The second photo exerts more pull on me-- fringe existence. When I first went there I needed that hard space, even its punishment, because I was in a similar state. Confession time. The planet should be more honest with me, I thought. I might be rescued from a land of plenty. I should mock my own good posture. Perhaps I was set adrift by that vision-- false, like the best of them. But I still take up the chase.
Several ridges northward is a dry lake playa which reclines for miles. On a good day it offers a hundred shades of white-hot tan and perspective-- a reset button. But it's a long trip. Pavement yields to earth, and earth to a concept. I cross countless summits and valleys toward something I had in mind. Patience. I follow a clay path to the playa-- a chalk river into a chalk sea. A resting place.
'a chalk river into a chalk sea'
A mirage floods the western horizon; deep blue, inviting. Pioneer tales of parched livestock stampeding to their death, toward the blue, must be true. Dust devils spin every way, churn across the mirage, leave a wake. The wind is an erratic soundtrack; a blast, then ringing stillness. A ridge of dolomite ascends lazily, showcases the bright clay below. There is no overt drama here. The angles are relaxed, the colors washed, and the light, true. I soak up the heat, the hours. I receive the blessing.
I notice the moving rocks when I venture out on foot. I might have missed them, except I've managed to slow my momentum. They're up to a foot in length, and each one leaves a smudged trail behind. Someone must have pushed them.... Except there are no tracks. I'm confronted with an odd mystery, out in a place as close to physical zero as it gets, where nothing should come as a surprise.
the moving rocks
Later, I learn that scientists have debated the moving rocks for quite some time. They moved, but no one has actually seen them move. Many theories have been sent up. Many have gone out to test their theories, from magnetism to moot. The best one so far posits high wind and rain-- slick playa syndrome. Suitably rare and suitably plausible, perhaps. But I'm more interested in the scientists than the science; those who obsess over this obscure flat and its odd indiscretions. Do we really want the answer? Would that be an advance, or subversion of yet another facet of wonder?
Yes, I know. I've unfairly pitted science against wonder. Everyone knows that wonder in fact drives science. Of course it does. What if we had every answer? What if we had the smallest building block? No more search. What then? Particle physicists pursue their quarks and gluons, closing in on God, and I imagine God is faintly amused.