Joshua Tree National Park is one of my favorite places. By now many of its nooks and crannies are comforting and familiar to me. The towering piles of stone, the clean yet erratic lines of the Joshua trees, the sparse foliage of the creosote, the arid smell of juniper and the slick limbs of manzanita … all of these hold a dear place in my heart. The desert is sharp and clean in scent and look. It draws me in. I even spare a kindly thought towards the yucca, as long as its mighty, menacing, pointy leaves don’t skewer me. I have “kabob candidate” stamped on my forehead as far as yuccas are concerned.

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