Category: Utah

About Utah and Me

I’m just back from a nearly perfect adventure in my Favorite Place on Earth! Sure, I was there with an open wound which isn’t healing as fast as I want it to. And I had a little hissy fit on someone I love dearly and have since made amends with. But other than that, my trip to Southern Utah could not have gotten much better.

I went to all familiar places and did hikes that I have done at least a few times before. The weather was stunning. The scenery following suit is expected, and the reason I can’t get enough of being there. I cried when I saw the Utah sign in front of me, as well as when it was behind me, for two different reasons. I was even suitably inspired to consider putting a forgotten dream back on the agenda. All this brings me closer to making a life-altering decision!

Anyone who knows me knows that I love to travel. Fifty states, six Canadian provinces, forty-two countries, six continents, nearly fifty national parks worldwide. Some pretty good numbers, by any count! I’ve taken a lot of heat and have been accused of many odd things for loving my globetrotting, and for loving life in general. (Imagine!) But this isn’t the reason that I’m getting closer to making this life-altering decision.

Okay, okay. Enough teasing. Are you sitting down?

Southern Utah moves me so much, I’m considering shutting down all other travel and spending all my leisure time and money there. For starters, I will likely return in the summer, even though I had other plans. I’ve managed to work my personal Promised Land into an itinerary that includes knocking off two more national parks. (I’m trying to hike all U.S. national parks, and I’m more than half done!) This is the behavior of someone who can’t live fully without something. I’m using every and all excuses to be back there again! And I’m thinking that maybe it’s time to stop making excuses and just go.

Well, here’s my disclaimer. Not so long ago I rethought, rewrote, and put out my Bucket List. And there really are some items on it that need to be done. A train trip through the Swiss Alps is bought and paid for. I’m traveling to Antarctica, my seventh continent, later this year! Another cruise on that list is a priority for next summer. And I want to continue to hike those national parks and see my niece in South Carolina. But maybe some of the other entries on that Bucket List aren’t as important as spending as much time as I can in Southern Utah before my time is up.

My time being “up” is another reality that I have to take seriously. Because no matter what anyone wants to think or do or say, my diagnosis of Stage IV Lung Cancer is no joke. Yes, it is a sad truth in my life that some people think that it is something to laugh about, that it isn’t as “serious” as it sounds, because why would I still be running around the damn world if it was so serious? Herein lies a strange truth: I am the beneficiary of the changing face of cancer, and that allows me to live my life much the way I always have.

But I digress. This was supposed to be a post about Utah and me, not cancer and me, and I wouldn’t want the world to roll its eyes at me and sniff, “There she goes again, talking about stuff that make people cringe.” Yet, another truth is that when I talk about Utah and me, cancer always has to be included, whether I want it to or not.

Which leads me to the aforementioned “forgotten dream.”

At one time I planned to buy a small RV and go on a really long road trip after retirement, for as long as I wanted. Naturally, a great deal of my time would be spent in Southern Utah. I also planned to buy a home in a 55+ park, though I could never quite figure out how those two things went together, and why I would buy a home, then go out on the road and leave it behind. Before I could figure it out, my friend cancer came along and made both of them highly unlikely.

But here I am, blogging from my little house in the 55+ community. And in spite of open wounds and a cruddy diagnosis, it appears that I’ll only have to go to Boston every three months now as long as scans keep looking good. Which suddenly opens up that RV road tripping dream to me again, that cancer not so much crushed, but that I let go of and decided to just keep doing what I’ve been doing all along. As I traveled through my cherished Southern Utah I was inspired to think that maybe, just maybe, it’s still possible, and that I can come home to my beautiful little house in between trips. I’ve figured out the mystery of how those two dreams go together!

The verdict is still out on the RV. I have a big scan day coming up on Tuesday, the 2nd. If all goes well I’ll plan my next trip to my beautiful land. Meanwhile, please enjoy some pictures taken on my most recent trip.

An Open Love Letter to Utah

Dear Utah,

I remember clearly when we met: the year was 1995, I was with my beloved mom, and we were driving cross country for the second time. The year before we had cut our teeth with a 9,400 miler that inexplicably, did not include a trip through your glory. Yes, there were many other glories, but maybe not quite like yours. This particular trip had a catch: I had just purchased a little bright pink car that we would leave in Southern California once I found someplace to live there. That was my biggest dream leading up to 1995: living in California, and I lived it for five years. But that’s another story for another day, and it’s a long story, for my love affair with California continues. At times, it even competes for my attentions that I usually reserve for you. Believe me, this is not a slight to you, my love. It just IS.

Well, how do you like that! In writing this letter to speak my appreciation, I realize that I have things a bit wrong. 1995 was not the first time I saw you, it was the first time, perhaps, that I REALLY saw you. Mom and me actually drove up to Zion from Vegas in 1993 and stayed a couple of days. Just a little sneak peek at your well known red rock magnificence, and yes, we were impressed. But as I said, 1995 was the deal sealer. As only a road tripper knows, the power to choose where you go and for how long, to have the time to marvel at the color of the rocks in Glen Canyon and wonder how a strip of I-70 can be more beautiful than seventy-five percent of the rest of Planet Earth, will do it. Love at first sight, and forever love at second. And third. And fourth. And…Whew!!

Records indicate that I didn’t make it back to you until 2008 (how can this be?!) and even then, I only flew into Salt Lake City to drive north into other states. Still, I remember that I was pleasantly surprised by random findings along the way.

Listen, I know what I was doing: I was beginning to explore the world outside of this country, and I was completing the tall task of visiting all 50 states in my domestic travels. I also buried Mom, my best friend and greatest traveling partner (sigh) in 2004, so I was cutting my teeth as a solo traveler and really, just trying to figure out who I was.

And then, a big event took place in 2009: I started hiking. That’s when things started to get serious. Still, the slam dunk didn’t happen until 2013, when I spent two and a half weeks hiking all five National Parks in your awe inspiring southern extremities. Zion, Bryce, Capitol Reef, Canyonlands, Arches. While I loved them all (of course!) one emerged as my favorite, and remains thus: Canyonlands. Even as I chip away at hiking ALL the National Parks in the United States, I just can’t keep away from Canyonlands. Doing the same hikes time after time in Canyonlands. Dreaming of Canyonlands. Not enough time in a lifetime to get enough of Canyonlands. Did I mention I love Canyonlands? 😉

For me, the only other place in Utah that comes close to Canyonlands is Glen Canyon. That narrow strip of excitement between Hanksville and Blanding. Yes, that part of Glen Canyon. The Dirty Devil River. Bridge over the Colorado. Hite Overlook. I take the same darn pictures every time. And I don’t care.

Oh, don’t even get me going!

2017, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022. COVID19 was the only thing that stopped me from being there in 2020. Our reunion in 2021 was unbelievable, because you see, I found out I had cancer in the autumn of 2019, and guess where I was a month earlier? And the thought of never seeing you again was unbearable.

Cancer sucks. Needles, scans, bad news, one step forward, two steps back. But as I became a pro at all of it, I realized that I had a pretty great defense mechanism: memory. Because of memory I didn’t have to think of scans when I was having scans. I could think instead of all the amazing places I’ve had the incredible fortune of exploring. And, you guessed it: I spent a heck of a lot of time in Utah when I was lying in some MRI beast two thousand miles away. How can I ever thank you for that?

I can’t. But I’ll try anyway, by giving you my continued patronage for as long as I have left in this life.

See you soon, my love.

Work in Progress: A Thousand Winds

I’ve written and published seven books under the pseudonym Brenda K. Stone. They’re fun and a little frivolous and I am extremely proud of them. Lately, I’ve taken a renewed interest in what I refer to as my “rock and roll series” and plan to read it after a long break away from it. The idea to pick it up and start writing again is a complete possibility. But not much will get in the way of finishing my current work in progress, “A Thousand Winds.”

The best writing I’ve ever done? “A Thousand Winds” is it. Since my cancer diagnosis, I come from a different place, and it’s not always a bad thing. It’s a deeper, more thought-provoking place. Interesting fact: I came up with the outline of the book before my diagnosis, and guess what disease one of the main characters was dying from? You guessed it, cancer. I’ve since changed that to ALS, so it wouldn’t hit too close to home. But like most authors, a lot of me is in the story.

The first few pages of any book are so crucial, and I’ve been reworking the prologues of “A Thousand Winds.” For a limited time, you can still read the “old” prologues here. Please enjoy the “new” prologues below, and drop me a line to let me know what you think!

A Thousand Winds

Janice

The way she looked at me is burned into my memory. The message in her eyes spoke volumes: You’re old. Therefore, you’re worthless.

She has no idea.

She thinks her generation invented sex. Drugs. Rock and roll. Millennials, or Generation Z, or whoever the hell they are, with Facebook and Instagram and TikTok, invented the world as we know it. The generation of youngsters who are afraid to show their faces without a “filter”, because one of their “friends” might see their soul, invented history. The “been there, done that” Me Me Me Generation covering up who they really are with whiskers or a pig nose, think they have the world at their fingertips.

 Will she ever know what it’s like to truly be loved? By the same man, for forty-eight years? Could she find joy in a sandbox? Or playing house in the woods, where the rocks are her toaster, the trees her shower stall? Did she ever have to disappear into that same forest to escape a man that would hurt his own daughter to satisfy his sick fantasies? No, because Jim and I protected her from that.

 I wasn’t so lucky.

 Coachella is a town one stop removed from the nightmare of my childhood, yet her biggest adventure. But was she marching in Selma, Alabama in 1965? Was she in the crowd for the “I Have a Dream” speech in Washington, DC, 1963? Did she watch the Beatles land at JFK on February 7, 1964, after hitching a ride from California?

Am I old and worthless now?

There’s so much more to tell. The life I’ve led even overwhelms me, to the point I have to leave it in the past sometimes as I struggle to move forward.

Kimberly doesn’t know any of it. All she knows is that seven years ago she found out that I’m her grandmother, and who her parents really were. She hasn’t spoken a kind word to me since.

Perhaps she’ll never know where her grandmother has been.

Because she hates me. And I’m dying.

Kimberly

“You’re such an asshole.” I toss a soiled napkin at Zac. I can relate to the crumpled paper as it floats to the carpet.

“I’m just gonna sleep through the whole fuckin’ scene,” he moans.

“C’mon, you have to help me,” I remind him.

“Grandpa Jim and me don’t exactly see eye to eye, remember? And you know what happens when a guy doesn’t see eye to eye with ‘ole Jimbo.” Zac makes a horrid noise as he pretends to cut his own throat with his index finger.

I blink, because his words sting. I feel like he should know better, and if he doesn’t, that I should tell him that he should know better. But I don’t.

Instead, I keep the light mood going.

“Do you think Kylie Jenner gets a visit from her grandfather that used to be her father the day after Coachella?”

We have a much-needed howl when Zac quips, “Did you forget that Kylie Jenner’s father is a chick now?”

My mirth is interrupted by the definitive sound of a car door slamming somewhere on the street in front of my apartment complex. A quick glance out the sliding glass door has me snatching up the napkin and running for my bedroom to put on the nearest pieces of clothing I can reach.

“Put a fucking shirt on, you sexy slob!” I shout into the living room.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Zac scratches his belly and yawns, but is soon behind me pretending to hump me doggie-style as I’m putting on my underwear.

“I see Grandpa Jim still hasn’t traded in the Oldsmobile for the Porsche he deserves,” Zac deadpans. He seems to think that Grandpa has a lot of money stashed away in his mattress. In fact, Zac is obsessed with the thought. Maybe that’s why he’s so hard to get rid of?

“Shut up.” I suck on his bottom lip and rumple his hair. He’s so beautiful that I put up with all his other nonsense.

Zac pats my butt and chases me for a few steps as Grandpa’s knock falls on the door. I’m trying to stifle a grin when I swing it open to face the man who used to be number one in my life.

“Kimberly…”

The look on Grandpa Jim’s face forces my smile to disintegrate.