DAVID JASPER'S 'WANDERINGS IN THE DESERT'

family has all moved away from the area and I have no connections to any sort of childhood home, I've often told people that the desert is my 'spiritual home'. These are the words that trickle out of my mouth when someone mentions the desert, my own Pavlovian salivation to the thought of dry skies overhead, and brown sand below. Yet, my own proclamation puzzles me, first because I radically dislike the term 'spiritual', though that's another subject, but second, I wonder, what do I mean by a 'home'? Can one actually reside, or abide, in the desert? Or is it always, as Professor Jasper reminds us, a place for travellers, wanderers, and explorers. As he himself relates his experience of the South Texan desert, 'I don't think I could live here for very long.' Obviously, people do live in the desert. In fact, the fastest growing city in the United States over the past decade has been Las Vegas, projected to top two million inhabitants in the next two years; and the whole state of Nevada, while mostly desert, was yet the fastest growing state for the last few years. Yet again, life in the air-conditioned cars, shopping centres, casinos, and