When someone describes a recent trip to me, I find the surprises of the trip the most interesting part.

There are movies set in the West, but they don’t show you the “Safety Corridor” signs one sees in New Mexico. These signs alert the driver that it is an area of high fatalities, an area heavily patrolled by zero tolerance police. A sign seen when driving in the Mojave Desert on a perfectly straight road, which by-the-way had a visibility of 10 miles, said, “Headlights On” and another sign said “No Passing Zone.”

These signs are to prevent optical illusions incidents. A 10-mile visibility road may seem straight, but that mileage can hide unseen dips and curves which might encourage an uninformed driver to pass a slower car, a possible fatal mistake. It is important to have headlights on because deserts are miles and miles of almost trance-inducing sameness and the spark of headlights can heighten alertness.

We’ve all seen movies of beaches with crashing waves, but movies don’t replicate the freight train roar of those waves, the pounding you feel in your feet, the signs saying, “Do Not Turn Your Back on the Waves” and “Warning Tsunami Area.” Movies can’t capture the sheer size of the waves, the fatal rocks near the shore, the speed of the tide, the high cliffs surrounding the beach. The sense that one is in a dangerously spectacular place.

And then there are the people. Traveling in the West involves driving in and out of Native American Reservations. Navajo, Apache, Zuni, Acoma, the list is endless. Going through the vast Navajo Reservations, one sees that every home has at least one six-sided building known as a *hogan and that also near that home, if you look closely, you can see a *sweat lodge. These buildings are important in a rich culture that has been here many more years than we have. Seeing them is a reminder that we were not the first people on this land. We know so little about the cultures that preceded us.

So much to learn, so many surprises, but when it is all said and done, there’s no place like home. One day while at a playground with our grandbaby, I unintentionally hit my head on a playground bar and wound up in the local ER. When I spoke to the nurse escorting me to the CAT lab, he asked me where I was from. Turns out he was also from Tennessee, the Memphis portion. I asked him what brought him to California, and he said, “The Grateful Dead, 1989, his plane landing just in time for the earthquake.”

I laughed and thought about Confucius’ famous words: “No matter where you go, there you are.”

Traveling gives you the opportunity to see the extraordinary in the ordinary. I once came across a woman from Australia taking pictures of squirrels. She considered them adorable, a rare sight in her home country. Ordinary for us, extraordinary for her. Navajo hogans, desert driving, fierce seas, extraordinary/ordinary – all of it there, wherever you are, available always if we can just remember to Keep. Our. Eyes. Open.

Cindy Arp, teacher/librarian, retired from Knox County Schools. She and husband Dan live in Heiskell.

* Hogan – A circular or 6-sided dwelling constructed of logs or stone, with a doorway facing east and a smoke hole in the center of the roof. The hogan always faces east so that the first thing that a Navajo family sees in the morning is the rising sun, Father Sun, one of the most revered of the Navajo deities.

*Sweat Lodge – A log profile hut, typically dome-shaped or oblong, made with natural materials and primarily used for purification ceremonies, but which can be used for the dual purpose of spiritual and body cleansing, especially in areas with limited water.