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if you drove from my house south down redwood road and then took a right at the goshen intersection and drove west for about 10 minutes you'd end up in this charming little town called eureka. for a brief time everyone who worked at the gas station there knew me by name. it's sort of a weird little half-dead ghost town. it has an operational high school and facilities and a few shops and houses (some for sale!) but the main street thoroughfare is just empty storefronts that haven't had anyone operating out of them since before world war 2. it's a nice little nowhere town right on the border between where utah is sort of shrubbish and where it gets to be flat out desert.

goshen is a tiny tiny tiny tiny tiny little settlement with less than 1,000 people that occupies less than a square mile of land. the only real notable things about it are an abandoned sinclair gas station that serves as a popular spot for high school photoraphers and an abandoned mine (called the tintic mine) that a lot of graffiti muralists and urban explorers like climbing around in. you have to pass through it in order to get to eureka, but it's a fun little town. if you turn left at the goshen intersection going eastbound there's a five guys the next city over.

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"the grand army of the republic highway"-- to the rest of the united states it's known as the loneliest highway in america on account of the fact that the stretch between utah and nevada is so desolate that it's very easy to get stranded in the middle of it if you don't fill up on gas before the stretch starts. it's hundreds of miles between any sign of civilization on highway 6 and i think it might be my favorite road in the country. to people that live in utah it's generally regarded as a death trap on account of the fact that it's a two-lane highway that has nothing going on anywhere around you so it's easy to get distracted or zone out while you're driving. it's more scenic than that though-- it's one of the largest trans-continental highways, taking you from provincetown, massachussets to long beach, california. the utah-nevada stretch has so much beautiful geography to it. mountains, cliffs, mesas, and a vast open absolute desolate nothingness. a beautiful, simple, uncaring and uncompromising nothingness- one you can't really find anywhere else in america. it's a spiritual experience to make the full gauntlet from one sign of civilization to the other. a rite of passage, even. it builds trust in your ability to drive, your car, your preparedness, and the land around you. it's gorgeous and i love it and i miss it.

in the middle of fish lake national park in central utah there's a single aspen tree that occupies the size and space of a full forest. it's one of the world's oldest living organisms, and it simply is the world's heaviest and largest living organism. i've stood in the middle of it only once and it's a profoundly awakening experience. being in the middle of something so connected and so alive and so absolutely massive can and will change your life.

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