Arizona: Passing and Staying — Silence with a Pulse

About forty minutes from Tucumcari, on the way home, sits Glenrio, a state-line ghost town with a population of zero and more character than many places still full of people.

I visited Glenrio during my New Mexico vacay of 2024 and it was wonderful to return! Glenrio is... a weathered apocalyptic landscape, dense, like a storm-before-the-storm.

I love it.

I’ve watched YouTube videos of people visiting Glenrio over the years, and the graffiti tells its own timeline, layered across decades.

It felt like the walls were remembering.

Not empty. Aware.

Watching.

Waiting.

It felt like a town that deserved more than a passing glance. I left with the sense that I’d only scratched the surface, and I could have spent hours there and still found something new. I wasn’t ready to leave when it was time to go. Some places don’t let you finish seeing them in one visit.

This was the kind of place you don’t photograph once. You return.

Again.

And again.