my weakness.

9 December. Listening now to Message From Io on headphones in cozy room perched precariously on the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. It had been a rough start this trip with seemingly lots of little things going wrong. The weather was beautiful in Phoenix but for reasons I cannot entirely figure out I just do not like that city. At all. I think it is the perceived generally apathetic attitude that permeates the city's pores. But one highlight was I found a friend for Stanley at a kitsch-Mexican store in old town Scottsdale. I cannot wait to surprise Julian with him tomorrow. Crazy to think I will be home tomorrow at this very time (probably just landing). So thankfully had the foresight to plan an extra day this time for myself after the conference to head up north to the Grand Canyon as I have never seen it. I finished up my last presentation (an RGB color correction lab) and ran up to my room to stuff everything back into my bags and check out. One last check of the weather confirmed it is supposed to be sunny here tomorrow. A quick farewell to a few remaining folks I knew. Then off north out and away from Phoenix and the smog and attitudes I-17 leading the way to Flagstaff two hours away. Past the red rocks of Sedona visible to the west flaming orange in the light of the setting sun, then beckoned onward by the alpenglow on Humphreys Peak. East on I-40 for a bit in the dark after a quick bite in Flagstaff, then north at Williams across what I could only surmise was flat, barren desert as twilight gave into night along US64 towards the town of Tusayan and the South Rim. I was in the middle of nowhere and finally beginning to relax and be myself again. I got to the park to find the entrance unmanned and open, a simple sign telling me to enjoy my visit and I slowed to a crawl feeling my way in the dark to the place I had reserved – a small, charming lodge called Bright Angel Lodge perched on the South Rim. In time I found it (with only one wrong turn) clustered among the other small lodges built by the Park Service. After staying in snobby resorts with their snobby desk clerks shirts buttoned to their collars fake and condescending bus boys and bell hops plastic I cannot quite convey how perfect it was to walk into the little lobby of this rustic lodge built out of materials found in the area and setting the precedence for all national park structures to follow a wood fire burning in the fireplace off in the corner me bundled up in down to ward off the cold (along with being sunny tomorrow the overnight low is forecast at seventeen degrees!) a nice woman smiling in fleece and khakis from behind the counter 'how may I help you?' We settled my reservation and she proceeded to tell a guy finally shedding the snobbery of ritzy resorts and settling into the fact this was the Grand Canyon although I had not yet seen it and this was me where to go come sunrise then I was off to my little room. I found it with ease and opened the door and was greeted by the most perfect accommodations I have ever had the pleasure of inhabiting. After such lavish but sterile surroundings for the last four days, the details made me smile – there off in the opposite corner this perfect little pedestal sink and mirror with soaps and lotions and a small towel tucked in the wall above, a small dresser and bed with tables and lamps on either side, the wood trusses running across the ceilings an antique lantern hanging from one, the door latches and mouldings. I melted into the place immediately with a sigh and set down my bag after turning on a small light in the far corner. This was perfect. I nudged the heat up a bit to ward off the chilly night. But somewhere out there was this enormous void I had not yet seen but must. And so I donned a sweater, put back on my down, grabbed my iPod and shut the door behind me to step out into the night. Not more than twenty feet outside my door I found myself staring into an abyss I could not even imagine as my eyes adjusted to the night. It was cold which was incredible. I could not believe it. I put on my new gloves and started east along the Rim Trail which follows the South Rim for thirteen miles. My shoes crunched atop hardened snow and slipped occasionally on black ice. But there it was. In all its grandeur hidden under the cloak of night. As soon as I got away from the lights of the lodges I stopped and let my eyes really adjust to the night. The moon was nearly full and cast shadows of the trees and the canyon and throwing mine behind me. It was incredible in such a way I cannot really describe. Feebly at best I am trying but standing there against the moon staring into ridges and ridges across ten miles of canyon so enormous as to defy gravity knowing I cannot. I walked and walked along the rim just staring out not watching where I was going hands in pockets Moby on my iPod. I could not believe I was here under moonlight walking along the rim of the Grand Canyon. In the dark I could see the curvature of the earth. Why am I so strange? Why do I find it so easy to smile alone? To laugh and cry surrounded by such immenseness. Under Orions to the east and Cassiopeas above even the Pleiades winking down on me. After a couple of miles I stopped just short of a rise in the bend ahead and wandered out to a point the lights of the lodges now hidden behind layers of the canyon rim so not a sign of life anywhere the moon showing me the way to the edge the dropoff intense. I laid down on a rock at the edge of that void staring up at the sky my feet hanging over an incredible drop and after some time sat back up laughing crazy tears streaming down my face Moby's Look Back In on repeat freezing cold yelling to the emptiness surrounding me this is the fucking Grand Canyon! laughing harder uncontrollable my breath frozen in the air miles of nothingness I could not have been more happy even the moon approving of my declaration. I got up at last and kept going toward Yavapai Point. I could not make them out under the moonlight but from a map I had glanced at back in my room before heading out I knew they were out there watching over me – Zoroaster Temple, Brahma Temple, Shiva Temple, Tower of Ra, Angels Gate. I had discovered earlier the canyon features bear names of worldly gods and heros because a geologist in the late nineteenth century named Clarence Dutton while writing the first important book on the geology of the canyon was overwhelmed and found similarities between the buttes in the canyon and the temples of India and China and so began naming the features after eastern gods. Rama Shrine. Krishna Shrine. Vishnu Temple. Tower of Set and Cheops Pyramid. Osiris Temple. And then to the the east there is Juno Temple, Jupiter and Venus Temples and the Colorado bends north. Moby's Chord Sounds had long replaced My Weakness and Look Back In as I found myself on this point surrounded on three sides by an enormous drop sheer and complete to the inner canyon it seemed in the dark nothingness just the night. Yes, this beauty was crazy beyond words. Everett Ruess could not even describe it except to say and only once ~

"Nothing anywhere can rival the Grand Canyon."

That was all he could muster so I too will not try. But standing on that precipice the sides falling away all around me into the depths of one of the wonders of our Earth lit only by the moon had me shaken. I trembled slightly then found the strength or sense of will to finally gather myself and started on my way back to a small, cozy room heater nudged up a warm bed right on the edge of it all.

10 December. Woke up at six o'clock still dark. An hour and a half until sunrise. Crashed back into the bed for another half an hour before rousing myself with excitement for the coming dawn. Cozy warm in my room and after quickly getting ready peaked through the curtains to find a dim light outside me snow on the ground pale as only bitter cold winter mornings can be and I shouldered my bag loaded up with camera gear and ventured out into the frigid predawn morning. I could not decide whether or not to go east or west. Ultimately since I knew I would be shooting west away from the sun and the walk around and east-facing bend in the canyon on towards Hopi Point looked like it would take me longer than I had until the sun would be up and the light changing quickly. So I headed back towards Yavapai Point the soft glow of light before sunrise incredible. Muted pastels of rosy pink fading to pale blue sky above the North Rim of the canyon. I moved quickly but constantly watching the light until it happened – the first glance of the sun along the top of the North Rim. It is always a treasure to witness the sunrise and simply unbelievable in the spot I found myself this morning. A smile again came across my face. I kept moving though and after maybe a mile and a half I found a perfect spot just before Yavapai deserted rocks protruding to a fine-pointed edge affording me a fabulous viewpoint and composition in which to set up the Hasselblad. I did quickly. Metered. Filter in place this time a yellow Wratten gel #8. After exhausting a roll there, I moved on to the true point and the outlook there where I went through the remaining rolls I had brought mostly of the same composition but different as the light and shadows moved and changed with the rising of the sun. It was cold. Despite gloves my fingers were nearly frozen (which proved difficult for changing rolls of film!). There were only a few people wandering about maybe kept away by the lure of a warm breakfast had near fireplaces back at the lodges. I preferred the cold. And solitude thankful for it. Once the light had exhausted the possibilities for film I repacked my bag and headed back towards the lodge and a quick respite from the cold to thaw out fingers and write a bit. It was incredibly clear and I could easily see Mt. Trundell sixty miles to the west. Walking back I could not help but think last night under the light of the moon and gentle watch of Orion was my moment of weakness. To not be able to really see and having to imagine the whole power of this place made it more gripping. It made me think back to a trip with Jeff a few years ago where we were driving through southeastern Utah knowing we wanted to be in a good spot close to Monument Valley for the coming day and Jeff finally fessing up he had forgotten the tent. It was early October and the temperatures on the Colorado Plateau were quite pleasant and the weather clear. So in the dark we stopped along some highway nameless to us could have been anything in the middle of absolutely nothingness. I stabbed at a state park off in the distance on our map even more in the middle of nothingness called Goosenecks of the San Juan. We drove a couple more hours in pitch dark two lane highways cutting across perfectly flat plateaus the dark stretching out all around us in every direction. After a turnoff and bouncing over a long dirt road we came to the end. Apparently this was it. In the middle of Utah desert night we could just make out a shelter and picnic table. We could tell it was perfectly flat all around us. The stars touched the horizons. Tossing our sleeping bags on the dusty earth we climbed in and stared up at a perfect desert autumn night clear overflowing with stars more than I had ever witnessed. We woke with the light and I roused myself out of my warm bag to walk around and get a bearing on our situation that we had not been afforded in the dark of the precious night. Not more than a hundred feet from where we slept I came across the edge of an enormous canyon. The Goosenecks of the San Juan River as it gouged its way into the plateau on its way to the Colorado River. I grabbed for my twin-lens two-and-a-quarter ancient camera lens tack sharp to photograph the scene spread out before me. The desert is insatiable. My memories of it as clear as that night (one day I will have to try to sum up a day of incredible light in Arches National Park but not now). My thoughts returning to the present I huddled against the cold as the sun rose ever higher and casting a layer of increasing warmth over the landscape. After packing up my stuff again and checking out (this little lodge even had free wi-fi so I was able to check in to my flight that evening) I tried waiting for a shuttle bus that never came so trudged back to my car to head west to Hopi and Mohave Points. I wanted to have been able to stumble upon them like I did Yavapai in the dark but was running out of time for this first visit to this place and so it would have to do just scouting them out for my return when I will spend more than one night and half a day and I will venture down into the canyon from one of any number of trails that descend quickly from the rim going back to Moby's The Sun Never Stops Setting which more or less ended up defining this journey through Arizona deserts warm and higher deserts cold snow-covered and desolate. I will retrace my steps. The last leg. Now thirty-seven thousand feet over somewhere between there and home. I want to develop the films. Perhaps if merited even venture back into darkrooms watching an image develop under safe lights smells of chemistries in the air. I want to return. An old Hasselblad fixed with an eighty-millimeter Carl Zeiss lens and some Wratten filters. A light meter. I now know the sense of being crushed by immenseness and I want to feel that from below the bottom passing through stands of cottonwood and oak groves down to the Colorado unable to contain myself again feeling the reality of our fragility lost among the enormous world crazy beautiful surrounding us shouting from the canyon floors waiting for the resounding echoes crashing off desert walls without hesitation this is the Grand Canyon!