"In loving memory of all the addicts just like me.
As drug addicts, we all knew the risks going in.
I'm sorry to say that some addicts just want their lives to end.
This is a harsh truth that no friend, parent or child should ever have to face
Unfortunately for so many of us, death will so often be the case
Especially for those of us who's families turned us away
Making it even harder for us to find any reason to stay.
If only there had been one family member brave enough to keep giving us love
It might just have sewed [us?] from going to that mansion up above
But we were only ever junkies that they didn't think deserved to live .
No one cared. how much love we were still able to give.
Only now no one will ever see how beautiful we truly were
Don't you think its time to see that love is the only cure
Why must any of us have to to die all alone in [pain?].
Just trying to numb out all this loneliness and pain.
If only one of you had reached out to show us that you cared
Maybe we wouldn't have left here so broken and scared"
– found in Slab City, author unknown
---
Slab City really is in the middle of nowhere. According to Dr. Spencer, it reaches 118 degrees most summers, and there are always a few people who don't survive because they just weren't prepared.
Dr. Spencer, on the other hand, is very prepared. His Church of Enlightenment includes an extensive garden with all kinds of vegetables and herbs, from which he makes a salad every night. He has three ponds and a hot tub. He has enough solar panels and batteries to keep power for two refrigerators and three freezers overnight and into the next day if necessary. He also has a tower, which relatively few want to climb (come on, where's your adventurous spirit!), and enough birdfeeders and birdhouses to qualify this as an official bird sanctuary (or so he says).
Between that and the fact that he claims to be an ordained minister of his "church of enlightenment", this place is ironclad protected from the law. As he puts it, if the government ever tries to evict him, he'll throw so much red tape at them in the form of "this is a church" and "this is a bird sanctuary" and "I've been living here openly and uncontested for over five years which gives me squatter's rights" that they'd leave him alone for sure. Considering this is Slab City, though, I don't think he needs to be worried about that.
Another thing he told me was that Camp Dunlap left unexploded ordnance buried somewhere. "We could be standing on top of them right now." And if the military tries to take this land back he'll throw that at them, too.
No, he certainly doesn't need to worry about being evicted. He's 75 years old. He needs to worry about being left behind. That's why I feel kind of bad about going, and that's why I feel I have to. As much as I hate staying anywhere as long as I've stayed here (four weeks now), I hate it even more when I feel someone's pressuring me to do it.
---
I walked into this place with a backpack and a tent slung over my shoulder, and a bag from Walmart with a "baker's dozen" donuts intended to share with whoever I met out here first -- and maybe a peace offering. It's the Slabs, right? My impression was that it's still the wild west.
And I wasn't exactly wrong, but then I walked past the Church of Enlightenment and Doc Spencer said "good morning!" and gave me a tour of his camp, and I said I'd be happy to help him out with a few of the things he'd mentioned he was doing, and he offered me a trailer with a toilet and electricity from his solar panels, and free meals. I didn't even hesitate to accept.
It's been kind of an unofficial WWOOF situation. I help him out in the mornings and we take the afternoons off to beat the heat. In the evenings, we have dinner, and then it's off to bed. It's a peaceful life, but I am not a peaceful guy. I get restless; I wouldn't have hitchhiked into the middle of the Sonoran desert if I wasn't restless. But at the same time, I'm only staying until my cousin gets out here, and Doc's giving me food and water, so you won't hear me complaining.
---
Despite not doing much exploring, I felt like I should hit the more famous spots at least, so here's your tourist brochure:
Salvation Mountain is a pile of rock soaked in paint and beaten flat by sunlight so intense it makes the colors look washed-out.
East Jesus is a collection of hard-edged metal sculpture sunk into the sand. Half of it is cars encrusted with decorations that make them look like shipwrecks covered in barnacles, and the other half is a hundred televisions with words that cut into your eyes, they're written with such passion.
The library is a small collection of dusty, cobwebbed paperbacks that nobody wanted. So many Robert Ludlums. So many Dean Koontz. I asked the attendant how it works, and they told me to bring the books back if I could, but they don't really care either, and won't do anything about it if I just take them. With no library cards and no due dates, I suppose that's the only way it could work.
The Range is a stage that looks like a cardboard dollhouse. When I walked up, it was under a full moon, and in the flat desert landscape, for a moment I thought I was on a movie set. It just looked fake, or too perfect somehow. Not that many people were there. Some guy in a brown vest and shorts that made him look comically thin beneath a huge panda mask was dancing. A guy on stage was playing guitar and singing about government oppression. A tiny bar was serving drinks. Lots of dogs moseying around. There are dogs all over the slabs. Almost as many dogs as people.
---
This has been a good adventure. So many things in my life were reborn. Before I got here I had some kind of spiritual awakening that I really can't explain, but it left me at peace. I feel like I can be a good man now, and have a good future. During my time here, I've rekindled my pursuit of physical fitness, my resolve to replenish my bank account, and my love of all living things. And I discovered that I'll probably be a drifter for the rest of my life.
I've seen a lot of drifters tell their tales, and they always say something along the lines of not being able to stop. They say the road calls them back, no matter how many times they try to settle down. I've tried to deny this in my own life for a long time, because that's crazy, right? I'm a sane person. I'm a productive member of society. I'm a ... well, I was a lot of "normal" things. I used to be. But I'm not anymore.
I've always known I wanted to travel, and I've always known I never really had a home. My family was military and we moved all the time. I got used to it. I never really feel "at home" because I never am home, unless I'm on the road. There are so many places I want to see. I think it could well take a lifetime, and that sounds just fine to me.
Whenever my cousin gets here to hang out with me and her friend, I won't be coming back. I'll try heading northeast from there. The rainbow gathering in Colorado sounds good, and I've got a friend who just got stationed at Nellis in Las Vegas. I figure it might be worth stopping by there on my way back east to see my brother. This is gonna be a good year. It'll be the first year I've ever truly lived.
As drug addicts, we all knew the risks going in.
I'm sorry to say that some addicts just want their lives to end.
This is a harsh truth that no friend, parent or child should ever have to face
Unfortunately for so many of us, death will so often be the case
Especially for those of us who's families turned us away
Making it even harder for us to find any reason to stay.
If only there had been one family member brave enough to keep giving us love
It might just have sewed [us?] from going to that mansion up above
But we were only ever junkies that they didn't think deserved to live .
No one cared. how much love we were still able to give.
Only now no one will ever see how beautiful we truly were
Don't you think its time to see that love is the only cure
Why must any of us have to to die all alone in [pain?].
Just trying to numb out all this loneliness and pain.
If only one of you had reached out to show us that you cared
Maybe we wouldn't have left here so broken and scared"
– found in Slab City, author unknown
---
Slab City really is in the middle of nowhere. According to Dr. Spencer, it reaches 118 degrees most summers, and there are always a few people who don't survive because they just weren't prepared.
Dr. Spencer, on the other hand, is very prepared. His Church of Enlightenment includes an extensive garden with all kinds of vegetables and herbs, from which he makes a salad every night. He has three ponds and a hot tub. He has enough solar panels and batteries to keep power for two refrigerators and three freezers overnight and into the next day if necessary. He also has a tower, which relatively few want to climb (come on, where's your adventurous spirit!), and enough birdfeeders and birdhouses to qualify this as an official bird sanctuary (or so he says).
Between that and the fact that he claims to be an ordained minister of his "church of enlightenment", this place is ironclad protected from the law. As he puts it, if the government ever tries to evict him, he'll throw so much red tape at them in the form of "this is a church" and "this is a bird sanctuary" and "I've been living here openly and uncontested for over five years which gives me squatter's rights" that they'd leave him alone for sure. Considering this is Slab City, though, I don't think he needs to be worried about that.
Another thing he told me was that Camp Dunlap left unexploded ordnance buried somewhere. "We could be standing on top of them right now." And if the military tries to take this land back he'll throw that at them, too.
No, he certainly doesn't need to worry about being evicted. He's 75 years old. He needs to worry about being left behind. That's why I feel kind of bad about going, and that's why I feel I have to. As much as I hate staying anywhere as long as I've stayed here (four weeks now), I hate it even more when I feel someone's pressuring me to do it.
---
I walked into this place with a backpack and a tent slung over my shoulder, and a bag from Walmart with a "baker's dozen" donuts intended to share with whoever I met out here first -- and maybe a peace offering. It's the Slabs, right? My impression was that it's still the wild west.
And I wasn't exactly wrong, but then I walked past the Church of Enlightenment and Doc Spencer said "good morning!" and gave me a tour of his camp, and I said I'd be happy to help him out with a few of the things he'd mentioned he was doing, and he offered me a trailer with a toilet and electricity from his solar panels, and free meals. I didn't even hesitate to accept.
It's been kind of an unofficial WWOOF situation. I help him out in the mornings and we take the afternoons off to beat the heat. In the evenings, we have dinner, and then it's off to bed. It's a peaceful life, but I am not a peaceful guy. I get restless; I wouldn't have hitchhiked into the middle of the Sonoran desert if I wasn't restless. But at the same time, I'm only staying until my cousin gets out here, and Doc's giving me food and water, so you won't hear me complaining.
---
Despite not doing much exploring, I felt like I should hit the more famous spots at least, so here's your tourist brochure:
Salvation Mountain is a pile of rock soaked in paint and beaten flat by sunlight so intense it makes the colors look washed-out.
East Jesus is a collection of hard-edged metal sculpture sunk into the sand. Half of it is cars encrusted with decorations that make them look like shipwrecks covered in barnacles, and the other half is a hundred televisions with words that cut into your eyes, they're written with such passion.
The library is a small collection of dusty, cobwebbed paperbacks that nobody wanted. So many Robert Ludlums. So many Dean Koontz. I asked the attendant how it works, and they told me to bring the books back if I could, but they don't really care either, and won't do anything about it if I just take them. With no library cards and no due dates, I suppose that's the only way it could work.
The Range is a stage that looks like a cardboard dollhouse. When I walked up, it was under a full moon, and in the flat desert landscape, for a moment I thought I was on a movie set. It just looked fake, or too perfect somehow. Not that many people were there. Some guy in a brown vest and shorts that made him look comically thin beneath a huge panda mask was dancing. A guy on stage was playing guitar and singing about government oppression. A tiny bar was serving drinks. Lots of dogs moseying around. There are dogs all over the slabs. Almost as many dogs as people.
---
This has been a good adventure. So many things in my life were reborn. Before I got here I had some kind of spiritual awakening that I really can't explain, but it left me at peace. I feel like I can be a good man now, and have a good future. During my time here, I've rekindled my pursuit of physical fitness, my resolve to replenish my bank account, and my love of all living things. And I discovered that I'll probably be a drifter for the rest of my life.
I've seen a lot of drifters tell their tales, and they always say something along the lines of not being able to stop. They say the road calls them back, no matter how many times they try to settle down. I've tried to deny this in my own life for a long time, because that's crazy, right? I'm a sane person. I'm a productive member of society. I'm a ... well, I was a lot of "normal" things. I used to be. But I'm not anymore.
I've always known I wanted to travel, and I've always known I never really had a home. My family was military and we moved all the time. I got used to it. I never really feel "at home" because I never am home, unless I'm on the road. There are so many places I want to see. I think it could well take a lifetime, and that sounds just fine to me.
Whenever my cousin gets here to hang out with me and her friend, I won't be coming back. I'll try heading northeast from there. The rainbow gathering in Colorado sounds good, and I've got a friend who just got stationed at Nellis in Las Vegas. I figure it might be worth stopping by there on my way back east to see my brother. This is gonna be a good year. It'll be the first year I've ever truly lived.
