I know, I know. The first item on such a list for most intelligent Americans would be "Stay out of Texas." As a (oxymoron warning!) thinking Texan, I readily admit that that’s a good way to start. It’s funny and contains just enough truth to have bite. But as a thinking Texas I would amend the line to "Avoid Crawford," and let it go at that.

The truth is, we are, all us Americans, in this mess together. More than once in recent travels around the country, faced with some bit of natural or urban beauty, I’ve been brought up short by the thought that no doubt Germans in a certain tragic era enjoyed immensely traveling around their lovely country, no matter what was happening in Berlin.

Certainly we are all—Texans and non-Texans alike—responsible for the stain of intolerance and belligerence spreading empire-wise from Washington over the entire world.

Assume for the moment that most of us are working to restore sanity to American government. Assume also that citizens of other countries still come here seeking to glimpse the best of America.

For readers who are willing to hold those two assumptions, I’ve assembled a list from my own travels, call it the best of the best. Ten American moments that I treasure and wish to share.

We, by the way, invite readers to submit their own lists. Main thing is: Keep them brief. Ten items, each with 1) the experience, 2) the location, and 3) a one-sentence commentary.

If you include one of the big tourist attractions in your list, you have to have a pretty good reason for doing so.

As for my own list: After I got to 10, I kept thinking of other things that just HAD to be included. So my list of 10 things to do grew to 15.

In alphabetical order:

Big Bend.
In the Lower 48 it’s becoming harder and harder to really get away from it all. I was recently at the bottom of Death Valley enjoying the isolation and solitude… when my cell rang. You can still escape, truly escape, in Big Bend National Park, so-called because of the large U-shape made by the Rio Grande in far West Texas. The huge park is high desert punctuated by very old volcanic upheavals, razor-thin deep canyons, and a fine Shangri-La called "The Basin," a small valley thousands of feet above the desert floor. Which is where the park lodge is. Ask for a room facing west. The valley wall drops away in that direction, leaving an opening called "The Window" through which, on good days, the view extends for 175 miles. On bad days, when pollution from the maquiladoras across the border in Mexico causes the view to drop to 50 miles, the chemicals will treat you to a sunset you won’t see this side of Los Angeles. Oh, I forgot to mention that cell phones don’t work in the Basin, nor do TVs. Nor radios. More info: http://www.nps.gov/bibe/

Café du Monde.
The Ninth Ward (and environs) may come and go, but the Café du Monde by the levee in New Orleans we shall always have with us. Beignets, Louisiana coffee, the Times-Picayune, with a view of Jackson square and the cathedral… what more could you ask?

Caravaggio.
Cleveland, Ohio. The little city that could in the 19th century struggled mightily as it discovered it couldn’t in the 20th. Remnants and reminders of 19th-century wealth dot Cleveland, the biggest of which is the Cleveland Museum of Art. Tucked in a park adjacent to Case Western Reserve University, CMA developed its collection at a time when the sacking of Europe was still underway (pace, Met), and Cleveland got some major treasures. The greatest of which is, strangely, almost hidden away in a far back gallery: Caravaggio’s late masterpiece, The Crucifixion of St. Andrew. If you’re wondering why bother, read this magazine’s report on a recent visit. More info: http://www.clemusart.com/

Corona del Mar.
California. The orange groves are gone, the air is (to put it politely) murky, few mountains vistas are undiminished by ticky-tacky $12-million manses clinging to their slopes. But. But. On rare occasion, weather and traffic permitting, you can still catch a glimpse of the paradise that California was. Come over the inland highway at sunset and, the gods willing, Corona del Mar will open before you as it must have looked 100 years ago.

Fallingwater.
Convenient for the traveler, Frank Lloyd Wright, the most American of architects, left stuff pretty widely scattered. In Chicago, you can do house tours. In Phoenix, you can see Taliesin West, his winter house and studio. Best of all, tucked away in the mountainous southwestern corner of Pennsylvania is Fallingwater, the iconic over-the-top, over-the-creek house he built in the 1930s for a Pittsburgh department store owner. The only private home ever to make the cover of Time, Fallingwater, like a great painting, has to be seen in person to be fully appreciated. Photographs give only a hint of its deceptively simple beauty, its virtuosic placement, its astonishing, baffling rightness. The house and extensive grounds are now the property of a conservancy. Reservations are required for both tours (one-hour, or three-hour: take the longer one; you’ll see—and can photograph—everything). More info: http://www.paconserve.org/index-fw1.asp

Hippie Hollow.
County Park 15 miles west of Austin, Texas. The problem with nude beaches is sand, which gets into places you really don’t want sand to get into. Then there’s the sun: nice for a while but you’ll eventually be wishing for a spot of shade. Deep in the heart of Texas (!), Hippie Hollow avoids both problems. It’s a county park (!!) on the shores of a beautiful Hill Country lake: conveniently flat limestone shelves stairstep down from the juniper forest into the cool, clear water. It’s clothing-optional. In such a paradise, few opt for clothing.

I-90 across North Dakota.
The "Great" Plains, indeed. Flyovers miss ‘em. Tourists on the lower-numbered Interstates to the south miss ‘em. Set out westward from Minneapolis in your vehicle of choice and you can’t miss ‘em, hour after hour after hour after hour.

Jemez Springs.
New Mexico. A few miles southwest of Los Alamos, New Mexico, Highway 4 winds through Jemez Canyon, a thousand-foot-deep declivity whose steep, forested slopes are dotted with unspoiled hot springs. You park. You climb. You strip. You immerse. The ever-changing patch of sky is your video; the forest provides the soundtrack. Your fellow immersees provide the smoke (if you so desire).

Key West.
Florida. Many of the best American cities have only smidgens of uniqueness that have to be sought out. The island-city of Key West is what it is and it is so entirely. How deep does the difference to? Pretty deep. Take "time", for example. Island time, in the Keys, is not at all the same thing as mainland time, and tourists, busy being tourists, almost never get it.

Kitty Hawk.
The Outer Banks of North Carolina are hard to get to, but once there you’ll realize it was worth the trouble: great beaches, good surf, and the National Park Service has done itself proud at the Wright Brothers National Memorial. The museum and lectures will answer all your questions (Why did the brothers come all the way here from Dayton, Ohio to do it? What does "Kitty Hawk" mean anyway?). You’ll come away with a deepened appreciation for what Orville and Wilbur did on this remote North Carolina seashore. You could do worse than take with you from the bookstore a copy of The Bishop’s Boys: A Life of Wilbur and Orville Wright, by Tom Crouch. More info: http://www.nps.gov/wrbr.

Paradise, Michigan.
There are two ways to get to Paradise: From the south (Detroit, etc.), which gives you the thrill of the Mackinac Straits bridge; or from the west (Duluth, etc.) which gives you the thrill of about 300 miles of Upper Peninsula pine-forest wilderness with occasional glimpses of Lake Superior off to your left. When you finally get to Paradise, proceed to Curley’s Motel (you can’t miss it), request a room on the back, and then spend whatever time you have contemplating the deep beauty of Lake Superior about 50 feet away either through your picture window (if it’s cold) or (if it’s not) on the "beach".

Seneca Falls.
1848: That’s when the first international meeting on women’s rights was held. In Seneca Falls, New York, a lovely little Finger Lakes village. Yep, it all started in this unlikely place. Why? How? Go and find out. Much of the town is a national historic site. The National Park Service has done itself proud with an excellent museum adjacent to the remains of the building where the first meeting took place, complete with a water wall on which is inscribed the Declaration of Women’s Rights. It all comes together in a powerful sense of place, of time, of victories won, and of victories still to be won.

Slave Market.
6 Chalmers Street, Charleston, South Carolina, known as "The Old Slave Mart." You can search the Internet, you can search physically, and in all the United States, where for three and a half centuries every city of any size had a place for the buying and selling of slaves, you will find only one surviving building, the Old Slave Mart in Charleston. Indeed, the number of cities that even have a marker indicating such a site can be counted on fewer than the fingers of one hand. America cannot be understood without remembrance of slavery. Go to Charleston and contemplate the one extant reminder of what this "democracy" did for so long.

Trail of Tears.
In 1830 Congress passed the Indian Removal Act. All Native Americans east of the Mississippi were to be forcibly moved west of the Mississippi. The tragic culmination came in 1838 when some 16,000 Cherokees in the southern Appalachian Mountains were moved to what was then known as the Indian Territory (now part of Arkansas and Oklahoma). Most walked. Many died. You can read a fairly detailed summary of what happened here: http://www.nationaltota.org/the-story/   In 1987 Congress designated the Trail of Tears as a national historic trail. The northerly route is now marked, sort of. A good single place to visit is the New Echota Cherokee Capital State Historic Site in northwestern Georgia. More info: http://www.nps.gov/trte/ and http://www.nationaltota.org/

Vietnam Veterans Memorial.
Washington, D.C.

That's 15, and I left out the San Joaquin Valley (California) on a spring morning, State Highway 7 through the Ozarks (Arkansas), Highway 50 through the Black Canyon (Colorado), Sedona (Arizona), any backroad in West Virginia, the coastline of Maine, Kapalua Beach (Hawaii), any mountain in Alaska, etc. Etc. <Sigh>

The Ten Worst Things to Do

Note: Just because they’re the "worst" things to do doesn’t necessarily mean you shouldn’t do them. You won’t enjoy any of these outings but you may well (probably will) learn important stuff about not just America but about human beings generally.

Sit through a Virgil Thomson opera anywhere.
Go to a California nude beach.
Attend the Indianapolis 500.
Hang out in Dallas.
Go to an NFL game.
Fly anywhere (instead of driving).
Tour a feed lot.
Spend time in the presence of a Frank Gehry building.
Search for an honest person in Washington, D.C.
Search for an humble person in Seattle.
Pay $100 for a ticket to a Broadway show.