding waters into the ocean before the tsunami. Imagine the rest.
Let’s not be a doomsday prophet or a conspiracy theorist. In my own lifetime, I have observed Germany’s climate change, especially because I live so far away from it. In the last 20 years, I have hardly experienced one of those warm-crisp “Russian summer” days I used to know in my childhood.
Compared to that, everything seems moist and clammy to me, even the laundry never dries up completely. I see a lot of moss growing. And sometimes the exertion from mountain hiking feels like being “water-boarded” by the secret service. The air is heavy with water, so it’s hard for the lungs to separate the oxygen out of it.
I still love the greenery and rainy landscape. But increasingly I am experiencing more aquarium-like days than I am able to remember. So the climate might have changed already. What now?
Look at the pictures from the Tegernsee Mountains. Some impressions reminded me of the rainforest in Ecuador. Naturally, in northern Germany because of the Elbe, Alster and Baltic Sea, there was a lot of water anyway. And another load fell from the sky.
Water critters
Tadpoles
More reflections