Abstract: In this essay, I work to define my sense of place through describing my raft adventure on the Green River, Gates of Lodore in Utah. I also describe my sense of place through my home in Heartwood. By using both of these examples I reveal a spiritual connection to these places.I use imagery and talk about how both of these places make me feel. For example when I describe the river like this, “The water was a soothing shade of green and as the piercing rays of the sun hit the water, the river looked like a thousand emerald gems.” I also try to intertwine some of my environmental ethic, which is mostly preservation within this essay. This is shown in the following quote. “ Our careless acts could very well be the reason these places slowly start to vanish. What will we do when we have completely developed and or ruined every last place like this?”.
Essay:
The Gates of Lodore
Araaa Aquarian
My phone vibrates in the back pocket of my jeans and the catchy tune of “Come Back Kid” by Brett Dennen, begins to play. I take my phone out of my pocket and look at the caller ID. I smile as I recognize the name: Joe. He and his family are at their cabin in Wisconsin for a couple weeks so I am naturally happy to hear from them.
“Joe!” I exclaim as I answer the phone.
“Hey, hey, Ray Ray” answers Joe.
“What’s up?!” I ask
“We were talking about a river trip we are going on in a few weeks and my dad said you could come. Do you want to? Can you?”
My chest filled with excitement as though there were bubbles rising higher and higher in my chest. Living in Hawaii before, river trips weren’t exactly on the “Things To Do List”. Joe’s dad, Mac, had briefly mentioned the possibility of me being able to tag along on this river trip but now it was reality and it was almost too good to be true.
“Wait really?! “ I ask.
“Yeah, do you think you can?” he replies.
“I have to talk to my mom about it but yes I would love to come!” I say cheerfully.
Before I knew it I was waking up at 5:00 o'clock on a Saturday morning, throwing various objects such as river clothes, sunscreen, chaco's, and a goofy looking sun hat into a dry bag and preparing for a full day of driving to the Green River, Gates of Lodore in Utah. For the first hour or two of the car ride, I was sound asleep. Soon I was woken up as we stopped for a bathroom break and a chance to stretch our legs at Mulas Pass. The grass was a deep green and there was an abundant field of assorted flowers. We reloaded ourselves and continued on what seemed like a never ending road. We at the arrived at the put in at around 4:30 pm. I stepped out of the silver Highlander onto the golden grains of sand and took in my surroundings. The sky had turned to a soft blue gray as the sun slowly began to set. The river looked gray at some points but as you looked out morphed into a see through green. After stretching our legs and dipping our feet into the refreshing river water we began to unload the cars. We took the rafts off of their trailers, set them into the water and staked their ropes to the ground so that they wouldn’t float off without us. When the rafts were safely staked to the ground, we began to set up camp. Al and I set up the tent and sleeping spaces while the rest set up the kitchen area and started cooking dinner. Once we had stuffed our bellies with tacos, we went to bed excited for the next day when we would finally start our journey.
The next morning, as I sat in a blue and green striped lawn chair and munched on my cinnamon raisin bagel, my gaze skipped across the river like a pebble and onto the red canyon wall. I drew my legs up close to my chest and wrapped my arms around my knees as I took a minute to fully take in the beauty of this place and enjoy the moment. I knew I would have to help pack up camp and load the gear into the rafts soon so I sluggishly stood up and meandered back to the tent to start. Once everything was safely packed we had a talk about what to do in the different scenarios the river could likely spit at us and then, finally, we started our 5 day adventure down the Green River. As soon as we turned around the first river bend, I was in awe. I could not bring myself to take my eyes off of my surroundings and nor did I need to. As the ducky rocked slowly back and forth with the tide, I concentrated on the feeling of the warm sun on my skin, the ageless red canyons directing the flow of the river, the sand, shrubs and occasional wildlife on the banks that guided us. I let my fingers, ever so gently, graze the tip of the water. We continued to float down the river for a little while longer and then stopped on a small bank for lunch.
Each of us dug into our coolers to retrieve different lunch items including bread, tortillas, meat, cheese, lettuce, pickles, tomatoes, onions, mustard, mayo, crackers and cheese. Nobody hesitated to dig in. As I finished my lunch, I let my eyes wander. Like a child at disneyland for the first time, my heart started to flutter and I immediately directed my gaze toward the river. The water was a soothing shade of green and as the piercing rays of the sun hit the water, the river looked like a thousand emerald gems. In this small and simple place alone, the beauty was overwhelming. The river seemed to be calling my name, asking me to become lost within it. Encouraging me to trust it and to surrender myself to it. As I submerged the entirety of my body into the water, a peaceful bliss washed over me. All the worried thoughts, questions and anxious yelling that constantly ran around my brain making my head ache, was silenced. I felt as if the weight that was so heavily bestowed onto my shoulders was lifted by the gentle current of the river. The weight that came from school, home life, stress, anxiety and the struggle for finding myself within this world was simply swept away with the tide. I was washed clean of all of it.
I came to the surface for a gasp of air and then submerged myself again. A feeling of deep gratitude washed over me and I realized just how lucky I was to be able to be where I was. This sense of gratitude anchored itself deep into my heart as I also recognized that this generation lives in the technological age where we can pretty much do anything we want but we don’t really stop and think if we actually should. I fear that many people within this world today are so glued to tv, cellphone and computer screens and so hungry to develop the world, that they might not ever get the chance to experience a place like this. One of my greatest fears is that with the rate the world is changing and developing, there may not be many more places like the Green River left on this Earth. Pollution and radiation threaten places like this daily. This is already evident in our very own Animas River. The part of the Animas that flows up near Silverton is so polluted that there is no sign of life. Our careless acts could very well be the reason these places slowly start to vanish. What will we do when we have completely developed and or ruined every last place like this? In Desert Solitaire, Edward Abbey once wrote, “ We need wilderness whether or not we ever set foot in it. We need a refuge even though we may never set foot in it. We need the possibility of escape as surely as we need hope; without it life in the cities would drive all men into crime or drugs or psychoanalysis”. His idea strives to acknowledge the fact that everyone needs a special place to lose themselves within, a place where the mind and body can be peaceful. Whether that place be a river, canyon, city, ocean, mountain, lake or a bamboo forest, it doesn’t matter. I want my children, grand-children and great great grandchildren to be able to come to a place like the Green River sometime within their lifespan. I want these types of places to be accessible to them and not just stories that have been past down by past generations.
I came to the water’s surface for a second time and stepped slowly out of the water. Resting myself on the warm sand, I watched as the boys played frisbee and jumped off the raft into the the sluggish river. As I watched the frisbee fly through the air, I was reminded of the many times we spent throwing the frisbee around in the village green at Heartwood. I thought back to the time when my family and I had just made the move to Durango, Colorado from Maui, Hawaii. At that time in my life, I was mad at my mother and mad at the world because my mother took me away from a place that I not only grew up on but also everything I had ever known, a place that I loved. We had just moved into our house in Heartwood and I had no interest in getting to know anyone or do anything. I was stuck in a tidal wave of emotions. Each time I would try and gasp for air, I was sucked into the current while the wave of emotions would drown me over and over again. I was sitting on the bench outside of our house when a woman with curly brown hair and beautiful hazel eyes approached me and said “My name is Carin, I live in the house right next to you. If you ever need anything just feel free to come on over and ask, treat me like I am your mother.” It was at that moment that I knew I was at home.
After I had gotten used to the community and met everyone I began to feel more and more comfortable and I grew happier. I began to spend time with Gabe, Jj, Helen, Al, Joe, Bekah and Amanda regularly and soon I was good friends with all of them. They helped me get through the move and showed me all the fun things to do around Heartwood and Durango. Soon I felt glued to the community and as I reflected on how blessed I was to end up here I realized that the first day when Carin came up to me, she represented the type of people in Heartwood. I also realized that as long as I was with these people, no matter where I was, it would feel like home. It was this same feeling of being at home that came over me while I was on the Green River.
***
Once we had all finished our lunch, taken the time to explore and had played at least 10 minutes of frisbee, we continued to follow the meandering of the river as it cut its way through the canyon until it was time to set up camp for the night. Once we had located our campsite, pulled out of the water and unloaded the rafts, once again we began to set up sleeping spaces and the kitchen. This would be the routine twice a day for our 5 days on the river. Later, after dinner was made, eaten, and the supplies were cleaned and put away, we played koob, bocce ball or frisbee until the sun had set and we were embraced by the silent darkness. After a long, enticing and peaceful day on the river, I rested my head on my pillow and pulled my sleeping bag over my body. As I laid there with Al and Helen on either side of me, I gazed up at the endless, starry sky above. My eyes fluttered for a few seconds and then as if my eyelids weighed the weight of the world, I closed my eyes completely letting the soothing sound of the river guide me as I drifted into the vast darkness and the world of dreams, dreams that entailed the river continuing to flow through the red canyons for many years to come.
Essay:
The Gates of Lodore
Araaa Aquarian
My phone vibrates in the back pocket of my jeans and the catchy tune of “Come Back Kid” by Brett Dennen, begins to play. I take my phone out of my pocket and look at the caller ID. I smile as I recognize the name: Joe. He and his family are at their cabin in Wisconsin for a couple weeks so I am naturally happy to hear from them.
“Joe!” I exclaim as I answer the phone.
“Hey, hey, Ray Ray” answers Joe.
“What’s up?!” I ask
“We were talking about a river trip we are going on in a few weeks and my dad said you could come. Do you want to? Can you?”
My chest filled with excitement as though there were bubbles rising higher and higher in my chest. Living in Hawaii before, river trips weren’t exactly on the “Things To Do List”. Joe’s dad, Mac, had briefly mentioned the possibility of me being able to tag along on this river trip but now it was reality and it was almost too good to be true.
“Wait really?! “ I ask.
“Yeah, do you think you can?” he replies.
“I have to talk to my mom about it but yes I would love to come!” I say cheerfully.
Before I knew it I was waking up at 5:00 o'clock on a Saturday morning, throwing various objects such as river clothes, sunscreen, chaco's, and a goofy looking sun hat into a dry bag and preparing for a full day of driving to the Green River, Gates of Lodore in Utah. For the first hour or two of the car ride, I was sound asleep. Soon I was woken up as we stopped for a bathroom break and a chance to stretch our legs at Mulas Pass. The grass was a deep green and there was an abundant field of assorted flowers. We reloaded ourselves and continued on what seemed like a never ending road. We at the arrived at the put in at around 4:30 pm. I stepped out of the silver Highlander onto the golden grains of sand and took in my surroundings. The sky had turned to a soft blue gray as the sun slowly began to set. The river looked gray at some points but as you looked out morphed into a see through green. After stretching our legs and dipping our feet into the refreshing river water we began to unload the cars. We took the rafts off of their trailers, set them into the water and staked their ropes to the ground so that they wouldn’t float off without us. When the rafts were safely staked to the ground, we began to set up camp. Al and I set up the tent and sleeping spaces while the rest set up the kitchen area and started cooking dinner. Once we had stuffed our bellies with tacos, we went to bed excited for the next day when we would finally start our journey.
The next morning, as I sat in a blue and green striped lawn chair and munched on my cinnamon raisin bagel, my gaze skipped across the river like a pebble and onto the red canyon wall. I drew my legs up close to my chest and wrapped my arms around my knees as I took a minute to fully take in the beauty of this place and enjoy the moment. I knew I would have to help pack up camp and load the gear into the rafts soon so I sluggishly stood up and meandered back to the tent to start. Once everything was safely packed we had a talk about what to do in the different scenarios the river could likely spit at us and then, finally, we started our 5 day adventure down the Green River. As soon as we turned around the first river bend, I was in awe. I could not bring myself to take my eyes off of my surroundings and nor did I need to. As the ducky rocked slowly back and forth with the tide, I concentrated on the feeling of the warm sun on my skin, the ageless red canyons directing the flow of the river, the sand, shrubs and occasional wildlife on the banks that guided us. I let my fingers, ever so gently, graze the tip of the water. We continued to float down the river for a little while longer and then stopped on a small bank for lunch.
Each of us dug into our coolers to retrieve different lunch items including bread, tortillas, meat, cheese, lettuce, pickles, tomatoes, onions, mustard, mayo, crackers and cheese. Nobody hesitated to dig in. As I finished my lunch, I let my eyes wander. Like a child at disneyland for the first time, my heart started to flutter and I immediately directed my gaze toward the river. The water was a soothing shade of green and as the piercing rays of the sun hit the water, the river looked like a thousand emerald gems. In this small and simple place alone, the beauty was overwhelming. The river seemed to be calling my name, asking me to become lost within it. Encouraging me to trust it and to surrender myself to it. As I submerged the entirety of my body into the water, a peaceful bliss washed over me. All the worried thoughts, questions and anxious yelling that constantly ran around my brain making my head ache, was silenced. I felt as if the weight that was so heavily bestowed onto my shoulders was lifted by the gentle current of the river. The weight that came from school, home life, stress, anxiety and the struggle for finding myself within this world was simply swept away with the tide. I was washed clean of all of it.
I came to the surface for a gasp of air and then submerged myself again. A feeling of deep gratitude washed over me and I realized just how lucky I was to be able to be where I was. This sense of gratitude anchored itself deep into my heart as I also recognized that this generation lives in the technological age where we can pretty much do anything we want but we don’t really stop and think if we actually should. I fear that many people within this world today are so glued to tv, cellphone and computer screens and so hungry to develop the world, that they might not ever get the chance to experience a place like this. One of my greatest fears is that with the rate the world is changing and developing, there may not be many more places like the Green River left on this Earth. Pollution and radiation threaten places like this daily. This is already evident in our very own Animas River. The part of the Animas that flows up near Silverton is so polluted that there is no sign of life. Our careless acts could very well be the reason these places slowly start to vanish. What will we do when we have completely developed and or ruined every last place like this? In Desert Solitaire, Edward Abbey once wrote, “ We need wilderness whether or not we ever set foot in it. We need a refuge even though we may never set foot in it. We need the possibility of escape as surely as we need hope; without it life in the cities would drive all men into crime or drugs or psychoanalysis”. His idea strives to acknowledge the fact that everyone needs a special place to lose themselves within, a place where the mind and body can be peaceful. Whether that place be a river, canyon, city, ocean, mountain, lake or a bamboo forest, it doesn’t matter. I want my children, grand-children and great great grandchildren to be able to come to a place like the Green River sometime within their lifespan. I want these types of places to be accessible to them and not just stories that have been past down by past generations.
I came to the water’s surface for a second time and stepped slowly out of the water. Resting myself on the warm sand, I watched as the boys played frisbee and jumped off the raft into the the sluggish river. As I watched the frisbee fly through the air, I was reminded of the many times we spent throwing the frisbee around in the village green at Heartwood. I thought back to the time when my family and I had just made the move to Durango, Colorado from Maui, Hawaii. At that time in my life, I was mad at my mother and mad at the world because my mother took me away from a place that I not only grew up on but also everything I had ever known, a place that I loved. We had just moved into our house in Heartwood and I had no interest in getting to know anyone or do anything. I was stuck in a tidal wave of emotions. Each time I would try and gasp for air, I was sucked into the current while the wave of emotions would drown me over and over again. I was sitting on the bench outside of our house when a woman with curly brown hair and beautiful hazel eyes approached me and said “My name is Carin, I live in the house right next to you. If you ever need anything just feel free to come on over and ask, treat me like I am your mother.” It was at that moment that I knew I was at home.
After I had gotten used to the community and met everyone I began to feel more and more comfortable and I grew happier. I began to spend time with Gabe, Jj, Helen, Al, Joe, Bekah and Amanda regularly and soon I was good friends with all of them. They helped me get through the move and showed me all the fun things to do around Heartwood and Durango. Soon I felt glued to the community and as I reflected on how blessed I was to end up here I realized that the first day when Carin came up to me, she represented the type of people in Heartwood. I also realized that as long as I was with these people, no matter where I was, it would feel like home. It was this same feeling of being at home that came over me while I was on the Green River.
***
Once we had all finished our lunch, taken the time to explore and had played at least 10 minutes of frisbee, we continued to follow the meandering of the river as it cut its way through the canyon until it was time to set up camp for the night. Once we had located our campsite, pulled out of the water and unloaded the rafts, once again we began to set up sleeping spaces and the kitchen. This would be the routine twice a day for our 5 days on the river. Later, after dinner was made, eaten, and the supplies were cleaned and put away, we played koob, bocce ball or frisbee until the sun had set and we were embraced by the silent darkness. After a long, enticing and peaceful day on the river, I rested my head on my pillow and pulled my sleeping bag over my body. As I laid there with Al and Helen on either side of me, I gazed up at the endless, starry sky above. My eyes fluttered for a few seconds and then as if my eyelids weighed the weight of the world, I closed my eyes completely letting the soothing sound of the river guide me as I drifted into the vast darkness and the world of dreams, dreams that entailed the river continuing to flow through the red canyons for many years to come.