Hello friends,
Greetings from a tiny town at the edge of Death Valley. I’ve been in Shoshone, California (population 31), on and off for a month, writing and hiking. I have no cell service. In the next town over, there’s no potable water. I wake up to the sound of palm trees and creosote swishing in heavy wind. The nights are deep and dark and quiet. A small coyote lives near me and I see him (or her?) most evenings around dusk. Every few days I visit a coffeeshop in the neighboring town of Tecopa, and just by sitting on the patio I’ve observed, and met, a whole cast of characters. Too many to describe here — an essay’s worth, perhaps! — but the other day one guy rode into town on a bulldozer (and wearing a bucket hat), and when he hopped off the bulldozer, I saw he had a fly swatter. For killing the bombers, as locals call the giant, biting horseflies. He went into the coffeeshop and bought a ginger cookie, and away he left on the bulldozer. A truly remarkable sight. Everyone knows too much about their neighbors — I’ve said to friends that it feels like living in a novel — and again, just by sitting there, I’ve learned of feuds, rivalries, angst, irritation. For example: Ross, the self-proclaimed one-legged miner with a three-legged dog has beef with Erik, the Hungarian earthworks builder living in the off-grid community of Charleston View, because Erik went climbing around Ross’s abandoned mines shortly after Ross bought them and didn’t know it was private property now.
It was a big monsoon year (I wrote about it for KNPR’s Desert Companion here) and Hurricane Hilary flooded out Death Valley National Park. The park was closed until last week, and I drove to Badwater Basin, the lowest point in the western hemisphere, so I could see the ephemeral lake, Lake Manly, that forms after heavy rain. It was stunning. The driest place in north America was full of water. Damp salt crystals crunched under my feet and weighed down my sandals. I watched sunset over the lake, the Panamint Mountains reflected in the glassy water, and saw a few stars appear before I decided to leave. Death Valley is a national dark sky area, which is fantastic for stargazing — usually if I look up for just five minutes, I see at least one shooting star — but terrible for my driving, and it took me half an hour longer than normal to get back to Shoshone. But I’m glad I visited. Death Valley has an extreme rate of evaporation: 150 inches per year, and Lake Manly is expected to vanish in just a few weeks.
I’ve been vaguely obsessed with disappearing and reappearing lakes lately, and this year have driven out to the Great Salt Lake, the Salton Sea (which is pictured in this newsletter), Tulare Lake in central California, Walker Lake in Nevada’s Great Basin, and now Lake Manly. I’d been wanting to see Tulare Lake for months; the lake, once the largest body of water west of the Mississippi, was dammed and diverted into oblivion over the course of the twentieth century, but after last year’s atmospheric rivers, it re-emerged, taking with it swaths of farmland and creating a new, temporary way station for migrating birds. Like the Salton Sea, it’s shrinking, and the stagnant water has bred all kinds of bacteria, killing off birds and fish. I saw at least a dozen fish carcasses when I walked the shore.
Why am I driving hundreds of miles to see these lakes? I think the urge to see them is connected, in some part, to climate grief and the feeling that I need to see everything I can before it’s gone. I’ve been thinking, as always, about permanence and impermanence, in the natural world and in my own life, and these lakes feel like a visual manifestation of some of those thoughts… more there that I haven’t quite developed…
Yesterday, I went on a walk along the Amargosa River, a 185-foot long partly underground river that ribbons from Beatty, Nevada to its terminus in Badwater Basin. I came across a waterfall. From even a few feet away, you can’t see it, but the sound of crashing water clues you in. I rarely see waterfalls in the Mojave, and the sound was disorienting. The waterfall flowed out of piles of matted brush and reeds, and when I looked closer at a small rapid, I realized a handful of tiny, silvery fish were projecting themselves into the air and trying to wriggle upstream. Some of them cleared a foot, then smacked onto rock and disappeared into the churn — the only churn of that entire stretch of river, as the rest was placid and, to me, seemed nearly stagnant. They must have only been two or three inches long each. I didn’t know fish besides salmon swam upstream — though these little guys were clearly failing — so if anyone knows what species this might be, let me know.
The region is known for its endemic, and endangered, pupfish, one species of which lives in 93-degree temperature water at the Devils Hole, a limestone cavern outside of Death Valley. My friends know I am obsessed with this cavern. (I have many obsessions!) It’s filled with “fossil water,” which left its main source in Nevada’s Spring Mountains 10,000 years ago and surfaced here. A lot is still unknown about the cavern, like how deep it is and how the pupfish got there. Last year, a scientist told me it’s the smallest habitat for any vertebrate species. When earthquakes happen in Mexico, or even as far away as Chile, water sloshes in the cavern, a miraculous display of the Earth's interconnectivity. (Another great fact: The pupfish like to spawn after seismic activity, and when they spawn, their dark bodies turn bright blue.)
I’ve written this so many times before, but I’ll repeat it: the Mojave teaches me to slow down and pay attention. I would never have seen those leaping fish had I not stopped and looked long and hard at the river. And what a reward, this drama of nature in miniature, unfolding in the middle of an unlikely place.
In other news, I have one last panned event for the WINE book tour, in Las Vegas on November 1. 6 p.m. at Garagiste Wine Bar (details here). It’s been so wonderful to see friends from as far back as high school in bars and shops across the east and west coasts. Thank you to everyone who’s let me crash with them, and thank you to everyone who’s bought the book. I have a handful of leftover copies that I bought from the publisher for an event in Oakland, so if you’d like one directly from me, I can ship one to you for $15 + shipping. As a thanks, I’ll give you a personalized wine rec and a desert surprise! This is not a money-making book by any means, but buying directly from me gives me a larger share, so I appreciate it!
And since I last emailed, I wrote a whimsical story about how one Elvis impersonator is experiencing climate change. One of the most fun assignments I’ve had in a while.
That’s it from me, for now. I’d love to hear where you are and how you’re doing. I, like many of you, have been glued to the news from Israel and Gaza lately. Here’s to hoping you’re able to find lightness in your days, and that your families are safe.
Love,
Meg