I'm taking a writing course...micro-stories with a high visual component. The heat we're currently suffering reminded me of my trips to the high California desert. These are some of the images from those trips. Of course, in California, it's a dry heat. That, of course, is B.S.

The story was a timed, ten minute writing exercise.

It’d been a long day with oppressive heat, air so dry my skin was parched and my nose hurt from spikes of dried mucous. And the wind, oh my God, the wind never stopped. Howling, whistling, crackling seeming to intensify the hot, dry air. I only had a short distance to run to the barn and I could almost feel the cool and dark of that strong building. I squinted my eyes to keep the fine dust out and started down the road. The wind seemed to calm a little and I looked up, softened my squint, and slowed my pace. Where the fence met the street a small whirlwind, a dust devil, was just beginning its mad rotation. The calm abruptly ended and the 6’ high dust devil began to grow and to move.

Doubling in height in just seconds, the small twister seemed to leap over the machinery and charged directly at me with bull-like intent. The wind and sand on my face was the constant slap of a porcupine and my vision began to narrow.

The noise was horrific, like standing next to a train or a jet engine. The little dust devil was now over thirty feet tall, roaring like a freight train, and almost black. And then, it wasn’t.

It was gone.

Sunrise Over Apple ValleyApple Valley sunrise looking over the Mojave River Apple Valley SunriseSun peeking over mountains east of Apple Valley Mojave Desert Joshua GroveGrove of trees outside of Hesperia, CA