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Scenic/Desolate
More than a month ago, the Lab Lemming tapped me on the shoulder with a question:
I had some grad students over for dinner during my last break, and one of them asked me if my field areas were scenic, or just desolate. I wasn’t sure what the difference was, so I figured I’d let y’all make the call. And maybe this guy [link to CRN] can tell us how to tell them apart.
I told him that I’d have an answer for him in a couple days. I told him that in August. I finally have an answer, after much thinking.
It’s like this.
The coyotes kept waking you up last night, but you hardly minded. It had been too long since you’d heard them anyway. Eyes closed against the sunlight, you stretch languorously in your sleeping bag, wanting coffee. Perhaps you are alone, and waking from a bit of a dream about someone you love, and the last part of that dream to dissipate fully is your longing. Or perhaps that person is there with you in the flesh, and your first thought on waking is a sweet memory of the night’s lingering kisses by the light of an unobstructed galaxy, and your second thought a bit of gratitude when the scent of brewing coffee plays against your nostrils. A cactus wren’s joyful clatter sounds from right next to your head, it seems, and your eyes open almost involuntarily, and when you rub the blear from your eyes and blink to focus, that cup of coffee in hand if there is one, if what you see is this, that’s scenic.
Or.
You were driving late last night, trying to get back from the casinos in time for work on Monday morning, when your engine light went on. You cursed, hoping that a garage would appear before long, or even — after a few fretting miles — a pay phone. There was nothing, and no one on the road to flag down if you stopped. But that decision was made for you anyway when your engine died, and you had just enough momentum to get all the way off the road, stranded in the deep sand on the shoulder. Your phone searched in vain for a signal. Up went your hood, and you waited. For two hours, then three. There was no one. You had no water and you weren’t quite sure where you were, and despite all that you fought off the panic long enough to realize that the low range to your south was likely climbable, and that you would almost certainly get a cell signal from atop that. Halfway there after two hours of picking your way through the creosote and blackbrush, you realized you’d miss work anyway, that you were dead tired, and that it’d be easier to find your way once the sun started to come up, so you sat down on a drywash sandbar to rest for a moment and fell asleep almost immediately. That’s how it plays back in your mind when you wake, at least, a flash of memory to distract you from the sore throat and pasty tongue, and as you wake up fully, pull a cholla stem from your dress sock, dump the pebbles from your shoes and curse, if you raise your head and see this, that’s desolate.
Posted by: Chris Clarke
Note: A database glitch in 2008 ate a bunch of archived comments. Don't be offended if yours isn't here, or confused if the conversation seems disjointed. Thanks!
Oy gevalt!
Yes, that would be desolate.
(and I’m not even of the Chosen People!)
By: By sravana on 2007 10 03
Well. I guess that answers that.
By: By Charles on 2007 10 03
I love this.
I am tempted to steal the form for something about this funky little house I just rented.
By: By Theriomorph on 2007 10 05
Thanks Chris!
Sorry to respond so late, but I was in the field then on holiday.
My problem with your situation above is that they both assume that the outdoors is a place seperate to one’s place of employment- either a retreat or a barrier. So your situations are hard to apply to those of us who sleep under the stars at work, who fire up the generator at the first blush of dawn and try to finish breakfast bbefore the flies wake up.
I think that when the wilderness is simply part of the work environment, as opposed to something one drives to or through, then it is less straight forward.
By: By Lab Lemming on 2007 10 13
