Rock

When I was younger and went on vacations with my family, I took many pictures of rock. The Tetons, the Grand Canyon, Arches, Zion, etc. I took pictures of the rocks, of the scenery. It became a joke in my family, and it is a credit to my parents that they never gave me too much flack about paying to develop my many rolls of film when there wasn't a person to be found in any of them. Sadly, I was always disappointed that my pictures were completely unable to capture what I saw and they were a very poor second to actually being there

Even now, I'm still overwhelmed by how beautiful the mountains and the desert can be. Red rock country in particular (Arches, Zion, Bryce, Grand Canyon, etc.) is incredibly special to me. Just seeing it makes me happy, and sometimes I am so overwhelmed by how beautiful it is that I alternate between wanting to cry and wanting to scream out load. There is nothing like the desert. Nothing like the peace, the calm and the beauty that you can find there.

This past week I was down in St. George, Utah helping out the local health department with an investigation. St. George is in the far southwest of the state, about 40 miles from Zion National Park. Unfortunately I was too busy to make the hour drive each way to Zion, but I discovered an absolutely gorgeous state park just outside of St. George, Snow Canyon State Park. If any of you are in the St. George area at any point, I would strongly recommend making the detour to Snow Canyon. It isn't a particular large park, but every section is amazing. The hikes are on the shorter side (2-4 miles), but you can make them longer by stringing different ones together (I managed to cover 4 or 5 trails during my two hiking outings there.) If you're only going to do one hike, I'd pick the Lavarocks trail to the Whiterock trail which wanders through desert scrub, piles of volcanic rock from eruptions as recent as 10,000 years ago, and then climbs up to a white sandstone natural amphitheater, which is absolutely amazing.

I didn't have my camera with me, but thank goodness for my cell phone, since I still haven't gotten over taking pictures of rocks.



Rock.










Lava tunnels were formed when lava flowed along the ground, cooled and hardened on the outside, but insulated the lava inside so it continued to flow until a hollow tube was left. Sand and debris accumulated over the tunnels forming caves; sometimes the top of the tunnel collapsed and were opened to the environment. This is a deep hole (about 60 feet deep) formed by a succession of lava tunnels and other volcanic activity. Not exactly what you expect to find in the desert.




More rock. Because I can never get enough of it.











Me enjoying the rock.

a few of my favorite quotes

I've been collecting quotes since I was fairly young. I have an old spiral notebook that has followed me around through many moves, many states and many schools. The cover is about to fall off, but the pages are still intact and there are still a number of blank pages with room for more quotes.

Looking through the book is somewhat amusing, since it follows me through my various discoveries (books, music, etc). The first quotes are from Tolkien, then it moves to Sting and the Police (I really liked Sting when I was in junior high and high school), and then on to Ursula LeGuin and Frank Herbert. The most recent prominent contributor to the book has been Utah Phillips.

Anyway, here are a few of my favorites (in no particular order):
(The quotes are usually from specific characters in books, but I've usually attributed them directly to the author.)

"What is an anarchist? One, who choosing, accepts the responsibility of choice."
-Ursula LeGuin

"The trouble with being in the rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat."
-Lily Tomlin

"Janie's first dream was dead, so she became a woman."
-Zora Neale Hurston

"So the first step out of childhood is made all at once, without looking before or behind, without caution, and nothing held in reserve."
-Ursula LeGuin

"No darkness lasts forever. And even there, there are stars."
-Ursula LeGuin

"Those who ride the night winds must learn to love the stars."
-Nikki Giovanni

"I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with someone, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible."
-Billy Crystal (in When Harry Met Sally)

"My father once told me that respect for the truth comes close to being the basis for all morality."
-Frank Herbert

"Beyond a critical point within a finite space, freedom diminishes as numbers increase. This is as true of humans in the finite space of a planetary ecosystem as it is of gas molecules in a sealed flask. The human question is not how many can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of survival is possible for those who do survive."
-Frank Herbert

"The convoluted wordings of legalisms grew around the necessity to hide from ourselves the violence we intend toward each other. Between depriving a man of one hour of his life and depriving a man of his life, there exists only a difference of degree. You have done violence to him, consumed his energy. Elaborate euphemisms may conceal your intent to kill, but behind any use of power over another the ultimate assumption remains: 'I feed on your energy.'"
-Frank Herbert

"Whose truth? Modified in what way? In what context?"
-Frank Herbert

"There was a man who sat each day looking out through a narrow vertical opening where a single board had been removed from a tall wooden fence. Each day a wild ass of the desert passed outside the fence and across the narrow opening--first the nose, then the head, the forelegs, the long brown back, the hindlegs and lastly, the tail. One day the man leaded to his feet with the light of discovery in his eyes and shouted for all who could hear him 'It is obvious! The nose causes the tail!'"
-Frank Herbert

"To paraphrase Hamlet:
To fight perchance to win, aye there's the rub
For victory brings power and prestige
And the children of the children of the fighters
Take all for granted and, in turn, oppress."
-Pete Seeger

"Il est triste d'oublier un ami. Tout le mond n'a pas eu un ami."
(It is sad to forget a friend. Not everyone has had a friend.)
-The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)

"I believe that there will ultimately be a clash between the oppressed and those who do the oppressing. I believe that there will be a clash between those who want freedom, justice and equality for everyone and those who want to continue the system of exploitation. I believe there will be that kind of clash, but I don't think it will be based on the color of the skin."
-Malcolm X

"I had a bad day. I had to subvert my principles and kow tow to an idiot. Television makes these daily sacrifices possible."
-Matthew (the movie "Trust")

"Life sucks and then you become a communist."

"If you hate it so much why did you spend your entire career working for the government?"
"You know what Willie Sutton said when they asked him why he robbed banks? 'Cause that's where the money is.' This is where the diseases are. Bugs. Bugs. Bugs."
-And the Band Played On

"Noncooperation with evil is as much as duty as is cooperation with good."
-Gandhi

"Let me say, at the risk of seeming ridiculous, that the true revolutionary is guided by great feelings of love."
-Che Guevara

"At this hour what is dead is restless and what is living is burning."
-Li-Young Lee

"The militant, not the meek, shall inherit the earth."
-Mother Jones

"Tell them not to forget us, that our truth is also theirs."
-Javier, EZLN

"I am not an angry girl
But it seems I've got everyone fooled
Every time I say something they find hard to hear
They chalk it up to my anger
And never to their own fear."
-Ani Difranco

"If I can not dictate the conditions of my labor, I will henceforth refuse to work."
-Frying Pan Jack (quoted by Utah Phillips)

"To be truly radial, one must make hope possible, rather than despair convincing."
-Raymond Williams

"Ain't no man can avoid being born average, but there ain't no man got to be common."
-Satchel Paige

This has gotten rather ridiculous, so I'll stop now and save some for future posts.