Mojave on My Mind

The Mojave Desert begins less than an hour from where I live on the edge of Los Angeles. When the wind blows out of the northeast, pushing back the ocean’s influence, the Mojave arrives in my yard. The garden crackles with fallen leaves, and the humidity plunges into the single digits. You can smell the plants drying in the heat.

I like those days. Because Southern California is as much about the desert as it is the Pacific, and the breezes remind me of the arid lands outside town that connect L.A. to the American outback.

When I arrived in Southern California 30 years ago, the first trip I took was out to the Mojave. Retracing that route now, we drop from State Route 14 into the Antelope Valley. The antelope are long gone and most of the Joshua trees, too, where Pearblossom Highway runs east toward Interstate 15. Conventionally