Goodbye 2020…and good riddance

Just about every person in the world, on this planet we call home, Earth, a mixed bag of species and environments, with all the differences and similarities, yes just about every human is ready to say goodbye 2020.

Let us all welcome and embrace the new decade, bringing the positive change we’d like to live into reality.  As a rather young species on this rock, a mere 200,000 years or more, we have so much to learn about self and surroundings and each person might get 100 years, if we’re lucky.  When I quit learning I’m dead, or at least not paying attention to my spirit.  Makes me sad, lost, confused, frustrated, and depressed even.  Any of those sound familiar?  Feel free to add to the list.  I don’t like living in this haze, nothing to do with dust as I have a tiny house full of that.

As a claimed intelligent species, we—including myself—are not taking care of our planet and selves in the healthiest ways possible.  Do I have all the answers?  No.  But sometimes looking back helps me learn.  So this is a look back at the craziest year of my life, and probably yours too.  Are we ready for goodbye 2020?

I wrapped up 2019 after almost three months of PT (physical therapy) so my broken wrists would move and do what they should at 70-80%, it got better.  This also included RV parks, spoiled with hookups, and all the noise that goes with being parked, IMHO, too close to the neighbors.  And so on the second day of the new year I ran away to the healing desert apricity south of Quartzsite, Arizona, the Kofa National Wildlife Refuge (NWR).  Yup, been there more than a few times.  I looked forward to continued personal healing in 2020.  I had never been so broken and learned to be more mindful about my physical movement.

Before continuing further south I went to Parker, and back to Congress dealing with a propane tank problem.  I note that because it took so long to resolve and I am still unimpressed with the entire design as a 5-gal tank will NEVER take more than 3 gallons though should take 4.6.  Manchester blew this newest model to meet new legal requirements about something that wasn’t broken and didn’t need fixing.  Except the old tanks couldn’t be recertified, so no choice.  I really should write to them.  Was this a sign of 2020 to come?

By the end of January I was settled in to a favorite piece of BLM Sonoran Desert sandwiched between Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, Cabeza Prieta NWR, Tohono O’Odaham Nation Reservation, and the town of Ajo.  The density and diversity of this environment continues to absorb me, draw me in, and blow me away.  I attended activities in Ajo, art gallery and fiddle music, lunch at restaurants with friends.  Remember those kinds of public entertainment?  I will try not to take these things for granted so much in the future.

A call from the February full moon rise drew me back to Kofa once again.  Stayed at Shady Lane RV Court more than once, had the refrigerator repaired, and a meetup with Sue and Mo in Quartzsite.  Then back to boondocking not far west of Quartzsite before stocking up in Blythe and trying a new location along the Colorado River, south of Ehrenberg, Arizona for a few days.  And then back to the Kofa once again, this time further up the road and I moved around a bit over a couple weeks and into March.  Travel was still happening and I wasn’t alone.

This time, after a little rain woke the desert growth, the earliest of wildflowers called me back to the Ajo area desert.  March, a time when we Americans started thinking more seriously about COVID19, or at least that’s when it really dawned on me how many people were affected and dyeing.  Isolating is something I do very well during winter in the desert, then add distancing and masking when in buildings to shop.  Plus, the end of March is when I start thinking of returning to work in the spring.  And with all the flowers blooming I knew it was spring.  I might have still been in denial about what 2020 would bring.

Into April as I started a slow journey northward to Wickenburg and Congress.

I could feel the warming temps of summer before the end of the month so moved up in elevation to visit Mary and Jerry in Walnut Grove, north of Yarnell.  They put up with me and extended hospitality into May as I continued to wait for the back to work date.  Not even sure if the park would be open, to the public.

As I continued northward from there traffic was limited to almost exclusively semi-trucks, presumably delivering essentials.  Not so much toilet paper (TP).  Who knew there would be such a run on TP in 2020.

Finally back to work in May, or at least masked training outdoors while otherwise going through 14 days of quarantine.  And June, we’re open for business, mostly providing information outside the visitor center and starting a few Ranger programs, the first park in the nation to do so.  Procedures changed almost daily as we all learned on the go.

June

July

August

That also included photographing the monthly full moon for me.

No wild fires in Bryce, yet we watched the smoke and haze change almost daily from fires all around.

The peak summer months were weirdly wonderful, and not overly busy.  No international visitors meant the numbers were way down, and many Americans were still staying home.  I didn’t travel far from Bryce for most of the summer other than to shop in Cedar City.  It’s unusual for me not to explore the surrounding area over the summer.  But even though I was in a national park I felt guilty about traveling away from ‘home’.  Those with a travel bug will be more than ready to say goodbye 2020 and hope we can get moving again in 2021.

After a couple pay checks in the bank I splurged on a new camera body that fits my old lenses.  I am happy with the D5600 but now wondering if the lens is bad or my eyes are out of focus.  Actually, I know my eyes need checking, new glasses, and it might be time for cataracts to be taken care of.  But 2020 is not a great time for any doctor appointments.

It was mostly a nonsoon summer with barely a measurable amount of rain.

Did make for a lot of clear skies for star gazing.  And although we didn’t bring out telescopes the Dark Rangers put on constellation tours with laser lights that were booked four nights a week.

We all survived summer one way or another masked and in some cases gloved, using buckets full of hand sanitizer and rubbing alcohol.  I hope nobody was drinking that stuff, but there were days…  We held on tight to get through Labor Day weekend knowing visitation would slow down afterwards, but it didn’t.  It just got busier and busier.  Minus the people just not traveling at all, it was time for my tribe of retired folks in RVs and young people without children.  But many children didn’t physically return to school.  And many families piled into the (often new) RV to travel national parks while home-schooling.  I might have done that too.  But the crowds were crazy with lots of people new to national parks and somehow lacking the understanding and respect for the parks.  We need to talk Leave No Trace in 2021.

Well, I survived September and the countdown past the middle of October.  Even lead my first full moon hike into the hoodoos.  Managed to stick around long enough to see the Aspen go gold.  And left before the snow fell.

Goodbye 2020 summer season at Bryce Canyon National Park.  See ya’ in 2021!

I then began my winter journey southward like the warm weather migrator I am.  I hung around the Congress area in November and got the calendar done.

And in December, I haven’t journeyed far from the Quartzsite area of southwestern Arizona.  The last month of the year. I am feeling a little guilty traveling at all with the current lockdown stay at home.  But I am at home.

Yes, I, like most of us, am more than ready to say goodbye 2020, and good riddance.  Yet even though I will look for positive change in 2021, I will be realistic, with no huge expectations that change will come overnight, because change is the slowest thing I know.  Just ask this procrastinator.

So what’s on my 2021 list?  Well, pretty much the same things as were on my 2020 list with more mindfulness, they just haven’t happened yet.  What kind of change would you like to be part of?

Goodbye 2020

Happy New Year!