He didnt come back that night. Abbey held the position from April to September each year, during which time he maintained trails, greeted visitors, and collected campground fees. Coming close we see that he lies on his back, limbs extended rigidly from a body bloated like a balloon. Inadvertently when drunk he exposes the wistful desire to somehow disappear and merge into the pale-faced millions who own and operate America. Perhaps, I suggest, a man could learn to drink this water by taking only a little each day, gradually increasing the dosage? If necessary weve got enough food for two days. Mr. Graham was sweating badly, his hands shaking, his chest painfully constricted. Carefully they removed the body which was covered with a mass of second and third degree burns. Not a silence so much as a great stillness for there are a few sounds: the creak of some bird in a juniper tree, an eddy of wind which passes and fades like a sigh, the ticking of the watch on my wrist slight noises which break the sensation of absolute silence but at the same time exaggerate my sense of the surrounding, overwhelming peace. If I did it for pay I might not like it. What little water he may need can also be extracted from the flesh of his prey. On my feet again, I explored the abandoned silver mines in the canyon walls, found a few sticks of dynamite but no caps or fuses. It is possible from here to gaze down on the backs of soaring birds. In the morning the wind is still blowing, its much colder, and the entire sky is dark with storm clouds threatening rain or possibly, judging by the chill in the air, even snow. Have mercy on us all, I thought. Descending the mountain we enter by degrees into a friendlier, more comfortable, more human environment forest, rushing streams, sunny meadows and soon hear the cowbells, see the villages and roads, all that is familiar and reassuring. He saw the stars caught in a dense sky like moths in a cobweb, alive, quivering, struggling to escape. I come to a fork in the canyon, the main branch continuing to the right, a deep dark narrow defile opening to the left. They will be needed on the trail. Back to the juniper, the red sand, and the fanatic rocks. The Flint Trail is actually a jeep track, switchbacking down a talus slope, the only break in the sheer wall of the plateau for a hundred sinuous miles. Too much for some, who have given up the struggle on the highways in exchange for an entirely different kind of vacation out in the open, on their own feet, following the quiet trail through forest and mountains, bedding down at evening under the stars, when and where they feel like it, at a time when the Industrial Tourists are still hunting for a place to park their automobiles. They must learn to be quaint, picturesque and photogenic. I was too hot and tired at first even to care about food or water. There is a burlap sack in the cab of the truck which I carry when plucking Kleenex flowers from the brush and cactus along the road; I grab that and my stick, run after the snake and corner it beneath the exposed roots of a bush. Whereupon you, too, will soar on motionless wings high over the ruck and rack of human suffering. The time passes very slowly but not slowly enough. Dehydration first enervates, then prostrates, then kills. After that came a swim in the pool beneath a great waterfall nearby, 120 feet high, which rolled in mist and thunder over caverns and canopies of solidified travertine. We sit outside our tent, enjoying the weather. The red rag flutters brightly over the bells poetry and revolution before breakfast. Stepping harder on the gas I speed over the sand flats at 65 mph, trailing a funnel of dust about a mile and a half long. The desert waits outside, desolate and still and strange, unfamiliar and often grotesque in its forms and colors, inhabited by rare, furtive creatures of incredible hardiness and cunning, sparingly colonized by weird mutants from the plant kingdom, most of them as spiny, thorny, stunted and twisted as they are tenacious. Apocalyptic, a creature out of a bad dream. The reason for this apparent anomaly is twofold. The survey chief and his two assistants did not stay very long. Though resembling the birch, the quaking aspen like the cottonwood is a member of the willow family, and reveals its kinship by the delicate suspension of the leaves. Though everyone has his or her own ideal place of beauty on Earth. Within an hour all the snow exposed to the sunlight will be gone and the rock will be damp and steaming. I drink some more coffee and study the dormant reptile at my heels. The wind blows, unrelenting, and flights of little gray birds whirl up and away like handfuls of confetti tossed in the air. Embittered little bastards. Neither a souvenir collector nor an archeologist, I have no desire to stir the ancient dust for the sake of removing from their setting a few potsherds, a few corncobs, a childs straw sandal, an arrow point, perhaps a broken skull. But no rain fell where he was. I test the rope, it seems to be well anchored, and with its help and a few convenient toeholds and fingerholds I work my way to the top of the pitch. The air is so dry here I can hardly shave in the mornings. I descend. Growing among the sunflowers and scattered more thinly over the rest of the desert are the others: yellow borage, Indian paintbrush, scarlet penstemon, skyrocket gilia, prickly pear, hedgehog cactus, purple locoweed, the coral-red globemallow, dockweed, sand verbena. The light bulbs dim and disappear, the furious gnashing of pistons whimpers to a halt. I find no spring within a reasonable distance and return to camp with empty canteens; there is water in the creek, of course, but wed rather drink from the river than downstream from a Hereford cow. All of the prints look fresh, none more than a few days old. We get up too late in the morning and have to cook breakfast in the awful heat of the sun. And up above the clouds replied thunder. How can I descend to such anthropomorphism? I mean the society of a friend or friends or a good, friendly woman. The next morning, after watching his first, breathtaking sunrise, Abbey wonders whether appearances equal reality. From the vicinity of Balanced Rock comes the cry of the great horned owl. Youve been out here in the wilderness long enough, old man. Because civilization needs us., Well, I say, how long do you think that jar of bacon grease will last?. He drank the water and bathed his eye. Beneath the little tree, in the shade, is the dead man. Overcome by emotion on his final day, Abbey suddenly leaves at once, not even stopping to say goodbye to his favorite juniper tree. Side canyons appeared. All this must change. Marauding enemies? The first morning. He hadnt seen a man for how many years? Others play the electric guitar, drive trucks, or break their bones with an unpleasant crunching sound on the rodeo circuit. He strikes; I can hear the click of the fangs against steel, see the stain of venom. Feet on earth. Reaching no conclusions. With two charges of blasting powder (one of which failed to go off) Husk excavated a pit toilet in the alluvium (he was in a hurry) and slung a tent over it. I couldnt remember the answer to that one. Bats flicker through the air. Fifty thousand? He lived now a dream. He describes how the desert affects society and more specifically the individual on a multifaceted, sensory level. The wind is rising. I am very hungry. No doubt it has, but I find no evidence to dispel the illusion that I may be the first ever to have entered here. Is that a fair criterion of beauty? Pulling out one foot, the other foot necessarily goes down deeper, and if a man waits too long, or cannot reach something solid beyond the quicksand, he may soon find himself trapped. Having nearly exterminated their natural enemies, the wildlife experts made it possible for the porcupines to multiply so fast and so far that they the porcupines have taken to gnawing the bark from pinyon pines in order to survive. None of the works I have named attack directly the problem to which I wish to address myself here: what is the peculiar quality or character of the desert that distinguishes it, in spiritual appeal, from other forms of landscape? Minor points on the same issue: I like horses. A week later he comes back. Bob Waterman is coming from Aspen with his beard, his Land Rover and one hundred and fifty feet of new nylon rope. The other creatures do the same. About once a week I put on my pants and walked up to the Indian village to buy bacon, canned beans and Argentine beef in the little store. Long before I could find the shirt with the badge on it, however, or the ticket book, or my shoes or my park ranger hat, the jeep turned in at my driveway and came right up to the door of the trailer. Without a bridge. Tasted like tuna, he reported. Pre-eminent among those I have known personally is Mr. Bates Wilson of Moab, Utah, who might justly be considered the founder of Canyonlands National Park. When I return will it be the same? The thought of the long walk back to my saddle pony, the long ride back to the pickup truck, made my heart sink. From the point of view of political geography we are standing on one of the frontiers of human culture; for the man inside the rubber sack it was lands end, the shore of the world. It resembled a childrens playground slide, concave and S-curved, only steeper, wider, with a vertical pitch in the middle. You know what happened to Ernie Faye? Roy said, evidently addressing me though he was staring up at the leaves. If industrial man continues to multiply his numbers and expand his operations he will succeed in his apparent intention, to seal himself off from the natural and isolate himself within a synthetic prison of his own making. Who? The little calves had never seen. Desert Solitaire: An Uncommonly Beautiful Love Letter to Solitude and the Spiritual Rewards of Getting Lost "Every man, every woman, carries in heart and mind the image of the ideal place, the right place, the one true home, known or unknown, actual or visionary." . The knowledge that refuge is available, when and if needed, makes the silent inferno of the desert more easily bearable. I look back and theres Newcomb beating a giant catfish on the head with his canoe paddle, putting it quickly out of its misery. All I see around here are fallen arches., Does it ever rain in this country, ranger?, I dont know, madam, Ive only been here eleven years., Well you said yesterday it wasnt going to rain and it did rain., Did I? The pitch is steep, the morning sun is blazing on my back, and the heat quickly becomes unpleasant. The royalties from the sale of oil, uranium, coal and natural gas, while hardly enough to relieve the Indians general poverty, have enabled them to develop a tribal timber business, to provide a few college scholarships for the brainiest (not necessarily the best) of their young people, to build community centers and finance an annual tribal fair (a source of much enjoyment to The People), and to drill a useful number of water wells for the benefit of the old sheep and goat raising families still hanging on in the backlands. As I neared the top and the overhang became noticeable I prepared for a slip, planning to push myself away from the rock so as to fall into the center of the pool where the water was deepest. On the crest of the flood as it came, above the churning debris of bushes, vines, weeds and logs, floated a delicate and rosy vapor, a fine pink mist suffused with the glow of sunlight. But then its never been an easy journey. I rear back and throw the stone with all Ive got straight at his furry head. I would have plenty of time to write not only my epitaph but my own elegy. So youll live longer, I explained. We pass an opening in the eastern wall, the mouth of a tributary stream. The earth remains, and the heartbreaking beauty where there are no hearts to break. Were the inhabitants actually destroyed by the enemies they had always dreaded? We bounce over a series of minor ripples and the river picks up speed. My lone juniper stands half-alive, half-dead, the silvery wind-rubbed claw of wood projected stiffly at the sun. Natural Bridges National Monument. Crescent-shaped, the dune shelters on its leeward side a growth of sunflowers and scarlet penstemon. will be the first of July. Youll find no deep thinkers at 13,000 feet anyway. Drunk as a Navajo I pull off my boots and crawl into the snug warm down-filled womblike mummy bag. Should I attempt to feed him? Creating notes and highlights requires a free LitCharts account. What did I have to lose? This canyon too has tumbled boulders into the river, forming one more stretch of rough water. As before I let my pony drink what he wanted from the stream while I pondered the view from beneath the meager shelter of my hat. Waiting for the fire to settle down to exactly where I want it, I spread a tarp on the ground close to the fire and place my bedroll on it for a cushion, sitting like a tailor. They would never understand that an economic system which can only expand or expire must be false to all that is human. He provides readers with a useful manual on hydrating in emergencies. But, in his favor, he is inexpensive; he is economical; he works full-time seven days a week for room and board and a hundred dollars a month. What right have I to interfere with an old mans antideath wish? Being a cold-blooded creature, of course, he takes his temperature from that of the immediate environment in this case my body. The population, though ten times greater than a century ago, must still exist on a reservation no bigger now than it was then. Based on Abbey's activities as a park ranger at Arches National Monument (now Arches National Park) in the late 1950s, the book is often compared to Henry David Thoreau's Walden and Aldo Leopold's A Sand County Almanac. Centuries ago. God provides. In the sand I see the prints of deer and coyote and bobcat, also a few cattle tracks, strays perhaps, fairly fresh. He looked like part of that burnt-out landscape. You sir, squinting at the map with your radiator boiling over and your fuel pump vapor-locked, crawl out of that shiny hunk of GM junk and take a walk yes, leave the old lady and those squawling brats behind for a while, turn your back on them and take a long quiet walk straight into the canyons, get lost for a while, come back when you damn well feel like it, itll do you and her and them a world of good. I defended the Americans no one else was available while he explained to me the positive aspects of anti-Semitism. Not so much from choice as from necessity I generally prefer to go into places where no one else wants to go. Yet from this nest of thorns, this snare of hooks and fiery spines, is born once each year a splendid flower. This psychological pressure eventually proved too much for three of Powells men; near the end of the voyage these three left the expedition and tried to make their way overland back to civilization and were all killed by Indians. There is no compelling reason, for example, why tourists need to drive their automobiles to the very brink of the Grand Canyons south rim. LitCharts Teacher Editions. At first, Abbey thinks that language helps people understand and remember their environment, but Waterman calls this a greedy impulsewhich Abbey then agrees with. Does that justify the continued and increasing erosion of the parks? Even the tourists that creep in and creep out in their lumbering, dust-covered automobiles reveal a certain weariness with desert travel, a certain longing to be elsewhere, to be where its high, cool, breezy, fresh mountain or seashore. In the evening the wind stops. Naked as Adam in the Bible, Abbey enters a dreamlike existence, almost forgetting that he is distinct from the surrounding trees. Insomnia, he said. A yellow planet floats on the west, brightest object in the sky. As we loaded the horses into the truck for the return to the ranch I asked Mackie how he liked this kind of work. 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