There's No Such Thing As The Perfect Couple (Publication Edit)

       

There’s No Such Thing as "The Perfect Couple"

The Outs
Ellen Jo Roberts
The Noise
July 2012

            

Drinking rum cocktails, watching the sun set over the high desert landscape, surrounded by adorable pets, fantastic climate and softly swaying wildflowers, we are keenly aware of what a great life we've got. My husband and I will celebrate our 17th anniversary on July 1st. Seventeen years, some more challenging than others, but each with a lesson. One thing I've learned over those years is that there's no such thing as "The Perfect Couple". Every duo I've thought to be "perfect" (charming at parties, sexy as hell, photogenic and fantastic) has crashed and burned up in tremendous flames, the combustion often causing lingering fall out over entire cities. The Perfect Couple is a figment, something concocted by Hollywood and Hallmark.

          Chad and I are far from perfect, but we work at it. We frequently disagree and our methods of dealing with the world and its challenges are 180 degrees different. Astrologically speaking, we clash on every level. He is analytical, scientific, critical, sensitive and easily wounded. He sometimes gets teary-eyed at children's dance recitals and during heart-tugging films. At parties he hides along the fringes, communing with nature.

         I am light-hearted and jovial, never taking things personally. He is slow-moving and thoughtful. It's hard for him to jump in on frivolously witty banter. When he says something it is usually very memorable and meaningful because he's invested a great deal of thought into it. I am quick on my feet and quick to speak. I sometimes make foolish detours or neglect to read directions.

   He doesn't get angry quickly, but when he does it's a slow boil that lasts all day.
   I am quick to get mad, but cool off just as fast.
      My husband thinks he can circumvent anything bad ever happening simply by doing as much advance research as possible.   I am the opposite. List making drives me bonkers and too much planning steals chances for delightful surprises. You can never prepare for every possible variable that could happen so I prefer to ride the world as it rotates, taking it as it comes. As an artist I count on those "happy accidents": the things you didn't plan for that turn out far better than what you originally had in mind. I don’t need to always be in control of the details. I have faith in the universe.

He likes to have all of the proper tools laid out and everything organized in advance

         We are night and day, yin and yang. On paper, we're a disaster. But yet we remain committed to each other. This polarity magnetizes us. It attracts us to each other.
Our differences are complementary, making us more well-rounded and a stronger team in the long run. Chad has taught me valuable lessons- like, foremost, "Not everyone thinks like you do, Ellen". Everyone's mind works differently. I am not always right. I do not always know everything. Stop and read the directions. Enjoy the silence and the scenery. Sometimes being so different from each other is a huge hassle, but being the partner of Chad has made me a better person.

        We were young when we got married. Carefree and foolhardy, packing up just our most precious possessions and heading to Arizona and the Great Unknown, with no jobs lined up, no place to stay. Just "living on love" and sleeping in the forest. Getting hitched was a lark. We met in college 19 years ago when we both lived in the same historic boarding house on College Avenue in DeKalb, Illinois. The first time we spoke, he winked at me. Within two years we were wed and moving west. In the 17 years we've been in Arizona, nearly every couple we've ever met has since disbanded. The exception is baby boomers currently celebrating their 25th, 30th, 40th wedding anniversaries, like Chad’s parents.
        My marriage model was far different. My father was killed in a car wreck when my brother and I were pre-school age and we were raised by a single mother. Marriage was no kind of commodity to me. I certainly never imagined I’d be hitched by age 23. My main notion of marriage came from my grandparents. Gram and Gramps spent 58 years bickering with each other, heels dug in tight for the long haul. Because that’s what their generation did. They’d survived the Great Depression and World War II and they weren’t gonna quit anything (even when maybe they should have). Their partnership may not have been affectionate or romantic, but it was well-managed and successful long term, like a good investment.

   We sit in the yard sipping our lime-crushed rum, and wonder how it is we've survived the marriage minefield, littered with our peers crashing and burning to the left and the right of us. Couples more alike, more beautiful, more "together" than we've ever seemed to be.
Was their perfection just an act for the public? Behind closed doors was it something else entirely? Or did their unions collapse when the heat became too much to sustain?  If they couldn't make it, how the hell can we, the obviously imperfect, ever make it?

        Navigating other people and their emotional grenades is one of life’s great challenges. And marriage is a tough gig. Anyone who signs up for it oughta realize. You'd like to think it's 50/50, but truth is a lot of times it's one person giving 100% and the other giving far less. Sometimes we take turns.

          A key to happiness occurred to me, while running along the river on a glorious spring day; the kind of day where the sprouting leaves are freshly green, the herons and hawks fly overhead right on cue and the world just seems impossibly awesome.
The key to happiness is that you've got to be able to make yourself happy. You cannot be reliant on someone else for your happiness. For one, you're bound to be disappointed. And two, it's just not fair to that other person. The key to happiness is to be happy alone, doing your own thing, generating your own good cheer. If you can do that you will be happy, I promise you. You'll also be a valuable asset to your loved ones. Such a self-contained source of happiness will provide endless delight with all the extra you'll have to share. If you rely on your spouse, your friends, your family or any other person to supply you your happiness it will end up a big mess.

         Some of my friends are vintage auto aficionados and they’re always buying, selling, switching and searching for that next great project car, the next great screaming deal, and never quite satisfied with their current ride. Even after busting their knuckles, investing blood, sweat and tears, they’re always quick to trade off for something else. I've had the same automobile for the past 14 years and I love it just as much today as I did the first time I drove it, even when it gives me grief, misbehaves, or needs special care as any long term relationships does. I found my dream car and I’m sticking with it.

Ellen Jo Dahlberg married Chad Roberts at Starved Rock State Park in Utica, Illinois on a perfect July day in 1995. There's never been a dull moment since. They live in a historic brick bungalow in Clarkdale, Arizona which they share with Floyd, Ivan, Ned, Hazel and several vintage Volkswagens. Read more about it at ellenjo.com

Baseball Fever

Baseball Fever

Ellen Jo Roberts
The Outs
The Noise
May 2012

      Nothing sounds more like summer than a baseball game broadcast over the radio. The tinny drone of the announcers calling the innings' events, punctuated by the fans’ jeers or cheers, sound like summer to me, like no other noise. At one time in my life I had a serious case of baseball fever. While the daily score no longer rules me, I still find the sport everywhere: the small historic baseball field across the street from my house, the faded vintage decal in my car window, the photographs of my nephews in their officially licensed Major League Baseball ® garb.

    We are surrounded by baseball, because it is often a used as metaphor for life in America. That’s why we root so strongly for the home team, the eternal champs and the ever-struggling underdogs alike. The energetic young rookie, starting fresh and learning hard-won lessons. The seasoned old-timer aiming for one last golden season. The homer in the gloamin’. Baseball unites people of vastly disparate age, education and socio-economic background who just so happen to live in the same area code. You may not agree on anything else outside of that baseball stadium, but while raising hands and voices to the home team you are united as one.

            Evolving from folk games played in Great Britain as far back as the 1600s, baseball shares similar traits with cricket, yet remains distinctly new world. Since the first pro team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings, were created in 1869, organized baseball swiftly spread across the continent into every major city. The current roster of major league teams numbers 30, split into two leagues. The sport connects us over decades, generations and centuries. In my diehard fan days, from opening day to end of the season I lived and breathed by the daily score. Newspaper clippings of game photos decorated my bedroom hallway, my own sports “hall of fame”. I had crushes on outfielders and wrote summer poems during the winter months. Worthless baseball cards filled lovingly-decorated boxes, priceless to me only because of my own sentiments and allegiances, cheering on journeymen who had played most of their best years in some other city. My summers were spent in the bleachers, or huddled on steps, standing room only, my brother and I squinting to the outfield and keeping track with pencil and scorecard.

     Though I have appreciation for all of the great players and fabled legends of baseball, my team is the Chicago Cubs. Since moving out west and losing sight of WGN I’ve been blissfully removed from the heartbreak. Loving the Cubs is a special kind of penance, a sort of masochism that is passed on genetically. My family is mental for the Cubs, and if I call during game time I will only get distracted, perfunctory response to any attempted conversation. Notorious underdogs, the downtrodden Cubbies won their last World Series in 1908. Legend has it the team was cursed in the 1940s by Billy Sianis of Chicago’s famed Billy Goat Tavern, for disallowing his goat entry into the park. Despite their notorious lack of luck,  their diehard fans stay true blue, filling historic Wrigley Field year-round through good seasons and bad. The beautiful ballpark, with its ivy-lined bricks and hand-operated scoreboard, was built in 1916 and definitely inspired my enchantment with baseball. Planted smack dab in the middle of a bustling north-side neighborhood, Wrigley Field has always been the 10th player in the game and, for me, always the MVP.  Citizens United for Baseball in the Sunshine (C.U.B.S.) attempted to keep lights from the park, but in 1988 the neighborhood succumbed after threats of the team being moved to a new park in the 'burbs. Night games began, after 72 years of daylight baseball. The "Friendly Confines" remains, however, a portal to a different time, a well-manicured oasis steeped in history.

My first major league baseball game took place 30 summers ago. I had no idea what was happening on the field, but the festivity of those seated around me, the sunshine and breeze on my face, the smells of beer and hot dogs and coconutty sun tan oil were all instantly captivating. The vendors hawking their treats. The rambunctious camaraderie and humor of the fans enchanted me as they chanted against opposing teams, taunting outfielders with rude rhymes and throwing back bad home run balls onto the field in disgust. Occasionally, during a lull in the game, the bleacher fans would comically chant against each other, "Right Field Sucks!"/ "Left Field Sucks!" jabbing the air and laughing 'til one side finally gave up. The first time I ever smelled the sweet, strange smoke of marijuana lingering in the air, was in the Wrigley Field bleachers as stock brokers and preppies passed a joint around a nearby bench. My Uncle was a White Sox fan and always dismissed the Cubs fans and their northside park as "yuppie" in contrast to his blue collar southside Comiskey Park crew, with their rowdy fireworks, disco demolitions and people brutishly being flung off the upper deck. Beloved promoter and baseball hall-of-famer Bill Veeck unites the history of the two otherwise disparate teams by being the creator of an icon in each park: he was responsible for both the "exploding scoreboard" at Sox Park, and planting the first sprigs of ivy on the walls at Cubs Park.

       To this day, "baseball movies" always kill me. I cannot tear myself away, and often times get choked up at classics like Field of Dreams, The Natural, and even silly ones like Fever Pitch and Major League rouse me to cheer, and sometimes to tears. If the Cubs win the World Series in my lifetime I imagine I will collapse in a sweaty heap of ectoplasmic goo.

          Small towns nationwide are home to local clubs, high school and college teams as well as farm teams for the bigs. The same enthusiasm and magic is generated from these small scale organizations. Clarkdale and Jerome were once homes to rivals, back in the days of the United Verde Mining Operations. The Muckers were Jerome's team and they battled the Clarkdale Wolves, until the mid-20th century. A more recent development in the local sports world is the Northern Arizona Baseball League, with teams in the Verde Valley, Prescott area tri-cities, Williams and Flagstaff, including the Cottonwood Toros, Paulden Diablos, Clarkdale Miners, Camp Verde Blue Sox, Prescott Brew Crew, Rimrock Lions, Williams Marineros, Prescott Valley West Siders and the Chino Valley Cougars.

        "Wood bat baseball at its finest, " says Carlos Godina, Clarkdale Miner and League President, referring to the participants as the League of Extraordinary Gentleman. "Well, maybe I am going overboard, but at least we have a baseball league. No more driving to Phoenix to play ball. Now your families can come watch you play locally. These are great days, men.”

Playing every Sunday afternoon March through June, with championship series in July, teams may be cheered on at various locations throughout Yavapai County: Yavapai College in Prescott, Bradshaw Mountain Middle School, Doug Davis Field at Camp Verde High School.

I've heard that the average baseball game generally offers only 10 minutes of actual action during 9 innings. Much of the game is spent waiting, watching, hoping, praying, fighting off pitches, brushing back base-runners. Foul balls, warm-ups, rude rhymes, the 7th inning stretch, warm sunshine and cold beer. The thrill of victory. The agony of defeat. It's a whole lot of anticipation. Just like life.

Ellen Jo Roberts grew up in Chicago in the 1980s.

She used to spend all of her babysitting money on baseball tickets.
She lives in Clarkdale Arizona with Bike Daddy Chad, Five Head Floyd, Super Spaz Ivan, Ned the Nut and Hazel Basil.
Read all about it at ellenjo.com

Local Character: Folk Artist Sallie Lou of Cottonwood, Arizona

Local Character:
Sallie Lou,
Folk Artist of Cottonwood, Arizona
The Outs
Ellen Jo Roberts
The Noise
April 2012



Any person wandering Cottonwood’s Main Street in the past 20 years has seen the handiwork of an interesting fellow best known as “Sallie Lou.” Since the late 1980s a staple of Old Town, and more recently relocated a bit further down 89A, the artist is a soft-spoken and slow-moving figure, strikingly garbed in hand-painted hats, shoes and pants. Sallie Lou is a living treasure, a local historian and an eccentric genius.



His home studio and gallery is well-arranged, equal parts stark and cluttered and smelling faintly of dust and sandalwood. His space is utilitarian and his possessions are few : art, books and photo albums. He's a documentarian. Sallie Lou has many friends and fans both near and far. He shows me a large framed collage comprised of photographs of favorite people. Painting on any available material he can come by, he makes art from canvas, wood, pants, jackets, shoes, boots, purses, mannequins-- pretty much any thing he can get his hands on, reusing, recycling. He works in acrylic paints, colored pencil, and ink. Many of his paintings are two sided, with an image on each side. Animal figures carved from soft Cottonwood decorate the window sills.



Subject matter tends towards historical, religious and abstract. He estimates he’s painted at least 35 Noah’s Arks. A large portion of his work is an extensive documentation of the daily life of Cottonwood, Arizona. Sallie Lou’s work also frequently features frank and playful nudity, saucy antics and an earthy sexuality. There are several paintings he calls “dirty”, gallantly shielding my eyes from viewing the bawdier canvases.



Surrounded by new works gently swaying on the fence, he sits in a plastic chair along Main Street and draws the cars that drive the highway and park in nearby lots, pedestrians, passers-by, strange looking clouds. “One day the clouds looked like a quilt. I'd never seen anything like it. And here is one day when the clouds were real frizzy on one end," he explains as he shows me pages of recent sketches, "I like cars. Every day I sit out here and sketch. I even do things that aren’t here.”



Andrew Spannuth was born in Pennsylvania 76 years ago and grew up the middle boy of three in the railroad town of Reading. There was another brother, born in 1930, who died tragically while riding in a car with his parents to his baptism. The car hit a large rock in the road and the door flew open. “They were going to church on Christmas Eve, and the child flew out the door and hit the ground and was killed. He was only three days old,” explains Sallie Lou, “That’s why Christmas was never a big deal for our family, after that.” The Spannuth Family history is traced back in painstakingly documented genealogical books packed with vintage photos and diagrammed family trees connecting to Daniel Boone, who is Sallie Lou’s 4th cousin.
“Baumstown, Pennsylvania is the hometown of the Boone Family”, he says, correcting popular fallacy that the Boones originated in Kentucky. The family’s history is full of interesting characters. “My mother was the only member of her family to die before age 100,” he shares, explaining his vigor. “I was a psychic spiritualist medium. My mother’s mother was known as 'The Great White Witch of the West'. She lived in Santa Rosa, California.”

Young Andy became an artist early on in life. “Somewhere in this apartment are two drawings I did when I was two years old. I was doing these drawings on the porch of our house and a man said to my mother ‘Oh you’re going to have a famous artist for a son.'” In the family genealogy book there is a photo of Andrew Spannuth as a young man in the 1950s, wearing tight-rolled chinos on his husky frame, crew cut and standing a full head taller than his father. His large size was a source of teasing,
“I had a terrible time growing up. I was very depressed all the time. My mother would tell me every day what route to go to school to avoid people. I was bullied beyond belief”



He left Pennsylvania for NYC to begin his studies in art. After one year he moved to the west coast and the Rudolph Schaeffer School of Design in San Francisco. “They gave me two years of college credit for one year of New York [schooling],” he says, “Because New York is so advanced of California. California is so slow.”
The 1960s were wild times, and by the early 1970s, Mr. Spannuth had joined Alcoholics Anonymous. He’s enjoyed 39 years of sobriety since. There’s an AA coin in his pocket and puts it in my hand for review, “When you get a coin in AA everyone passes it around. What you get is the vibration of all the alcoholics on the coin.” Entering a 28 day rehabilitation program at Pennsylvania’s “Chit Chat Farms” changed his life in more than one way, as it eventually led to his future arrival in Cottonwood, Arizona.



In the 1980s, the artist sold his work at a popular flea market in Kutztown, PA, frequented by New York art dealers. “I sold 350 paintings a year,” he said.
“That’s like one a day!,” I remark.
“Yeah, but I only sold them one day a week!”, he laughs.
Earlier artwork is abstract and intense, with bright colors, heavy shapes and architectural puzzles with intertwining staircases. “Stairs was my favorite thing,” he says, unrolling a favorite canvas with an Escher-like mystery of connecting staircases, all drawn freehand yet somehow looking ruler-straight. Soon he would venture in a new direction and a folk art style of whimsical narratives bustling with people.
He was told by his lawyer that in order to be a successful artist he had to create a separate name for his art persona. “When I went from being Andrew to Sallie Lou,” Mr. Spannuth explains, “I decided Sallie Lou would be a black woman.” His eyes twinkle as he recalls the birth of Sallie Lou, “My lawyer told me I had to have a story. So I’d say, ‘As the story goes, Sallie Lou was born in Texas.’ It was fun because somebody would come in and ask me a question. 'Does Sallie Lou have any brothers or sisters?' They’d ask questions and I’d say, ‘As the story continues…’”
As the years passed Sallie Lou's story became richer and more complex. She became a complete character, with many siblings (Tyrone, Canellia, Micki, Trische, Matt) and a self-portrait which depicts her as a buxom woman in an modestly cut, ocean-colored dress. The name Sallie Lou is an amalgam of two of Andrew’s friends’ names: Salvatore Bellone, and a woman named Louise he met in AA.

In the late 1980s, Sallie Lou’s “Negro History Series” featured important African American figures and Civil Rights events. Rosa Parks, George Washington Carver, Harriet Tubman, Matt Henson at the North Pole, the Woolworth Luncheon Counter Sit In, and assorted tangles with the Ku Klux Klan are all highlighted in this series. The Archbishop of the Catholic Church of Washington DC bought 17 paintings from this series. “All of his parishioners were black,” said Sallie Lou, proudly.

Sallie Lou arrived in the Verde Valley in 1988 after an invitation from Claire Miller Burns, a New York English teacher he met at Chit Chat Farms.
“What was it like when you first arrived here?” I ask.
“I had long hair. I smoked. I was a smoker. I walked up the street to the gas station up the hill. Now it’s a restaurant. And a little girl walked up to me and she said, ‘Oh you’re Andy. You’re living in Claire’s house.’ And she was so friendly and welcoming. Then I saw two men walking towards me up ahead, so I crossed the street. And the two men crossed the street.” Uh oh, I think remembering how young Andy avoided street encounters with bullies. He continues, “They wanted to say hello. They’d heard of me and wanted to wish me well. In Pennsylvania you wouldn’t have that.”

“At that time Cottonwood was very clean. Not a cigarette in the gutter. Not a piece of paper in the gutter. It’s not like that any more.”

I ask him how Arizona life has changed his artwork.
“In Pennsylvania I was really into color, “ says Sallie Lou, “ but when I came out here they told me I couldn’t paint with the same colors I was using in Pennsylvania because they were too bright.”

20 years ago, Old Town Cottonwood was tumbleweed sleepy, a slow-down spot along the highway with a bar called The Buckaroo. There wasn't much going on in the neighborhood back then. But in the 21st Century things are quite different. It's become a vibrant street scene packed with boutiques, wine tasting rooms, cafes and restaurants, hotels, galleries and pedestrians. (The Buckaroo still thrives on the corner, though it's now known as Kactus Kate's.) In his early days in Arizona, Sallie Lou used to work at the old Shep's, under the sun-baked neon beacon of Old Town, selling his art and manning the counter at the mini-mart. In 2009 the faded sign was renovated with new neon by Ledbetter Law Firm when they moved their offices into the old motel court.
What used to say "Shep's LIQUORS" now says "Old Town WELCOME".

“What do you think of Old Town’s changes in the past 20 years?”, I ask.
He is a man with a close up view of its transformation.
“Oh yeah,” he responds quickly, “It’s much better.”



One of Sallie Lou’s first western hits was creating art from cowboy boots.
I remember seeing the brightly painted boots on display outside of the old Shep’s back in the mid-1990s.
“I’ve painted so many cowboy boots. A couple from Texas bought 15 painted boots from me, and they sold them in Texas for $3,000-4,000 dollars a piece!” exclaims Sallie Lou. Makes me wonder why this fellow has never been swept up by some big city art dealers. He shakes his head at the thought. The shoe painting started for a practical reason, “When I lived in Pennsylvania I wore normal shoes. They were black and they’d get scuffed up. So I’d take acrylic paints and do an abstract design. And that’s how it started.”



Up until two years ago Sallie Lou was a resident of the Sun Dial Motel in Old Town. Art sales were good there.


“I sold a lot at the Sun Dial. Not so much here.” Relocated to a small house along Historic 89A across the street from Nate’s Cowboy Café, Sallie Lou invites people to visit his studio any day. “I am always here,” he says. He has much art readily available for purchase at a great range of prices, and also is happy to create commissioned work. I commission him to create a small painting of my car for $20.



“Last year I had a couple from Canada come up and down the street asking everyone where I was and they sent them to me,” he says as he flips through a large photo album. He keeps photos of every happy customer who ever bought a piece of his artwork since he’s been in Cottonwood. He touches each photo from page to page, remembering tidbits about each person.

Though Sallie Lou maintains a solitary profile much of the time, you don’t get the impression that he is alone. He is friendly and welcoming to visitors, and his life is rich with people and beautiful memories.
He keeps busy creating every day, explaining, “That’s why I’m not lonely. Because I can make something out of anything all the time.”



Visitors are always welcome at Sallie Lou’s studio. If you see him sitting outside sketching, he’d love for you to park for a spell and have a chat. His home gallery is located at 209 S Main St. #3, in Cottonwood, across from Nate’s Cowboy Café. You may call him at 928-639-2088.
And coming soon, plan to see Sallie Lou at this summer's Farmer’s Market in Old Town Cottonwood.
Sounds like a perfect fit for this fellow who has spent so many years documenting life along Historic Highway 89A.


Sad foodnote. On June 25th, 2012 Andrew Spannuth died in Cottonwood, Arizona. He was a special person and his presence will be missed.
Ellen Jo Roberts lives in a historic brick bungalow in Clarkdale Arizona with a boy named Chad, a cat named Ned, and three dogs, Floyd, Ivan and Hazel. You can see her driving a yellow Karmann Ghia through town. Read more at ellenjo.com

20th Century Tourists

20th Century Tourists
By Ellen Jo Roberts
March 2012
The Outs
The Noise




When we travel we aim for the authentic. Back before there was a matching Cracker Barrel at every interstate exit ramp, back before corporations created theme vacation packages, there were authentic places native to each region. In addition to natural highlights of the landscape, there were many distinctly un-natural landmarks not to be missed: Elizabeth, a building shaped like an elephant along the shore in Margate, New Jersey; The Corn Palace of Mitchell, South Dakota, decorated each year with new murals made from multi-colored kernels of corn; Dinny and Rex, colossal concrete dinosaurs presiding over California’s Coachella Valley; The Cadillac Ranch, a row of 10 graffiti-encrusted Caddies ranging in model year from 1949-1963, buried in a Texas field along Route 66. These places and others like them still exist, dotting the United States from sea to shining sea, along historic highways and forgotten roads, some kitschy, some artistic and all created with the intention of luring visitors. Arizona is lucky to have plenty of national parks, monuments and historic towns to lure travelers, but we also are home to more obscure attractions. The Hi Jolly monument in Quartzite commemorates US Army camel trainer, Hadji Ali. The actual real life London Bridge in Lake Havasu City was imported to Arizona in 1968 by Robert McCulloch. A mural and statue on a corner in Winslow, Arizona pays tribute to The Eagles’ 1972 hit (co-written by Jackson Browne) “Take it Easy”.

Fellow tourism state Florida is a perfect case study on the topic of new and old attractions.
Before Disney's corporate vision absorbed most of central Florida in the 1970s, small-time attractions like gator-wrestlin' and air-boat tours of the swamp land were prime tourism draws of the Sunshine State.



Me and Florida, we go way back. First time I was ever on an airplane was during a trip to Orlando when I was 10. Typical of early '80s style, I wore bright banana yellow pants to the airport with a striped yellow frilly-shouldered shirt. Florida seemed like a magic dreamscape: a balmy green jungle full of clowns, costumes, coconuts and palm trees, shells and sand, scented with sea and citrus and sparked with fantastic lightning shows. My husband's family caught the Florida bug in the 1980s too, spending many winter holidays in the Keys.



His folks later bought a condo in Key Largo, which provided us many tropical escapes over the decades, paddling sea kayaks through the saltwater Caribbean back country, skirting along the mangroves and manatees, hooking and cooking snappers and sheepshead and other abundant native fish. Even my Chihuahua has even been to Florida, more than once. We love it. It's an enchanting land, rumored to be the legendary fountain of youth! Our dry desert wrinkles vanish and our hair curls in the humidity making us feel like teenagers again. Despite all the magic, saltwater and sweet scents, we've just never considered moving there. Too many people, too flat, too many mosquitoes, too many hurricanes.

“Speaking about tornadoes,
The hurricane's the worst of all
They come and go through Florida
Blow down 14 feet of wall.


Hurricane is so powerful
Blow the house away where I live.
It make hair rise on your head,
Gives you fever and cold chill.


Winter clothes are not needed.
You spend money rebuilding your home.
When the ocean gets rough,
You're not in Florida all day long.


I really like Florida,
If the winds don't blow me away.
Lord I really like Florida
If the winds don't blow me away.
But if that don't never happen,
I'll be in Florida the rest of my days."

-"Florida Hurricane" c. 1948, St Louis Jimmy/ Muddy Waters

Florida juts to into the sea like a phallus. Almost an island, but settling for peninsula. All of its coasts are spring break meccas, so I always think of Florida this time of year. On St. Patrick's Day 1994, I walked the cool night night breeze of Key West in bowling shoes and cut-off shorts, sipping from a Tropicana bottle half filled with rum, my hair wild and wooly with salt water and sand from our three nights camping on an island in the Everglades. With its liberal strongholds in the south and conservative central and north, Florida is an interesting blend of old and new money, snow birds, immigrants from Cuba, Canada, the West Indies, Africa and Eastern Europe, all layered atop 300 years of Old South culture.



Before corporate tourism homogenized everyone's holidays, old timey attractions drew visitors from near and far for their authenticity. Gatorland bills itself as "Florida's First Theme Park". Located in Orlando since 1949, the park catches interest with its toothy gator jaw front entrance, a local icon looming over the roadside since its early days. Gatorland features 110 acres of alligators and crocodiles from all over the globe. Shows like the "Gator Jumparoo" where alligators leap for raw chicken, and the "Gator Wrestlin' Show" can only be described as old timey American weirdness at its best. Many "problem" alligators are relocated to the park from throughout Florida, captured from communities where they've eaten too many pets and disrupted too many golf games. There are thousands of the prehistoric creatures here, everywhere you turn, and all of them so beautiful you feel like you really understand something important about Florida.



A close encounter with a Cuban Crocodile may leave emotional. She hypnotizes you with her soulful eyes and seems so docile (though the sign describes the species as quick and cooperative hunters, similar to the “Velociraptor” character from Jurassic Park, able to work in teams and leap high…perhaps higher that that fence she's behind). After we walk on to the next exhibit, I miss her and the amazing patterns on her leathery skin. The park also features a tiny train ride, an aviary and breeding marsh with observation tower, petting zoo, nature walk, and educational wildlife programs. But no frills, few gimmicks, no movie tie-ins. And on a winters day the parking lot is so crowded you must wait for a spot.

Not far from Gatorland, in an area known as Florida's Nature Coast, colossal fresh water springs gurgle sparkling blue, sending thousands of gallons of fresh water out towards the Gulf of Mexico each minute. In one of these springs, the one called the Weeki Wachee, there are mermaids! Swimming with their sparkly fins, sharing their stage with native fish and amphibians, the Weeki Wachee Mermaids have been performing in their underwater amphitheater since 1947. It's amazing to think that, in the world of pre-packaged Disney adventures with mega–marketing campaigns, something as charming and small scale as the Weeki Wachee Mermaids could still exist. They anchor the old time Florida with their three shows a day, performing 30 minutes submerged while sipping air from hoses.



Sitting in the underwater auditorium looking into the spring like an aquarium, I feel like a kid again. I’m so excited I can barely sit still on the hard wooden bench seats. The soundtrack is piped in over the audience and the performers gracefully pantomime along with the dialogue and songs in their sleek mermaid costumes, air bubbles acting as exclamation points. The price to see the show was something crazy cheap like $12, and afterwards you may pose for photos with one of the mermaids, a doppleganger for Darryl Hannah in Splash.

Another natural spring, not far from Weeki Wachee, offers an interesting modern tale of old tourism and new. Rainbow Springs in Dunnellon is now part of the Florida State Park system, but from 1930 until the early 1970s it was a theme park, complete with a monorail, zoo, rodeo, artificial waterfalls and glass bottom boat tours. Florida’s 4th largest freshwater spring is a crystal clear travertine blue, a steady 72 degrees year-round. Cornville resident Kim Poucher grew up in Dunnellon and has fond memories of the park, “My earliest and coolest recollections of Rainbow Springs was when they had the glass bottom boats and old man Captain Skipper Lockett reeling off the names of the fish and vegetation. Sounded like rap music! When it shut down, I guess mid-70's, we kids had a wonderful time sneaking around up there. There was a monorail about 30 feet off the ground that we would walk on top of through the whole park.”
Disneyland had already enjoyed 16 years of success in California before expanding the empire into central Florida. Disneyworld opened in October of 1971, inspiring a whole region of similar attractions, luring visitors away from old time parks like Rainbow Springs.



In 1972 the U.S. Department of the Interior designated Rainbow River a National Natural Landmark and in the mid-1990s it reopened the property as a state park. It’s a lesson in modern methodology, because in the 21st Century it’s unlikely that a beautiful natural feature would be “enhanced” with commercial venture, girdled with a monorail, and converted into an amusement park. The harnessing and redirecting of natural wonders is a notion that began to lose steam in the mid- 20th century, with the first wave of ecology consciousness. So, in becoming a state park, Rainbow Springs has been allowed to revert back to the wild. Ruins from the theme park days remain, adding to the intrigue. Pilons from the monorails stand guard and deserted cages of the small zoo are overgrown with tropical brush.



Walking the park gives an enchanted feeling, slightly surreal like a dream. The springs are a popular spot with swimmers, canoeists and kayakers as well as native birds, fish and reptiles.



Florida is one of the world’s most popular tourism locations for its sand, surf, tropical climate and coastal beauty…and its epic theme parks. There is an old time Florida that still thrives along the back roads where stands full of fresh oranges entice motorists. Just as in any state, there are the authentic tastes of local culture: the places you cannot find anywhere else. Much as it’s important to be a locavore, consuming locally and regionally grown foods, let us also espouse the locatour, participating in locally-conceived tourism, imagined outside of a corporate headquarters. When you find a unique place on your travels, be it a mermaid show, giant dinosaur, weird museum or a row of Cadillacs half-buried in a field, you must go there. Someone wanted you to visit and you must heed the call.



Ellen Jo Roberts celebrates her birthday at the end of this month. Send cards and money.
www.ellenjo.com

Be Mine, Arizona

Be Mine, Arizona!

The 100th Birthday of the Valentine State

The Outs- February 2012

The Noise

Ellen Jo Roberts

       Upon return from any out-of-state road trip, the first glimpse of the “Welcome to Arizona” sign always chokes me up, teary-eyed with joy. Everything feels right when we see the warm sunset stripes of the state flag beckoning us along the highway home. Like many Arizonans, I was not born in this place, but I love it as if it were my own mother. It’s a land of extremes. As one flatlander visitor declared to us, “Arizona is not for beginners.” It is a place that can have both the hottest and coldest temperature of the nation, on the same day. Curvy back roads mix with the ever changing landscape and elevation. Ecosystems change from Canada to Mexico in a two-hour time span. Chock full of public land, there are 3,928 mountains here--more than any one of the other Mountain States. Route 66 and the sun- baked neon and kitschy artifacts of the Mother Road continue to be mythologized in films and publications. It’s fantastic how commonplace it is to pull up at a stop light next to vintage cars and trucks, because this fine dry climate preserves the old metal.

     Even in the bigger cities, people here are friendly open-faced and helpful in a small town way. I love the vibrant blend of cultures here, ranging from the great population of native tribes, to Mexicans (who once called this land Mexico), to the melting pot mix of retirees and transplantees. Clarkdale, founded in 1912, shares the centennial with Arizona, and our 98-year-old brick bungalow was built during the United Verde Copper Company reign. Our views from home are steep angles to the mountains. The Verde River winds through our neighborhood, bringing with it ancient cottonwood trees and a wealth of wild and rare critters. The quality of light here is so phenomenal that when certain seasons and atmospheric events conspire it appears that everything is aglow, even us. These are some of the things I am in love with about Arizona.

     For the past few years I have spent countless minutes defending my state from being a cheap punch line to a thousand political jokes. We are stereotyped a lawless desert, full of gun crazy racists.

“In Arizona, it’s illegal to be black!”- NBC’s 30 Rock.

Last summer the NYC-based website Gawker named Arizona “the worst state in the USA” as the finale to a week-long countdown, awarding it the grand prize. Written by an urban hipster in Brooklyn (who had apparently only been to Arizona once, to visit the Grand Canyon) the article was an mean-spirited, over-simplified attempt at comedy (insulting pretty much every state along the way).

 “Arizona is swiftly devolving into a dystopic free-for-all of armed mad men patrolling the state with guns, often to disastrous effect…Arizona is a hissing snake pit of angry old white people (they are angry because they are literally being cooked to death) yelling at the immigrants and others. Others whom they fear and loathe, and it is probably going to explode someday soon into a bright ball of orange fire and we will know that either the end times have come for us all or thank god we are finally rid of Arizona.”- Gawker.com

    This assessment of my state is inaccurate. These are not the people I know. Arizona is home to a wild variety of ecology, geology, ethnology, politics, culture and climate. In lumping Arizonans all into the right wing nut-job category a vast population of liberals, hippies, artists, and new-age, left wing nut-jobs is slighted. We demand equal representation! The reality of our surroundings is complicated. Arizona is more than a political punching bag, or a stock photo of the Grand Canyon. As we celebrate Arizona’s Centennial, I asked local folk about their complex relationships with this state we call home. Consider it a love letter, a valentine for our Arizona as it celebrates its 100^th birthday on February 14th.

    Ona Ziegler is a world traveler and a clothing designer who grew up in Jerome. She finds a lot to love about her native state, “I love the sky as my ocean. I love the animals, birds and coyotes. Tarantulas. I love the heat! I love the blue water in the red desert I also love the murky brown dirt water. I love the space above my head and the earth beneath my feet! The sunsets and sunrises. I always thought as a kid that it was where God lived in those times of day in Arizona. I also believed and might still do that the aliens and their ships use our Arizona clouds as perfect camo transportation devices. I love the saguaros and prickly pear and the snakes that sleep beneath them. The I-17 I love. I've always imagined the saguaros were in motion until a moment before I saw them! Just laughing and cuddling and gesturing to each other. You'll notice they do mainly live in family groups.”

When asked what she doesn’t like so much about Arizona, Ms. Ziegler says, “So the biggest things that standout, as far as not liking goes, is the governor, Jan Brewer and all the immigration laws surrounding her and her cronies. The lack of heart and love that goes into electing people like her and the laws she enforces.” She also calls Sheriff Joe Arpaio “embarrassing and creepy”. Back to the things she loves (because there is a lot to love!), “The night deep dark starry sky and the full blazing sun. I love Arizona with my whole being and feel amazingly blessed to be able to call it my home. And as for being raised in the town of Jerome, with the weirdos, the artists, the drunks and the free. My family! I've always thought I must have been a kind and good person in my last life to have been able to have experienced that in this one.”

   I know lots of Illinoisans who migrated to Arizona, myself included. Seeking big sky country, wide open wilderness and freedom from sour weather, many Midwesterners relocate to Arizona, perhaps initially inspired by watching our baseball teams romp in their metro-Phoenix spring training grounds. Flagstaff resident Jim Buthman grew up in Chicago’s north shore suburbs, and lived in Florida and Colorado before arriving in Arizona in 1995. Here he earned his PhD and is an instructor in Politics and International Affairs at Northern Arizona University. About his adopted state, “There's lots I like. The abundance and diversity of nature. Lifestyle, specifically the Northern Arizona lifestyle. Attitudes: friendly and neighborly people. Libertarian ideals: anti-authoritarian-self sufficiency.” There’s not much Mr. Buthman doesn’t like about Arizona, though says the Libertarian ideals are a double-edged sword, as they also exhibit an “obliviousness to reality.”

Sarah Harms, a Camp Verde jewelry artist and mother of two, also came from the Chicagoland area. “Since moving here what will be five years ago in July, I fall more in love with Arizona every day. Obviously, I love the weather and scenery and the ability to get out into the middle of nowhere really fast. Lack of traffic, and the general good natured-ness of the inhabitants here are also on my love list. Arizona had a rich and colorful history that I am loving learning more and more about. I guess if there is anything I don't like, it's some of the politics.”

       Artist Brice Wood has been a full time Arizona resident since 1988. He and his wife bought a home in Jerome in 1979, and later moved here permanently from Los Angeles. It bothers him when folks visiting for the first time remark, “I was so surprised the people here are so nice!” “It bothers me,” he explains, “because that’s what we all used to think about the [pre-Civil Rights] ‘Old South.’ Beware of places with this reputation.” An unabashed liberal, Mr. Wood finds the state’s right-wing politics discouraging. “As a conservative state, I think our priorities are wrong. We should spend more on education.” Mr. Wood finds much to love about Arizona, “The beautiful air. The landscape, the open space. I live in Jerome. I think Jerome’s a great place.”

He rhapsodizes over the “blue haze” in the horizon, caused by big pine forests exuding oils into the atmosphere, coloring everything in the distance with deep blues, and tinting reds into deep purples.

 “I hated Arizona growing up,” says Jennifer Epperson, a vivacious and popular bartender at Jerome’s historic Spirit Room. Growing up in a dilapidated Cornville trailer park, Mrs. Epperson remembers always being teased about her neighborhood at the end of Loy Road, known as “PIC”. “Pukes in Corntown is what most kids liked to call it.” She thought Cottonwood was “a big fancy city, especially when Wal-Mart came. And Phoenix blew my mind! Arizona was not cool at all to outsiders, especially to Californians it seemed.”

“Now, I love Arizona to the core of my being. I love sharing all the stories with the other locals that I grew up with. Like the recently retired Jerome officer, Chuck Harris, laughing about the trouble his kids and us would all get into. And laughing with other locals about the PIC jokes, and proud now to be a ‘Puke in Corntown’. What was then the low-income area, I now can't afford!”

As youngsters she and her pals grew up playing with scorpions and centipedes, building forts, having “boonie” party bonfires, and wandering Jerome’s dangerous ruins, including the old United Verde Hospital before it was reinvented as the Jerome Grand Hotel. In later years, she and husband Josh enjoyed their honeymoon at the Jerome Grand, after marrying at a friend's ranch in Cornville’s Page Springs area, not far from where she grew up. “It was the most beautiful barefoot wedding ever. I love that he and I are both born and raised here and can share in all the memories of yesterday's Verde Valley to today's.”

True “local yokels” are a rare species, and I always value their opinions on my adopted land. Mrs. Epperson finds a lot to love about Arizona, “I love Arizona sunsets, I love the monsoons and lightning shows. I love Jerome and working there and love that we have a lot of great restaurants there, and Old Town being fixed up.

I love that there are still real cowboys and ranches here. I love how you can drive for three hours and see Saguaros, then red rocks, then pine trees. The diversity in the geology is incredible.”

     Brian Mitchell has lived in Arizona his entire life. “I love Arizona because it is truly a state with everything!,” he exclaims, “I live in Phoenix, and in a little over two hours I can be snow-skiing. Or I can be fishing in an hour. The desert landscape is gorgeous, there is nothing like the smell of the desert after the rain. You can pretty much count on a breath-taking sunset every day!”

     Blake O’Neill is a Cottonwood resident, retired from a long time career in the U. S Navy where he was a navigating quartermaster on submarines. Though he spent many years living on coasts, he was born and raised in the wild open western spaces of Idaho. His favorite thing about Arizona life? “There’s nothing I don’t like about Arizona.” Prior to arriving in the Verde Valley in 1994, Mr. O’Neill drove a tour bus for Florida’s Disneyworld. “The humidity chased me west. I had to squeegee off my bus every damn morning at Disney and then one morning I said, ‘Blake, let’s go home.’ Home to me is anywhere west of the great rock pile that goes all the way up into Canada.”

 “What I love best about Arizona,” says Clarkdale Mayor, native Arizonan and nature photographer Doug Von Gausig, “The beauty of the land. The dramatic open spaces, the juxtaposition of red rock against blue skies.

The stars – the sheer number of stars in the sky, so clear and so bright that we see the color of each. The birds – nowhere else can I find the diversity and numbers of birds like I can in Arizona. The pristine Verde River – a treasure unique in the desert southwest – miles of clean flowing water winding its way through wilderness and farms, habitat for some of the richest diversity in the country. Otters play while beavers work in its pools and native fishes still thrive there. The desert in bloom – nothing compares to such a starkly beautiful landscape painted with so much color!” Mayor Von Gausig is a big fan of sustainability, and continuously working on a plan for his community to create a viable future for the historic town. He also appreciates “the people who care, who work hard every day to see that our children and grandchildren will still have these things to appreciate and value in their lives.”

With all those positives, the Mayor still sees some things that need work, including our ongoing struggles with water consumption and “the polarized politics that lock us into inaction at a time when action is so critical.” He feels some have a far too easy disregard for the limitations of living in the dry southwest. “Deserts are austere places with limited and precious resources. Water, plants, trees, open space, clean air – all the reasons we all live here – the reasons we moved here - are being depleted so quickly and so easily.” Mayor Von Gausig doesn’t like “the fact that we must struggle to convince people that we need to educate our children, preserve open spaces, nurture our river, and conserve the limited water resources.”

    As the nation’s 48th state and the final within the continental U.S., Arizona is considered young, with great riches that ironically contribute to its drawbacks. The fine climate and brilliant scenery attract more residents than can ideally be sustained, unless the newly arrived from wetter locales can abandon their carefree old ideas of water use. As the population continues to diversify, however, the state’s classically right-leaning politics will level out somewhere more towards middle ground. Happy 100th birthday, Arizona. This land of great contrasts and brilliant light, I am proud to call you my home.

Ellen Jo Roberts and Bike Daddy Chad arrived in Arizona in August 1995, with Illinois license plates and brand new wedding rings. Read all about it ellenjo.com

Mogollon Calendar

The Mogollon Calendar

Ellen Jo Roberts

The Outs

The Noise

January 2012



       Remember the Y2K Bug, the boogeyman of the new millennium? Because early computers were programmed with a two digit code for year rather than four digit, the change from 1999 to year 2000 was a cause for concern. Everything coordinated via computers would go haywire. You’d better get your survival skills in order, and stock up on drinking water, gasoline and toilet paper. Electrical grids will shut down. Planes will fall from the sky! You’d better take all of your money out of the bank and stuff it in your mattress, because all records of your savings will vaporize! People will be rioting in the streets! As we know now, none of that happened. What a ho-hum the Y2K Bug turned out to be. In 2012 the world is predicted to come to an end. On December 21st, 2012, the Mayan Calendar screeches to a halt. Is this just another failed Rapture? Another Y2K-style Boogeyman that ends up a non-event? Or is 2012 truly The End of Times? Like, This time we really mean it-End of Times? We are so not joking-End-of-Times?

      The Mayans actually operated off of three different calendars, all of them cyclical. December 21st, 2012 is considered the end-date of a 5,125-year-long cycle in the Meso-American Long Count Calendar. Many New Agers interpret the calendar’s finale as a dawning of a new era of positive transformation. Gloom and doomers (and Hollywood film producers) imagine a catastrophic end to planet earth, as it enters a black hole or collides with a global-killing asteroid. Scholars of Mayan culture refute predictions of catastrophe, as such events are not evident in any studies of the culture. The mere notion that the Long Count Calendar can end is contrary to Mayan history and culture. Astronomy scientists also refute the proposed cataclysmic end of earth, negated by simple facts and observations of the cosmos.

I cannot deny I feel big shifts in our world in a way I did not in the 20th Century. More uncertainty. More wild weather. More tragedy. These things all happened in the 20th Century too, but we were younger and more foolish. and we didn’t pay so much attention. We got our information more slowly so there was less to be worried about.

In addition to potential apocalypse, 2012 is also an election year. Election season generates its own special kind of stress, and the hoopla leading up to it is well underway. Rather than concern ourselves so much with the surly mix of ancient glyphs and alarmist instant news, we at the Noise interviewed locals about their hopes, dreams and fears for this new year: a Mogollon spin on the Mayan Calendar.

         Alex Rovang is Director of Education and Community Outreach at Sedona Recycles. “As a resident of the fine city of Sedona, I have noticed an emphatic attention to some arbitrary Gregorian calendar dates including the most recent ‘11/11/11’ gathering,” observes Mr. Rovang, “While much can be debated about the accuracy of calendars and how this one lines up with that one, I think that the logical fallacy behind these announced alignments is that it gives people the impression that something tangible will happen on these dates. That's why I find it silly. I like some things about it too, though. I feel that there is a universal consciousness, and that no matter what the date is, if people are meditating on a particular concept or idea at the same time great things can be achieved. Maybe even ascension.” Mr. Rovang feels that a group effort of positive thought, focused on a single idea or even a single word, can bring about positive change in the world. The power of positive thought has been proven at mass transcendental meditation events around the world. “So, the date need not be significant just the intention. I feel that ascension for our collective consciousness--plants and animals too!-- is possible, whether through a soft peaceful revolution or a violent cataclysm. The trick will be to work together. Meditate together. And we don't have to wait till some arbitrary date, we can practice meditation everyday starting right now.”

             A recurring thought sprung from 2011 is the need for unity as a nation, and the power of positive thought. Jason Benatz is an artist and owner of Ace’s Clarkdale Tattoo. His family has a long and illustrious history in the Verde Valley. Grandmother Dorothy Fain Benatz was Mayor of Clarkdale in the 1980s.

“With all the changes in our country and economy I hope we can all reevaluate how we live and spend, and what we value as people, as families and as a nation,” says Mr. Benatz, "I hope we can learn from the Occupy protests that this is not a bi-partisan issue, it is a national issue. 99 % of our nation is controlled by big business and is not dependent on our political views or party lines. Consumers have the power in 2012 to remind big business they work for us. 2012 is a great time for artists and craftspeople to strike out on their own and live their dreams. With the recession, I hope the value in the arts is revitalized from school age child to retired adult. I hope 2012 brings a renewed sense of human value, and solidarity.”

         Continuing on the theme of creativity, Mr. Benatz’s lady love and lingerie model, the very clever Miranda Gunnell chimed in with her “Classy Lady” fashion-forward (and amusingly tongue in cheek) predictions for the new year. For 2012 she predicts stiletto shoes for cats, designer duct-tape, and “Bedazzling” to the max. “If you don't have a lot of money, the trick to looking wealthy is to make your MONEY look expensive,” suggests Ms. Gunnell, “The rich have been doing this for years with their ‘platinum card’ this and ‘Black Am Ex’ that. You can do the same by bedazzling those one dollar bills and putting glitter in your coin pouch so that a spray of sparkles explode each time you open your wallet!,” says Ms. Gunnell, “Everyone will be so blinded by your bling money (and maybe the glitter in their eyes) that when you leave the Dollar Store they will be talking for days about the Classy Lady with the expensive pennies.” A floral designer and the chief proprietress of Peacock Flower Company in Clarkdale, Ms, Gunnell predicts 2012 will be a great year for mash-ups, celebrating interesting combinations of juxtaposed elements, “Beach weddings with an Old Hollywood Glamour theme. Backyard BBQ weddings with a Sexy Moroccan theme. Elegant weddings on industrial rooftops. Elements that traditionally would not be paired are being beautifully infused to create endless possibilities for unique weddings in 2012.”



          Regarding wedded bliss, many feel that 2012 should bring equal rights for same-sex couples to legally marry nationwide. Penny Smith is a USPS Mail Carrier in Cottonwood, Arizona. “As a lesbian, I am hoping that 2012 will be the year of equal rights for all of us. The right to love and marry the one you love is such a simple thing, yet it seems so difficult for so many people to understand. I'm hopeful that the ‘live and let live’ ideal will become stronger in the upcoming year. Equal rights, not special rights, is not much to ask for. I am hopeful that people in power will do the right thing as afforded by the Constitution.” As a cancer survivor, continuously grateful for her clean bill of health, Ms. Smith is immune to the Mayan Calendar scare as she has spent every day of the last 12 years savoring each day as if it were her last. “I am hoping for good health for all my family and vast network of wonderful friends. I am hoping that healthcare reform becomes a reality and people are given or able to afford basic healthcare. I have been a lifelong Democrat and stand behind President Obama 100%. I feel he has made great strides with the mess he was given when he took office in 2008. I am scared for our country if the conservative, religious right are allowed in such a position of power. I am hoping that I do not have to watch another person lose their home or job in the upcoming year. I am hoping the ‘working poor’ will be able to stay afloat and prosper once again.”

       The past several years have been very challenging financially, for both employees and business owners. Many have weathered storms in economies past, and use their skills, creativity and positive thinking to maintain strength in the current recession. Kelley Foy and Leta Hollon live in Jerome, and are the owners of Crema and Maison du Provenance in Cottonwood. They are active in the local arts scene, and avid supporters of area artists. "Optimistic about the coming year and thrilled to see the people of Old Town coming together, "said Ms. Foy, "I'm looking forward to more local collaborations."
Adds Ms. Hollon,"Accepting 2012 will bring changes here and afar, reminding myself to lend a hand in the direction I hope to see. This year, my focus will be staying open to whatever happens so we can adapt. Unless it's the end of the world, which doesn't require much adaptation."
       Nancy and Tracy Weisel live in Jerome, where they are long time owners of the Raku Gallery. “We wish for the continued success of our little town,” said Mrs. Weisel, “We're thankful for how well things have gone during 2011 and hope for the same or better in 2012. People enjoy the ease of our town. There’s an appreciation for the wonderful, positive local energy. We would love to see a community garden area for people who do not have access to gardens at their living space.”

         2012 may become the pinnacle of the Do-It-Yourself Revival. Knitting, home farming, bee keeping, pickle canning. It’s all quite chic and economical. Dani Vorves, of Old Town Cottonwood, is an analog photographer and the “resident hippie” at Jerome’s Caduceus Cellars. A Capricorn born in 1982, Ms. Vorves looks forward to joining the “Dirty 30 Club” when she celebrates her birthday this month. Her hopes for the new year are bountiful, upbeat and lyrical. “I look forward to enjoying my man and all the love we share. I'm hoping to further my knowledge on wine-making, nap-taking, smoke-breaking, leaf-raking and some foreign lands,” she says, “I am not afraid of much, so this year I have no fear, only dreams of wine and sweet little songs. Oh and maybe to own a Vespa. Love love love you all!”



Ryan Matson is Vice President of the architectural art installation Eliphante Village in Cornville. “Living at Eliphante on Oak Creek means January is cccccolddddd, so thanks, 2012, for starting off so harsh. Lighten up!” laughs Mr. Matson who quickly turns philosophical, “Perhaps 2012 is ushering in a collective vision of the horizon during a celestial dawn, welcoming a ‘great day’ of about 13,000 years in duration. In light of such, everyone just get over fear already and stop this war on emotions!” On a more personal note, Mr. Matson looks forward to kicking ass, being alive and “lightening [his] footprint while bringing more art into the world for anyone to enjoy!”

Those who cultivate a healthy enthusiasm for creativity may be best able to adapt to strange new situations. Simplicity and "back to basics" values also seem a recurring theme. Debbie Leavitt is a professional photographer who lives in Flagstaff. "My mantra is 'keep it simple and have fun with it. And my resolution for the new year is, as the world seems more and more extreme, to be calmer than ever. Maybe I should start doing yoga." Expressing concern for Arizona, and its future, Ms Leavitt adds, "My hope for 2012 is that we the people decide to Occupy Democracy. 'It’s not a spectator sport', as Howard Zinn said." Ms. Leavitt also hopes 2012 is the year a cure for cancer is discovered."Please could it be early in the year to save those loved ones who are fighting it right now?"

For many, the dawn of 2012 is of no significance, just another year, and a time to, as Wooderson says “just keep livin’”. Greg Sawyer is a Clarkdale resident who works at Jerome’s Mile High Grill. On the myth of 2012, Mr. Sawyer says, “I personally think it is overhyped. If something actually does happen on the projected date no one is going to have any idea until it takes place. Concerning the upcoming year, I mostly just take things one day at a time and see how things unfold.”

David Lindmark is a restaurant server in Sedona, and an occasional Bono impersonator residing in Verde Santa Fe, just outside of Cottonwood. “To be honest, I don't really think that much of the coming year,” confides Mr. Lindmark, “New Years has never held any rebirth or anticipated excitement for me.” Generally happy with what life provides, he hopes the restaurant stays open, his health insurance remains affordable and that his daughter continues to be successful, happy and healthy. “I just want a good night’s sleep. Friends tell me they admire how I live in the moment, and seem to enjoy the simplest to complex conversations with friends and strangers. And I do. I hope they're right and I'm not floating by naively.”
Big events and holidays are important but it's the little moments, the day to day joys, that comprise most of our time on planet earth.
Amber Godina is a part-time hair stylist, living in Clarkdale. “As a busy mom and wife, it is very hard to see more than a few moments ahead,” says Mrs. Godina, mother to two youngsters, “I would love to promise the new year a work-out everyday, to eat right and do more sewing and crafting, teach my children to say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’, and get them to mean it. I’d love to learn a new language. Ah, Mandarin sounds good. I would also like to put my cooking emphasis on Country French this year, learn to throat sing, learn to belly dance, and hoop. To throw random tea parties. And of course see the world become a better place. But in all reality I will be happy to just keep my house somewhat clean, to keep my kids somewhat clean, to keep my hubby pretty happy, and to just be able to keep my part time job.”

Every generation has had its panics, ranging from war, to disease epidemics, to great financial depressions. Contrary to what renaissance faires would have you believe, I bet the Middle Ages were a rough time to grow up. Back then you were lucky to keep any of your teeth, or make it to your 30th birthday. When I was a kid everyone was afraid of imminent nuclear war. A popular TV movie from the Reagan era, "The Day After" was a visit to a post-apocylyptic America, life in a nuclear winter. The free-wheeling hippies before us were naked any chance they could get, but a hit song of my teen years was Germaine Stewart's "You Don't Have to Take Your Clothes Off (To Have a Good Time"). My generation got gypped! We didn't get to have any of the same fun the Baby Boomers did! We grew up under the specter of AIDs and the Cold War. I wonder what it must be like for young folks coming of age in turbulence of the 21st Century.

Gabe Greenfield, 17, has lived in Sedona his entire life. "In the coming year I hope that I am able to get good grades, have fun with my friends, play sports and be healthy, " says the Red Rock High School senior, "Also, I have heard that the Mayan Calender ends towards the end of 2012 and the world is supposed to end. But for me, my life is just beginning," he says somewhat poignantly. With a hopeful expression he adds, "I will be graduating high school and moving on to college. 2012 will be a good year for me."



Make the most of your time here, be it long or short. No sense in squandering any of it.





Ellen Jo Roberts shares a historic brick bungalow with Bike Daddy Chad, Floyd, Ivan and Ned.

As a founding member of the "1972 Club" she is a little anxious about turning 40 in 2012.

Read all about it at ellenjo.com