The Desert is Trying to Kill Me

This abandoned house and truck sit on a small parcel of land near the industrial center of my town.  It was once a homestead and farm.  You can see the Sagebrush and Rabbitbrush have reclaimed what used to be.

Rabbitbrush, starting to come into it's fuzzy glory.

I live in Utah’s high desert.  I love living here. The mountains, red rocks and sagebrush plains all make me very happy.  Its the most beautiful landscape on the planet in my eyes, especially in the fall. Too bad Utah tries to kill me (or at least pay dearly for living here) every year. We have a plant called Rabbitbrush which is very pretty to look at.  Dusty green/blue stems lead up to fluffy mustard yellow flowers blooming prettily right now. It grows everywhere the land hasn’t been plowed or paved into submission.  It's one of those bits of nature that just won't be tamed. My dogs love to rub on it. It also makes my eyes swell and itch. My head fills with fluids till my ears buzz and I feel like I may drown in the gunk. My joints ache and I can't sleep. Yay! Allergies!

Sagebrush smells dusky and rich. It is never prettier than
in the fall.

And then there’s the Sagebrush.  Another high desert plant I love which doesn’t love me back.  Sage also blooms right now, and grows alongside Rabbit Brush. I love the way it smells, especially after a little rain. It’s tiny silvery leaves and woody stems distinguish it from Rabbitbrush. And Sage is tough. Good luck trying to get rid of this stuff. Some of my neighbors have given up and incorporated it into the landscape around their houses. It looks pretty cool. There's a lot to admire about this scrubby little brush. Too bad the tiny chartreuse flowers are also suffocating. They stuff my nose and give me flu-like symptoms that, on a bad year, no allergy pills can touch. I am grateful I don't also have asthma like my sister. She really suffers through autumn in Utah.

I’ve gotten used to spending the end of September with buzzing ears, a hoarse voice, creaking joints and itchy eyes, living as near a humidifier as possible.  I do my best to go about my life, and keep loving the desert plants. They're some of the coolest life on earth. After all, you have to be TOUGH to bloom in the desert. One might think the desert would love me back and stop making me suffer for appreciating its prettiest time of year. Wishful thinking. I guess I should consider the amazing allergy inducing pollen one more inspiring defense mechanism of the Sage and Rabbitbrush.  I can’t plow them or pave them if I can’t breath.

My dogs love to snuggle up right up under the brush.  I think they like the scent, too.  Too bad for me
they then bring the pollen home.

The Email - A Micro-story

I was recently looking for a book in my old boxes of teaching supplies.  I haven't taught for almost 16 years but I still have a few boxes of my favorite resources and digging through them is always fun for me.  As usual, I not only found the particular item I was looking for, I also found a little unexpected something - this time a book of writing prompts I had occasionally used with my fourth graders.  It brought back good memories as I thumbed through it.  I read one prompt " You just received an email message from ___ and it said ___" and a lightening bolt zipped around my brain.  A little story unravelled faster than it took me to read the rest of the page.  I laughed a little, but then stopped.  I haven't written anything for quite a while, but I liked this idea.  I decided to write it down.  I call it a micro-story because it is very short.  I still like it.

The message was brief but she felt dread when she read it.  "I need to talk to you ASAP."

Given the state of their relationship, that could not be a good thing. Oh, there had been good times in the past, but now times were bad.  Very bad.  What communication there had been recently was brief and compulsory.  "We're almost out of toothpaste."  "Did you walk the dog?"  He had not forgiven her.

It wasn't her fault she had gained an admirer.  She had done nothing but go to work.  At first.  Michael had started it.  Charming, just-out-of-college-boy flirting was really fun.  She liked feeling young and fun again.  Being an adult could be SO boring.  But, young and fun led to lunch. Then lunchES.  Then long lunches.  Before she knew it Michael was being punched and shoved and thrown out of her apartment while she yelled.  He yelled back at her.  Lots of yelling.  The yelling did stop after a time.  She wanted to apologize.  She tried a few times but he wasn't having it.  He just glared at her.  She stopped trying.  She felt humiliated.  

He was calm.  He was cold.  There was no more yelling but there was nothing else, either.  For weeks.  Nothing.  Being together was torture.

When she saw the message she knew he had made up his mind.  He knew his next step.  She didn't like it.  She had been happily married. She wasn't with Michael because she was unhappy.  She hadn't wanted a divorce when she started flirting back.  She just got carried away.  It cost her.  The email staring back at her all but confirmed that.  

Suddenly, she sat up straight.  She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin.  If she couldn't change his mind, she owed it to him to let go peacefully.  She would be brave, for him.

She hit reply and typed "I'm free this afternoon."  She swallowed hard and hit send.