Tucson...

I seem to dance around the perimeters without alighting on the core .. perhaps because the outerlying sprawl seems a direct provocation. But Tucson is deserving of its own consideration. To begin with, it is perhaps a lazy excuse for a city, but a city (and an old one) none the less. Perhaps 5,000 years old, all told. There is much that charms about the town, but I am often confused as to why. I can reel off the list of Tucson's impressive features .. the San Xavier mission with its hand-painted frescoes, the extraordinary Deer Dancer, the Spanish Presidio, the mosaic-covered onion dome on city hall, the downtown adobe restorations, Gate's Pass at sunset, the Catalinas, the Rincons, the Tucson Mountains and the Santa Ritas.

Why do I feel an inexplicable happiness when driving down streets with tatty little businesses and hand-painted signs all burnished by a late-day sun? I love too the simplest adobes with their walled gardens and backyard guesthouse. They appear quite humble (the early anglo arrivals described them as primitive mud houses) .. but they are human scaled, the rooms cool on hot days, the light pouring through an overhanging tree into a not huge window somehow enchanting. And really it does seem silly to wax on about a perfect bean burro .. a certain unctuous texture, an impossibly subtle (read unremarkable) flavor .. or a perfect chile relleno.

There are other distinguishing (or perhaps un-distinguishing) features. One fastens on the moment's pause that proceeds each thought before it is spoken and a certain propriety that is attached to weighing all sides. One might say it is a gentley polemicized town (if many acknowledge the divide that exists between East and West .. or even North and South hemispheres). Still it feels more integrated than its northern counterpart. There is also a certain disconcerting fatalism, as the urban arena expands with little imagination. One is not surprised to learn that the University -- in the wake of Tucson's exponential growth -- has seen fit to close its urban planning department. The concept of urban planning would of course betoken faith in humans creating effective all-encompassing systems .. and Tucson is somehow still a frontier town where in the end the huckster will take all.

Of bookstores...

Back from travels along two seaboards .. Lake Michigan and Cape Cod. Funny how that dense mid-summer green one finds elsewhere now seems obscene, especially given the drought that has felled well over 60 percent of our oak trees. And we lived until recently in an oakland. Luckily the monsoons have started in earnest.

Back east I was however grateful to once again wander in real bookstores, where the offerings on display have been suggested by a staff of serious readers. Standing at the polar end of the spectrum is the Barnes & Noble in Marana, a 20,000-square foot stadium in which only one team is allowed onto the field and the star running back is Lisa Anne Coulter. Frankly, with no opponents in sight, does it matter how wide she is of the mark?

Marana is a densely populated de-centered city located on the fringe of Tucson. There are no true public spaces in Marana, just squeaky clean and capacious churches and super-malls that spring up on the edges of major roadways, interspersed between undulating hills dotted with planned community after planned community. The result is that all public announcements -- for yard sales and elections and blood drives and the like -- congregate like outcasts in the no man's lands of meridiens and intersections.

Shuttle Bus (part III) or Madam get your knife...

On a typical Tuesday morning as I approached the Phoenix-bound shuttle, which had stopped to pick up passengers at the Ina Road Circle-K (a roadside convenience store and gas station), I noticed one of the seated passengers disembark to head into the ladies' room. This was odd given that she had arrived from another pick-up point a mere 15 minutes away. I took the only seat remaining, directly behind the missing passenger, and we all awaited her return before taking off for Sky Harbor Airport.

When she re-entered the van, I noticed that she was quite tall and dressed in a conservative mien .. she wore a high-buttoned striped blouse, a pleated skirt falling below the knees and practical pumps, as well as paste pearl earrings. Her face, which was pale and somewhat pocked, was covered in a thick layer of pancake.

The moment we pulled away from the Circle-K, she began figeting in her seat, twisting her entire torso to face away from the other passengers. At times she would press her face up to the plate glass window, staring at the passing fields and occasional cows with disturbed fascination. But she never held a position for very long. I realized -- she was a changeling, perhaps someone who had recently transformed herself from a man into a woman and was as yet uncomfortable in her skin. Perhaps this was her first adventure as her new person.

After 10 minutes or so, she retrieved an old-fashioned cassette player from her large straw handbag, as well as a small microphone attached by a cord. She pressed a button and in a scratchy and deep monotone proceeded to intone into the microphone: "It is 10.32 and I have boarded a bus headed for Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix." She then rewound the tape and played back her recitation, loudly enough for all to hear. A few minutes passed and she again held up the microphone. This time her voice emerged a few notes higher: "It is 10.38 and I have boarded the Arizona Shuttle Van Service to Sky Harbor Airport. We are now driving northbound on I-10". Again she rewound the tape and played the new recording out loud. The voices around us dimmed and then picked up again as the other passengers made efforts to ignore the proceedings.Another few minutes passed and she she began her recital again: "It is now 10.43 a.m. and I am seated on the Shuttle Bus headed towards Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix along Interstate 10." This time her voice, a full octave higher, cackled as if choked. Not daunted, she again replayed the tape.

And so the trip proceeded with these strange periodic interruptions. And although she chose to share her new intonations, she at no time would make eye contact with any of the surrounding passengers. Her agitation likewise did not cease, as in between the recordings she would reach into her handbag retrieving such items as a makeup compact, package of tissues, address book and hold them to the light in the window as if beholding their like for the very first time.

I began to feel nervous, regretting my choice of seat. I had a sudden image of her paranoia flaring up to excessive proportions and her suddenly feeling required to grab a knife and stab something -- and for a moment and with no provocation I imagined that something would be me.

As it turns out, I wasn't too far off the mark, for as we reached the perimeters of Phoenix and espied our first butte, she did in fact pull out a switchblade with an 8 or 9 inch blade, which she used to go through the elaborate motions of slicing open a bag of potato chips. I looked in panic at the fellow seated next to me, who shruggged his shoulders and merely laughed. Having lived in NYC for 20 years, I did not take the matter lightly. I tried to remember Arizona's laws regarding the carrying of weapons -- for example, at one time it was okay if it was visible (as a gun in a holster) but that had recently been changed. Could I in fact protest her display of the knife? And if I did wouldn't she then be truly tempted to strike out and use it?

I tried to imagine her motivations. Her visible upset throughout the trip did not indicate a stable or happy frame of mind. I thought to myself -- on some level she sees us all as enemies, as people who despise her or might threaten her in some way. In my mind, I could somehow hear her say (in that same high claustrophobic voice last used) "But a girl must have protection in this world."

When the shuttle finally pulled up to the airport curb, I quickly disembarked.