By Abe Villarreal

Sometimes I get the feeling a lot of people think the Southwest is nothing but a dry desert. Everything a different shade of brown, cracks on the floor, and tumbleweeds rolling back and forth across long empty highways.

To me, that is beautiful. Sure, a summer afternoon at 3:00 p.m. can be too much, too hot. Still, it's beautiful.

When you look up in the sky, it's all blue. A kind of blue that's hard to describe in one word. The clouds are there, but they are too far away to provide shade. The trees are green this time of year. The grass is green ,too. It's not always this way. Those things are beautiful too.

If you live in certain parts of Arizona, Nevada, or New Mexico, you know that the newspaper will say something about record-breaking heat. A kind of heat that feels like just the reporter says it will feel. Like it will break something.

And yet, the lizards are out doing their pushups. The occasional snake you see is slithering on the side of trails during your evening walks. The cacti have flowers. Your dog knows it's too hot too, but he can't miss his daily walk. All that makes living in these parts beautiful.

There are more colors in the desert than in the concrete jungles of the urban northeast. More than different hues of grays and rust. During the day, there are blues up above, until the sunsets when there are purples, oranges, and reds. The weeds are not just a weak kind of green. They come in all shapes and adornments. Flowers that make them feel like works of art. The bees like them too.

The people here are just as colorful. Families that descend from pioneers. Homesteaders who have been here for generations. Newcomers that make their way here every summer. They are escaping something and this is the place they choose to be. The Southwest is an escape for all of us. Permanent and temporary.

Teachers and farmers. Those work-to-the-bone folks that open cafes and small general stores. They all make the Southwest what people think it isn't. Full of life. An adventure. Ordinary and at the same time not-so-ordinary.

That's what I like most about living here, especially during the summer. Every day there is something for which to have hope. A hope for rain. A hope for a cool breeze in the shade. A hope that your plants survived the late freeze and will be in full bloom. A hope for days that are a little longer than the day before. At 7:00 p.m., when the sun is almost gone and the horizon is telling you something magical, you want the day to be a little longer.

When I go away for a week or two to the East coast, I take it all in. The buildings, the diversity of people, the food, the fullness of it all. And then after a week or two I can't wait to be back. To return to summer in the Southwest.

To the vast openness. What seems empty to others, is rich and fulfilling to us. To the space between the place you start and the place you end up. There's always something there, something to pull over and admire. Something new that catches your eye on a road you've taken hundreds of times.

In the Southwest, things don't change much. We honor where we came from because what we see all around reminds us of it. It's a kind of place like no other.

Happy Summer.

Abe Villarreal writes about the traditions, people, and culture of America. He can be reached at abevillarreal@hotmail.com.