and the nagging mystery of Lake Powell

2010, 2015, 2019, 2023

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Water has written its history across this land and then made itself scarce.  

“WATER. WUZ. HERE.”

What little remains we extract, overuse, and commoditize.  We capture the Colorado (Green, White, Yampa, and San Juan), and corral it into a Glen Canyon-sized bathtub for safe-keeping.

“An oasis in the desert!” “Water sports mecca!” “Find your guide: $250.”

We made Lake Powell.

 

As a citizen of the high desert steppe, 8 trillion gallons sitting behind one dam is incomprehensible.  Seventeen rainy seasons in waiting.  The shape of the canyon that lends its capacity is unimaginable.  Perhaps it is the undivulged which lures me to this place again and again.  So much so that my urge has been named “Quinquennial Quench.”  As if every five years I absolutely must get back to cogitating hard questions:  what was lost? and what was gained? 

 

I have circumnavigated the Colorado Plateau many times over in many different seasons:  Antelope Canyon, Coral Pink Sand Dunes, Grand Canyon, Havasupai, Bryce Canyon, Capitol Reef, Canyonlands, Monument Valley...  Always circling, an uneasy eye evaluating the ghost in the middle.  Drawn as I was, I had never touched the water that makes Lake Powell until my mid-thirties.

 

2023 was the year I finally decided to seek answers beyond books.  First by way of a 26’ deck boat - coleslaw and potato salad violently rocking in the butted bay.  And later by my own paddle - serenely floating the ten-mile stretch of Glen Canyon from Petroglyph Beach to Lee’s Ferry (hi, Horseshoe Bend people).  Both water sojourns were profoundly beautiful with their red rocks, turquoise water, and views stretching either wide or high.  The reality shimmering:  beauty can be found in the grave… in the complicated, in the mistakes.  Nature, of course, is always speaking to me in metaphors.

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Just as it would take a lifetime on the water to understand it, it may take a lifetime in this body to let it go.  And to me, none of that time is wasted as long as there are still questions to ask.  Probably in five years I'll be seeking enough answers to return to Lake Powell.  See you in 2028, friend.