I am still neck deep in West of 98, considering many points of view as to what is the WEST. Larry McMurtry fights the myth of a pastoral West… no William Jackson, John Hiller, or Ansel Adams views. Are we really a nation of tourists? Does that mean we don’t ever really know where we are, that we are more concerned about the take away photograph than actually being somewhere? Jim Barnes suspects that many do know where they are and I am equally as hopeful that many of us do feel cool water in our mouths in contrast to the heat on our skin, that we do notice the intersection of a 3 minute rain storm with a damsel fly trying to get in the window screen, or that after spotting lightning we count seconds to miles before the accompanying boom. Rebecca Solnit has taught me to be realistic and hopeful, to actually see rather than buy the postcard or the disparaging misanthropy.
