Va Va Voom

I have just returned from my first trip to the lovely State of Arizona. I went to visit my sister, and she was kind enough to take me on a very nice day trip to Sedona.

Sedona was beautiful--a Warner Brother's road runner cartoon come to life. I loved the tumbleweeds and the red plateaus and the rust colored dirt. We had lunch at the Barking Frog, where I inhaled a mountain of guacamole, and then we were off to our first vortex.

I'd never been to a vortex before. Luckily we picked up a flyer at the local information center that filled me in on what they are all about: "Vortexes are swirling centers of subtle energy coming out from the surface of the earth . . . the subtle energy resonates with and strengthens the Inner Being of each person that comes within about a quarter mile to a half mile of it."

I love this kind of thing. Vortexes. Inner Being. Yoga. Feng Shui. Hot Stone Massages. Raking Sand. I love all of it. I was very excited to experience the vortex energy for myself.

Our first vortex was "Airport Vortex" and, according to the flyer, it strengthens your Masculine Side and gives you strength.

The vortex was basically a huge rock, and the wind interacted with the rock in a way that made it swirl. You can tell where the energy is strongest because there are Juniper trees whose trunks have been all twisted from years of responding to the wind. We climbed to the top and sat in the lotus pose to drink it all in. The view was breathtaking. The energy is hard to explain, except to say that you felt a lot of wind, but the wind didn't blow past you and leave you behind, but it swirled around you and enveloped you. It made you feel as though you had plenty of oxygen and you could breathe deeper than you ever had.

After sitting there for 20 minutes, our masculine sides were definitely stonger, and so we left to do a little shopping.

We went into a little shopping area called Tlaquepaque and wandered into an art gallery called the Navarro Gallery. And who should be hanging out sculpting a clay bison but Chris Navarro himself. The gallery wasn't very big, so it was basically me, my sister, and Mr. Navarro in his cowboy hat. We admired his work for a bit, but I felt rude leaving without complimenting him. I told him I thought that he was a wonderful artist, and before we knew it we were all flipping through his coffee table book together and he was telling us about the life-sized bronze Columbia Mammoth he was working on for someplace in Wyoming. He told us how he got started and the stories behind several of his pieces. I really could have talked to him for much longer because he was very interesting, but we had more vortexes to visit.

I must say, after a masculine vortex and a fun and unexpected interaction with a bull-riding, cowboy artist, the masculine energy was practically beaming out of me.

Which probably explains what happened with the breasts . . .

After a few gift shops, we ended up at another, larger art gallery. This gallery was packed with fabulous paintings and sculptures and I found myself wishing I had a lot of money so that I could adopt several of the pieces and take them home with me. Many of the sculptures celebrated the human form--dancers, mothers holding their babies, couples fused in an embrace--and all sorts of wonderful shapes created from stone and metal and clay.

And there, sitting on a pedastal, was a piece entitled "Va Va Voom." The sculpture was the shape of two ample breasts, formed from polished stone, forever manifesting their simplicity and glory.

I can only imagine what the artist thought to himself (for he was surely a man) when he was creating them: "The stone is telling me what it wants to be; I have no control; this is the shape that the stone wants to take . . . "

And standing there, filled to the brim with masculine energy, I couldn't resist either . . .

"You know," I said, "This piece, it just makes you want to . . . "

"Stop that!!" my sister hissed as she looked around the store to see if anyone was watching.

"What?" I said, my two cupped hands hovering over the sculpture, "I'm just responding to the art."

I didn't actually touch it, because galleries are for looking and not touching. Ah yes, I thought to myself, this must be how men feel.

When I was finished embarassing my sister, we moved on. We looked at more art and then headed to Bell Mountain--a very powerful vortex that strengthens all three parts: the masculine side, the feminine side, and the balance. (Thank heavens for that very enlightening flyer.)

We climbed up to a ledge where we had a lovely view of the valley, and we watched the sun set as the energy swirled around us and through us. It is probably a good thing that I reinforced my feminine side on Bell Mountain before I ended up doing something crazy like going home and watching sports.

Instead, we bought fancy glitter cupcakes and ate them while we watched a Jane Austen movie.

As you can tell, I had a great time in Arizona. Thanks to my sister for being a great hostess. I'll be back again. And next time I intend to chase down a road runner.