Quickie Thoughts Inspired by Moving and Vacation

by Katharine Niles

Blog Last Updated; 7/27/2009

1. The best thing about the American West is the amount of public land and access to it. I've come to accept I'm quasi-urban in my tastes; I've lived far from town, on 35 acres, and though it was quiet and lovely, it was not, ultimately, for me. Most of all what I hated was my reliance on the automobile to get me anywhere, and the fact that, oddly enough, I had less access to hiking trails, ski ventures, and so forth, surrounded as I was by other ranches and ranchettes. In town now, I can walk out my door, go three city blocks, and hike to Denver if I wanted to. Even Albuquerque and Salt Lake have favorable attributes in this direction ? you do have to drive or take a bus or bike a little to get there, but on the edge of town you can easily find ample space in which to roam. Santa Fe is the same, and even Phoenix has desert hills left in the middle of it for public enjoyment of open space. That's one of the first things I feel when I visit the in-laws back east ? that the cities are big and fabulous and an amazing polyglot of people and food and smells, but that my daily dip into nature, solitude, the peace of trees and the sudden surprise of stumbling on a deer or rabbit, could not occur should I live there.

2. I love public transportation. I now live on a bus line! In a small southwestern town! Who knew this was possible? I ride it to work. It's fantastic. And it's even more fantastic seeing that the Main Avenue line, at least, is well used. I've loved public transportation ever since I went to pre-Wall Falling Down Berlin at age 17 and got to wander that whole city with a pack of fellow teenagers without having to rely on parental cars or the worry that goes with borrowing them. I was thrilled. Plus, I'm a writer, and there is no better place to stare at people and try to figure out the stories behind them than on a bus or subway line. The car isolates us. It stinks up the air, creates an unbelievable amount of noise (listen to your town at dawn. Then listen to it at 5 pm. Arrgggh.), makes us detest our fellow drivers, is the leading cause of death for those under 25, and causes obesity. Blech. I get the "love affair with the automobile" that Americans supposedly have when I am on the open road on a long trip, or when I see a remodeled thing from the 1950s replete with wicked fins and two-tone styling. No doubt about it -- there is something about cars like that; in the Eisenhower era of conformity, they were audacious. They still are. But man. My "love affair with the automobile" ends there.

3. We're about to fly the coop for the annual Back East In-Law extravaganza. This year, it takes place in Chautauqua, NY, home of the Chautauqua Institute, a sort of elite summer camp for all ages. We're doing this because my son's step-cousin (got that?) is on the brink of being a professional ballet dancer, and is dancing there that week. So my stepmother-in-law, who used to be a camp director, has rented a rambling Victorian into which copious family members will stuff themselves for the week. Last year, it was the Berkshires and Hyde Park country, which made me want to organize a road bike trip with my best girlfriends and ride the rolling countryside for a week, indulging in wine and summer theater at night. Most of the time it's southern Massachusetts, where I get my ocean and seafood fix. And all of the time it's a nice break, a chance to sniff humid air, eat bluefish, and talk to people whose lives are entirely different from mine.

4. But it's nice to come home. Now that we've finally gotten to town, I feel I have my perfect combination of urbanity (the bus line! The downtown job!) and wilderness access. I look out over our mountainous terrain and the river valley and I'm flooded over and over with how beautiful it is. Four Corners territory has never let me down in that way. It's my church, my god, my great love. It always will be.