Before I came to Tucson, I imagined the desert as desolate, deserted, true to its name. But one look at the Sonoran desert changed that picture, filling it in with bits of green and splashes of red over the monochrome, tan sands.
The Center for Sonoran Desert Studies bounds this desert at 100,000 square miles, stretching from Sonora to Baja California, and from California to Arizona. It even reaches some of the islands in the Gulf of California, and is home to more than 2,000 species of plants.
We were first introduced to the desert the night we arrived in Tucson. After an awkward half day of smiling introductions and extended silences, we all piled into the van (for the first time) and drove to A mountain to watch the sunset. From our rocky perch, the valley poured down below us in a velvety skirt. Everywhere were buttons of green – giant, knobbed saguaros; skinny ocotillos and palo verde trees. The last rays of our first Tucson sun lit up a new vision of the desert.
It was the first sight, but it wouldn’t be the last. We saw another side to the desert on the bumpy ride up the dirt (mud) road from Altar to Sasabé. And the desert trees hung with backpacks and nylon jackets near a highway rest stop on the road to Tucson, stark reminders of the people for whom the desert is sea that must be forded.
On our last day in Tucson before we fly down to Guatemala City, Rachel and I hike out to Bear Canyon. Its rapid waters flow down from the Catalinas, Tucson’s northern mountains, and are red and yellow with minerals. We sit on the rocky banks, bounded by scraggly trees and cactus, and watch the water. I can’t believe that this, too, is part of the desert.
More than that, I can’t believe the “Keep Out” sign that is attached to a crooked tree by the water. Rachel is equally appalled – how could someone own this? The Sonoran desert is something shared. Arizona shares it with California, Mexico shares it with the U.S. So many people since we’ve come here have shared it with us.
But in many ways, the Sonoran desert has become more of a barrier than a tie between peoples. Through Operation Gatekeeper, the U.S. government pushed people into it, to push them out. Merriam-Webster cites the origin of the noun “desert” as the opposite of the Latin verb serere, to join together. De-serere – desert – means to abandon, to divide.
After five weeks of travel, we’ll come back to a new desert with new minds. With all this rain we’ve been having, there’s hope for blooming ocotillos, and maybe some blossoming new definitions to go with them.
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