Armchair Travel: Antelope Valley, California

Among my closest family, friends, and colleagues, I'm a bit notorious for my rather intense distaste for all things California.  The funny thing was, this wasn't something that sprung up after I moved away; California and I always had a less-than-perfect relationship, from the very beginning. Well, time and distance have blunted some of my unhappier memories, to the point where I'm almost ready to go back for a visit, and I'm certainly open to taking a trip down memory lane every now and then. Fortunately, during my almost-decade there I did manage to tamp down my disdain enough to occasionally go forth and explore some of the many, many rather awesome things that California had on offer.

Today, April 6, is designated as California Poppy Day, in honor of the California State Flower, which is (gasp!) the poppy--specifically, the Eschscholzia californica, the California Poppy. In honor of this rather whackadoodle holiday, I decided to sit down and blog a bit about the time I had the opportunity to frolic about in literal vast fields of these rather lovely little flowers. 

While I reckon you can find the California poppy in lots and lots of parts of the state, there's this one area which is rather famous for its concentration: the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve. It's located in the middle of fuckin' nowhere, in northern Los Angeles County (hard to think that anyplace out in Southern California could be considered the middle of nowhere, but really, it's a damned big state.) It's rather a desolate bit of the region, save for when the poppies are in bloom. And not every year is a good bloom season--it depends on the when and the how much rain that falls in a given year. So, while strolling the poppy fields of California had been on my bucket list for many years, it wasn't until the spring of 2014 that an opportunity of good timing enabled me to explore them. 

My travel companions (my was-band, and a couple of our housemates) and I ventured out on Easter Sunday, and after a lot of driving, we got to the nowhere place of all the poppies. (Hey, I think that should be the new name for the nature preserve! or at least the title of an epic poem.) To be honest, I'm not even sure we made it into the proper preserve; there were so many fields blanketed in the orange-gold blooms, we just stopped and strolled wherever the was-band deemed photogenic enough. 

The region we explored...it was vast. Huge. Big sky, big fields. We rarely encountered other folks. Only sheep.

Given the mercurial nature of the bloom season, if you live far away, it can be difficult to time your visit so that you can get the full poppy experience. Now that I live far away, I reckon it's unlikely that I'll have a chance to return, at least in this lifetime. There are always more places to travel to, after all. But if you can find a way, do try to explore these vast fields and their blooms. 

March in Review

Well, let's first address the elephant in the room: My whole "blog every day in March" turned out to be a flop. Not sure why, exactly...I think it was a combination of "jesus christ, what the fuck am I supposed to blog about today," "oh god it's 10pm and I haven't started and I'm so exhausted," and, finally, "fuck this."

On the bright side, it did get me in the mode of trying to brainstorm content and be proactive and strategic about planning content. I think, part of it too, is always trying to remember why I blog. God knows, blogs seem to be "so 2010", and one need look no further than someone like the Pioneer Woman to see how far they have evolved (and not in a good way, as far as I can tell.) Also, I was never in this for getting views or whatever. My main purpose in blogging has always been to quietly remind myself that while I don't matter on a grand universal scale, my life matters to me, and I enjoy documenting my struggles and joys and reflections and explorations and little accomplishments, and sometimes even my acquisitions. So that's what I need to remember when writing and planning and brainstorming. 

So! other than my blogging failure, what else did March bring?

• MY FIRST VACCINE! On Friday the 26th, I took a rather circuitous route out to Spencer, where I got my first Moderna jab. The vaccine site was at the First Nazarene Church, and while I confess myself a little surprised that the Nazarenes would have anything to do with letting something so sciencey take place in their church, I was a little reassured: if the Nazarenes are letting us use their church as a vaccination site, the vaccine can't be the Mark of the Beast, right?  From beginning to end, the experience was smooth, and the road trip out to Spencer was, in and of itself, a pleasant reminder of Indiana explorations to come. Which brings me to...

• The concept of "The After Times." Very early on, I began referring to the time before the pandemic as "The Before Times." And then, of course, the pandemic itself, I've been calling The End of the World, or the Apocalypse. I was so engrossed with simply surviving that it has only been in this last month that I began to register what my friend Jain is calling "The After Times." Yes, the pandemic is not over. Yes, we still need to be not utter dickholes and mask up and be considerate. But many of us are well on our way to being vaccinated, and that means it's time to think about hope, and making plans, and rebuilding. I'm already plotting my first big vacation!

• Beautiful weather: Normally, I have a love-hate relationship with spring. I hate the fact that it's a harbinger of summer, my least favorite season, but this winter was so bleak and dark, both literally and metaphorically, that I couldn't help but to rejoice in the fact that March seemed to be unusually warm. This warm spring, coupled with the rapidly-expanding availability of the vaccine, seems like a true rebirth in every sense of the word. 

• This also led to my annual "cleaning of my deck space"

Before (resembling a post-apocalyptic wasteland)

After (And ready for After Times Entertaining!)

• March 22--my 5 year Indianaversary! How the hell have I been home 5 years already?

• Word of the month: "Vaccined" (tipsy shorthand for "vaccinated")

• Quote of the month: "I consider myself 'man-agnostic.' I'm have neither faith nor disbelief that decent men exist. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that I'm open to the possibility, but I'm not motivated enough to go out and find evidence." -Me, of course

What did March bring into your life?