When I was twenty-four, I ran screaming from a small town, with many spiteful things to say. I was done, overdone, and I was confident in my blame leveled at the town for the problems in my life. With the clarity of hindsight, I think I was more done with my husband’s grad school and the grad school-adjacent life. I wanted out, and I was confident that Phoenix would solve many of my problems.

Nine years later, I still love Phoenix, but let me tell you, last weekend my family and I went three hours south to Bisbee, AZ, a historic mining town of 4,994, and it was heaven. We parked the car at the house and walked all over for two days, then went home. Vacation is only restful for me if it’s a break from driving.

Bisbee is known for ghosts. The hotel bar where friends and I went for a few glasses of wine was a stop on a ghost tour. We’d just sat down when a crowd of 15 came through a side door, led by a woman in early 1900s garb carrying a lantern. She introduced the group to the bartender, explained that he was also the caretaker of the hotel and lived there full time. He made a well-worn joke, “So you can all see me, right?” 

Later in the evening, when my two friends and I were the only ones in the bar, he would jump into our conversation like it wasn’t odd at all. He launched into a tale about how his grandmother used to give him weed gummies when he was too young to be having them, and he didn’t know what they were till he was much older. We laughed and went back to our conversation, not inviting more stories from him, but not annoyed.

As I age, I take things less personally. An interruption that would have pissed me off when I was twenty-four rolls off my back with a bemused look, tucking the story away for later, not inclined to make it more than it is. A person interjecting into our conversation. Not a big deal.

A vacation can be a small dam holding back life, so I can float ahead, see what it’s like without all the clutter of daily responsibilities. Time off clears a space to see how large my grief still is, to see how lucky and grateful I am, to see how much more rest I need than I can get. I visited a city of ghosts to ease me into the week of my ghost — two days after I returned home was the one-year death anniversary of a friend. 

What’s the point of vacations? To see more clearly the crushing weight of surviving in this world? How fun. I’ve chosen many parts of the life I’m living, and still, it’s on vacation that I have a moment of clarity – like a small circle wiped clear on a fogged mirror. Oh. I am so tired. Why must I work so hard? I’ll never “catch up.” Without fail, on vacations, I have the thought, Maybe I’ll just stay here. 

But then, by the last morning, I long for my bed, my kitchen, my full-to-bursting bookshelves. Life may be hellish at times, but I’ll have my comforts about me. Vacation is for metaphor, home is for doing the tiring work that I love.

What makes a small town die, survive, or thrive? A problem I have with the small town vs city discourse is that they are all different. Towns and cities. They must be considered on a case-by-case basis. I know small towns and big cities I wouldn’t inhabit. Bisbee is thriving, and I knew it for sure after stepping into the Copper Queen Library. A building as close to living as a pile of bricks can be, animated with the care of the people working there, tending to it, remaking it so it doesn’t become a relic.

Bisbee Zine Fest was held at the library, and my table was tucked into the children’s section – appropriate because my 11-year-old son and 7-year-old daughter were with me, selling and trading their zines and stickers. Next to us was a papier-mâché statue of Mr. Tumnus, a favorite character of ours, and a lamp post. It was a lovely nook to occupy for three hours talking with people from all over Arizona about zines, art, printmaking, activism, and more. A gentleman wandered in, looking for the chess meetup and finding a zine fest instead. He chatted with me about printmaking for some time and as he was saying goodbye, set his backpack on the table and rummaged through it. To my delight, he pulled out a print he’d made of his fluffy black cat to show me.  

After zine fest, I sat on a patio across the street, eating vegetarian nachos, basking in the sun, and recharging my social battery by being nearly silent. Once the cheese and pickled jalapenos revived me, I had a meandering conversation with old and new friends, and I got to ask a local artist some questions. Bisbee is thriving because people live there on purpose. It’s not perfect because no place is, but I saw plenty of space for different folks to be content. That’s really all I can ask and hope for in a town, no matter the size. I saw more elders walking briskly along or sitting at outdoor tables playing cards and whiling away the time than I can remember ever seeing in Phoenix. The communal scenes reminded me that I can set up some chairs in front of my house and drink a beer or coffee–and have a deck of cards handy in case anyone wanders by without something to do.  

I’m halfway through this travel blog, and I thought I should let you know I won’t be linking to where I ate, I won’t be rounding up the names of the restaurants, and I won’t be sharing the hundreds of photos I took. Call it gatekeeping, though that would be a bit silly because the internet exists. But I’d suggest not searching Bisbee to death. Show up and walk around. I will tell you that in Bisbee, I couldn’t walk twenty paces before I found somewhere serving food that satisfied me above and beyond, and I stood in line for the best croissants of my life. 

Back on that sunny patio, a small group discussed whether we could live in a small town or not. Immediately, I volunteered, Yes, I could live in this small town. Sign me the hell up, I already spotted a vacant storefront with a “for rent” sign that was begging to be filled with books, magazines, zines, and nooks and crannies. Our group was mixed – some couldn’t stomach the idea of living in such a small place where you were bound to become known by and know everyone else. Watching a friend shudder at this thought, I understood it to my core. And, half surprised, I saw in myself a much smaller vision for life than I had at twenty-four. Smaller and more expansive at the same time: I want to be known to a small group of people, and I want to know them. I want to pass people in the street and know each other–not to need to stop and talk every time, but sometimes, yes, to stop and chat before going about our days. And that is difficult to achieve (but not impossible) living in a metro area like Phoenix, where communities are spread out across vast highways and neighbors can be slow to warm. In a small town one can’t pick and choose friends as easily as in a large city, and I’m coming to see that this may be for the best.

Ending at the beginning of my time in Bisbee, I stared into a giant, empty pit mine. The Lavender Pit (named after a man, not the plant) is the history of the place and its treasures were the reason hotels and houses and people multiplied at the turn of the 20th century. The town is up a road, removed from the mine a bit, a place people went for reprieve, or the wealthy lived profiting off the mine without toiling within it. People and businesses have gotten slightly better at hiding their tracks. Much of modern extraction is done just out of view of the global north because there is a sense, growing with each generation, that the way ‘successful’ people live is possible for less and less. There is only so much copper, gold, or silver. What happens when it’s all mined?

My feet in the dust at the edge of the mine, I pressed my face to the chain-link fence and remembered that 150 years ago, most agreed that the pit was miraculous. Pulling metal from a new place to make modern life possible. What progress, what modernity! They didn’t want to hide away the mine; they wanted it right on their doorstep, a monument of community pride. I wonder what it would have been like to see the mine as unlimited possibility without consequences. I wonder if living by the gaping wound in the earth informs the way people live in Bisbee now. I wonder how much copper is left in Kamoa-Kakula in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Escondida in Chile.

I held up my copper-filled iPhone and took a picture.

P.S. If you’re ever planning a trip to Bisbee, let me know and I'd be happy to share some details, but really you don’t need all that – just show up and walk around.

P.P.S. If you can tell me the movie the title references you will have my undying love.