[Landline] Two for Dooby

Remembering an old desert sage

Hello again friends,

A brief one this morning.

From “Finding the Space in the Heart” by Gary Snyder:

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This is what Snyder was talking about: words carved on rocks in a Nevada desert, on an informal dirt road called 'Dooby Lane' created by a World War II veteran named DeWayne Williams (born Sept. 11, 1918, died Jan 11, 1995).

The photograph is by Peter Goin, as published in his book Dooby Lane: Also known as Guru Road, a testament in stone tablets by DeWayne Williams (1996; 2016), with a preface and field notes by Snyder.

I feel like somebody must’ve told me about Dooby Lane before, especially given its location near Gerlach, a place I visited a couple times in the mid-’90s on the way to/from an annual festival that can no longer be named…

…but, in any event, I was hipped to this wonderful Goin/Snyder book via the great Northern California poet/author/doer Jerry Martien, who mentioned it in Infrastructure: Dreams, Divinations & Dispatches From the Underground — a 2020 collection of his serious/playful/brilliant work that I refer to regularly for wisdom, laughs and consolation. Both books are very recommended.

DeWayne Williams. Here’s the one video of him I’ve been able to find so far:

What a character.

If you need more Dooby Lane, right now, see this text/photo piece by Lee Juillerat.

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Addendum:

And what the heck, here’s a representative piece from the aforementioned Infrastructure, by Jerry Martien:

More soon,

Jay

Southern Arizona

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