Palm Canyon Drive

My friends that I came to Palm Springs with left in the early afternoon for their festivities at Coachella. I was stuck in our suite with nothing on my plate, nothing to do, nobody to see, no agenda. I also was recovering from a massive hangover being that I really took to celebrating the night before. The drive from Seattle took around 25 hours or so, and I felt I needed to let myself go since sitting in a seat for that long is actually quite difficult.

I finally took my shower, and clothed myself around 4 in the late afternoon. I didn’t know what I was to go do, or go see. I ended up finding the main strip in Palm Springs, which is called Palm Canyon Drive and I went from one end of it to the other. I found myself innately walking slow in order to take in my surroundings.

It’s a beautiful little town. I myself am a lover of the past, or at least the thought and images of the past. Specifically the 50s and 60s. Not the hippie 60s but the “mod” sixties, the Mad Men sixties and the cool portrayal of them in movies. I’m not saying Palm Springs is exactly like that, but it definitely has a “retro” or a “vintage” feel to it. I instantly felt about half way down the main strip that I was in a timeless place, a place that hasn’t really changed and that if you left it 10 years ago, and came back today you would feel like you were living twice.

I find that there is an authenticity in that, a consistency in that, and a not hidden but obvious beauty in it.

As I was walking down the side walk there was a good amount of bars/restaurants and stores, much of them were either “desert clothing”, “antiques”, but what stuck out to me the most was the abundance of art galleries. It seemed like for every other block there was a few.

I only walked into one of them. It was an outdoor gallery but had a large tent over it. The place was completely empty and there was loud music playing. The pieces were massive and were stretched from end to end in paint and canvas. Most of the pieces were abstract, but had a beautiful display of colors in an array of different geometrical lines and shapes. I walked around the entire gallery until one particular piece struck me.

I probably stood in front of the damn thing for 10 minutes just staring into it. I don’t know exactly what it was about the piece that made me so intrigued, maybe it was because it was relatable, something I wanted and want, maybe because it brought me some form of harmony or perhaps my mind was running at a natural high so everything felt and appeared beautiful. And once I completely soaked my eyes into the image the music disappeared

I’ll do my best in describing the piece. It had these large street lights, benches on either side and green fields, yellow and brown leaves falling around, it was probably set in the fall in a place that has a fall, and then there was what looked like a gravel path going down the middle, and it seemed as if the objects like the benches and street lights got smaller and smaller, to create depth and a objectiveness, a skill I’ll never be able to wrap my head around.

However what made the piece really pull me in was that there was a woman in the middle; she was off in the distance out of reach. I want to say she was running, running with the wind and the falling leaves. It made me want to reach out and run with her, to dance in all the real colors, with the perfect leaves and balanced street lights, I longed for that image and I couldn’t and still can’t get it out of my mind.

Maybe when a painting or an image represents something that we all want, something we long for whether it be a thing, object, idea, or person there is a beauty in that, there is a brilliance in that something that can’t be written down effectively, no combination of 10 dollar words, or insightful pros can honestly show that conviction, and that kind of truth. I think only the person can imagine that, and eventually dream it.

The painting was beautiful and at first it made me almost sad because it was so perfect, and the image of my adaptation in my mind made me want to not just dream it but experience it, and live it. Maybe I will, or perhaps I already have and can’t remember.

I walked out of the gallery into the sun and back down the streets of the timeless city, not dated, but aged. A kind of age that has no limit and no sense of time. It makes it’s own moments in relation to itself.   

As I looked down Palm Canyon Drive everything really did seem far away, but not out of reach.