sometimes i go the entire day without seeing anyone. its mostly barbed wire and cows out here. dirt walled and tin roofed houses occasionally pass surrounded by corn or sorghum and dusty barefoot kids. the earth isnt paved here so everything gets dirty and dusty. my hair is dusty, my donkey is dusty, my books are dusty, my food is dusty. everyone tends to want to beat it back but im not convinced yet. from the streets the dirt climbs up the outer cement walls of the little houses, it covers the shelves and plates. the women whip it up into the air and broom it out into the streets again. then they sweep the streets. they pause to watch a yellow haired man walk by with a donkey. a dog stops chasing the chickens and barks from a burning trash heap. the children stop playing and gather certain that something unusual is happening. someone stops me and gives me a cup of coffee. the men look at the donkey with heads to one side making observations, comments; asserting facts to demonstrate fluency; eventually the questions begin to surface.

“¿a donde vas por ahi?”

“¿de donde viene?”

“¿tienes familia por aqui?”

these are polite precedings to what everyone is really wondering.

when i walk in the early morning ill often meet a poor farmer in the ditch cleaning the fence line with his machete. he is humble and quiet. he doesnt ask because he thinks it a little rude and he is certain that i have my reasons.

“youre one of those…” a young man asked me as he flexed to think, “one of those…tourists, yeah, tourist right?” he beamed because he had remembered the word and used it correctly in a sentence. “were suppose to help you people.” i appreciated that.

in the towns and cities the people are more polarized, more modern more right or wrong and so they are less tacit. they ask things like “¿y eso, que es?” which I like to translate, “what the hell are you doing?” or, “cuales son los motivos para viajar asi?” which is more polite. it almost doesn’t matter what I say. a conversation will normally ensue in which i am a minor contributor and eventually an explanation will surface. usually someone of good will will offer a suggestion:

“no, no, its because they (gringos) like to do stuff like this, its like a sport for them, or a hobby, or a coming of age.” they will exhange ideas until they come to some reasonable answers. I just watch and wait for the verdict.

i am raising drug awareness in the children of the Americas, i am saving the environment, i am a prospector, i am a drug addict.
i am a writer, a photojournalist, a traveling salesman, i am a spy.
i am a pastor, an evangelist, a missionary, i am a people smuggler.
i am fulfilling a vow, on a pilgrimage, a vision quest, i am wasting my life.
i am walking for world peace, in a well paying government program, a role model, i am a drug runner.
i am here to learn, to free political prisoners, to break a world record,to moonshine.
i am looking for the meaning of life. i am crazy and my favorite: i am a little old man.

i have become all things to all people. the only thing is that im not really any of these things. how do i explain to a people so intent on finding an answer that where i am from it is no longer believed that their question is a meaningful one? its hard enough convincing the very people who no longer believe. an existentialist in new mexico asked me why and then recovered by explaining that it was a trick question. an antirealist in texas asked me why and then listlessly threw “whatever floats your boat” to me. a naturalist in california would ask innocently enough not realizing that again the answer is zero, or at least mathematical.

“Lightning and thunder require time; the light of the stars requires time; deeds, though done, still require time to be seen and heard;"¹ i spend a lot of time waching the land pass; changing from mountains to desert to plains to jungle, thinking about what that would look like. i spend a lot of my time sitting in the dust while whothey grazes thinking about what that would sound like. you might think that after three years of having to try and explain something thousands of times and listening to it explained for me that i might have some good answers but im afraid all i have are some scattered thoughts which it is my hope to try and communicate here.


1. friedrich nietzsche, thus spake zarathustra, trans. thomas common, (london, allen & unwin, 1932), p. 205.