I should have written last night. I stayed at a hotel in Blanding, Utah. I went to Arches and Canyonlands yesterday. The contrast between the lush, green Rockies and Utah’s reds and browns was so stark one has to wonder if it was done with careful deliberation by one more powerful than us. I took that as my cue to go looking for contrast when I took photos. I wanted to see nature vying with itself. In places the ground was so hard that the roots of trees couldn’t penetrate.
They just curl in upon themselves. Some trees do manage to find root there and thrive in conditions that seem impossible. I was surprised to see one that had fought its way through the heat, dry weather and hard rock beneath it. All is not a solitary struggle, symbiosis exists there as well. The most prominent example of symbiotic life in the Utah desert is the special macrobiotic crust that grows on top of the dirt. The crust needs the dry environment in order to survive. The desert floor needs the crust to hold it together and prevent it from eroding away into nothing.
It was while I was walking through the Canyonlands that I had a wonderful conversation with a retired gentleman from Bakersfield, California.
He had a nice walking stick and had carefully made his way the one mile along the Grand View Point trail in Canyonlands. He was tall and overweight. He wore glasses and clothes straight out of the retired batchelor’s catalog. I knew right away he was a traveler. A traveler always knows when he’s met another one. He had been a surveyor till he retired last year. I wish I had looked for a ring on his finger or asked him if he was married. I got the impression he was a solo traveler, like me. I asked him the question that had been with me from the beginning of my trip. Had he ever found a place he considered home? He felt that Bakersfield had been a good home to him, but that it wasn’t the same as when he first moved there. Like many people I talked to he lamented at how the city had lurched and leaped into the land surrounding it, swallowing everything. He told me stories about his surveying days and the things he had seen.
I learned that computers have taken away the need for surveyors to spend time in the field. I imagined a younger, thinner version of him in the field before computers. He said he had been staring at computer screens too much and that’s why he retired. I understood that feeling all too well. We talked about travel and why we travel. I told him my favorite trip had been my drive to Alaska and told him not to worry about all the warnings that it will kill your car. He said his favorite trip had been to hike down from the south rim to the north rim and back in the Grand Canyon when he was about my age. Our conversation ended and we carried on, going our separate ways. I couldn’t help but feel like I had missed some tremendous opportunity. I wondered if I had been looking at a future version of myself, like time had been out of joint. Thinking about the landscape and my life in general my mind was dominated by one question that I would ask my future self if I had the chance again.
Will my life be solitary with me fighting to establish my roots, or do I have a companion out there, the two of us drawing strength from the harsh landscape around us?
If I was seeing my future self it’s not so bad, actually it looks pretty good. I’d like to try that Grand Canyon hike.
Overall I was blown away by the beauty in Moab and in general southeast Utah. It’s hard to imagine a more beautiful, unassailable, wilderness to make home. It is rural but not dominated by small-minded bigots. Also I believe the terrain is rugged enough it won’t be urbanized any time soon. I took 191 to Blanding. Then I took 95 to Hanksville. That drive has been the most stunning so far. It is in Hanksville that I met the Stan’s Snack Shak girl.
