Correction

A few days ago, I wrote about the Little Salt Lake. I called it a "salt flat." That is not correct. The LSL is, in fact, a "playa," which sounds much better. The salt on the bed of the playa comes from minerals that precipitated from the lake water as it evaporated, probably thousands of years ago. The authors of "Geology Underfoot in Southern Utah" are the source of my new information (Orndorff, Wieder, and Futey). They believe that the Little Salt Lake was caused by freshwater snowmelt becoming trapped in the Parowan Valley from the emergence of the Red Hills ridge about two million years ago. This was during a cool, wet period, which eventually gave way to a hotter, dryer climate, reducing the fresh-water input to the lake and evaporating the rest.

Rural Ways are Good for You

Both of my readers know that I have an antipathy for urban areas. Even Parowan, Utah, the small town where I live, is too busy for me, and I would prefer to live on the farm. What has not been shown . . . until now . . . is that our lifestyle choices at Rural Ways have protected us from schizophrenia. That's right, country living is good for your mental health.

Doctor Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg of the University of Heidelberg's Central Institute of Mental Health in Mannheim, Germany has just published a study in Nature proving that city dwellers are more prone to mental disorders than those of us who live in small towns: "[S]chizophrenia is twice as common in those who are city-born and raised as in those from the countryside, and the bigger the city, the higher the risk." City dwellers evidently respond to stress differently than do rural folk, and that stress response sometimes signals the onset of psychosis.

It is, however, a sad truth that not everyone can live in the country. Some people must live in the city in order to pursue a career or to care for family. And, it is possible that some people even like living in a city, though it is hard to see why. In any case, for those who must live in the city, but want to avoid schizophrenia, what is to be done?

Professor Meyer-Lindenberg has not answered that question with his current study, but a solution seems worth pursuing. For now, however, I'd recommend a daily dose of Rural Ways. After all, it can't hurt, and it may well keep you from going crazy.

Sunrise on the Little Salt Lake

The Parowan Valley has a place called the Little Salt Lake. It is not really a lake the way someone from, say, Minnesota, would conceive of it. For one thing, it contains no water; and, for another, it is flat. Which is to say that the Little Salt Lake is a salt flat. On hot, windy days, it is nice to go out there and watch the towering clouds of alkali dust build like columns of smoke.

This year, however, much of the western United States has enjoyed a near record snowfall in conjunction with a late spring warm-up. In Utah, many of the river basins have accumulated (and retained) up to 200 percent of the normal water supply. As that snow-pack melts, many areas are at risk for flooding . . . including the Little Salt Lake. So, the other day, I drove out there to see where all the run-off was going. It was going into the lake, and it made me think of the canoe.

This morning, at sunrise, I launched the Old Town on the Little Salt Lake. I'm not sure, but I'd guess, that it was the first Old Town ever paddled on the Little Salt Lake. Actually, no paddling occurred because there wasn't enough water. The Little Salt Lake is probably two to three thousand acres in extent. The entire lake is currently covered with water, but it is only one inch deep. I moved the canoe away from the shore by pushing on the lake bottom with a paddle. The bottom consisted of five inches of saturated muck, so the going was slow. After pushing out a couple of hundred yards, nothing had changed (I had hoped to float), so I pushed myself back and went home.

It was a failed endeavor, I suppose, but the lake was quiet at six in the morning, and calm, and beautiful. That is something. Besides, I'll probably never meet another person who can say, "I paddled the Little Salt Lake."

Solstice at the Gap

Near town, there is a collection of ancient petroglyphs considered to be one of the largest in the western United States. The panels of rock art are located at a place called the Parowan Gap, which is a narrow canyon that cuts through a ridge of rock between the Parowan Valley and the Escalante Desert. Created by Fremont Indians and "discovered" by the Parley Pratt expedition, the petroglyphs, at least some of them, served as a kind of solar calendar. For that reason, the summer solstice is celebrated at the Gap each year by the Piute Tribe, by the local tourism bureaus, and by the BLM. If you are in southern Utah today, the event will be "observed" at sunset.

Defending Champ

Last year, Valerie won the poster design contest for the Cedar Breaks National Monument Wildflower Festival. For 2011, she submitted another image, and . . . won again. The Wildflower Festival will run from July 8 through July 24. Valerie's painting can be viewed on their web site.

Immigrant Labor

When we bought The Homestead two and a half years ago, the roof leaked. Because the rough estimate for replacing it was $10,000, we needed to live with it until we could afford a new one. I patched it a few times, and it was more or less functional for the time being. This spring, however, we finally had a pot of money and we saw some new leaks developing, so it was time to find a roofer.

We called some numbers in the yellow pages, asked for advice around town, and talked to some local contractors. One thing we noticed is that some of the local (American) contractors sniffed at some of the other companies because the other companies hired non-local labor. "Of course, if you hire them, you'll get a crew of Mexicans." OK? So, are they corrupt? Are they part of the drug mafia? What? Why does it matter to me who swings the hammer?

In any case, the company we hired showed up with a crew of Mexicans. Holy schmoly, do those boys get after it. They work hard, they work fast, they do a great job, and they do it with smile—no whining. No wonder the other contractors hate them . . . their attitude is so un-American. At Rural Ways we don't like to think of ourselves as lazy, but next to these guys we're a bunch of slobs.

An acquaintance of Valerie's who is in the property management business whispered to her that Mexicans will work for $12 per hour, but Americans won't. Ah, so now the comments from the American contractors become clear. How Ayn Randian. These contractors are the James Taggarts of Parowan: It isn't good for society when you hire people who are willing to work harder for less. No. That makes us uncompetitive, and that is bad for the railroad.

Rural Ways Visits Vegas

In Las Vegas, I believe that it is possible to wager money on most sporting events. In fact, I believe that it is possible to place bets on individual performances within sporting events, like whether or not Derek Jeter will get a hit in the fourth inning of today's game. What I do not know is how to place the bet or collect my winnings. So, last night, as I wandered through a Vegas casino with one of my colleagues, I attempted to find out. I made my way to the sports betting portion of the casino and tried to follow the action. I don't know if it was the noise, the haze of cigarette smoke, or the free drinks, but I was unable to solve the mystery. There were dozens of television screens showing everything from horse racing to hockey; there were betting "windows" consisting of computer screens; and there were lots of people sitting there; but it was difficult to discern the winners from the losers. The participants didn't much like me looking over their shoulders either, and, after a couple of threatening glares, my colleague said, "Hey, we look like a couple of hayseeds. We'd better get out of here." So, we went—staggering through the maze, the din, the smoke, the slack jaws, and the half dark, looking for the door.

Globemallow

I plucked a sprig of orange globemallow from Cross Hollow this morning. The area has a paved road, a paved bike path, and a view of the Walmart parking lot. (I like to pick through the rocks and weeds sometimes to look at the broken bottles from the pre-Walmart period when Cedar City residents used the canyon for target practice.) In any case, I brought the globemallow home for Ellen's plant guide. It is a plant so common in southern Utah that I consider it a weed, but we needed a specimen for the book. (You can see it growing thickly along the trail in this picture.)

The funny thing is that Ellen picked her own sprig last week but was unable to bring it home. She was visiting the Cleveland-Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry in the San Rafael Swell last weekend when she stooped to pluck a flower. Before she could get out the door with it, however, she was accosted by the staff and had the globemallow forcibly confiscated. She was told that no one was allowed to take anything from the site.

Um? Are we in Utah? Is this the BLM? Has something changed? Having a little trouble with a sense of proportion, are we? Is this the same agency that is known as the Bureau of Livestock and Mining? Is this the source and location of most of our nation's natural gas wells? C'mon. This was a kid carrying a weed. Do you go home, in your smart BLM uniform, and smugly gloat about having saved the world from a first grader carrying a dandelion?

Ode to Ford and GM

A couple of weeks ago, we were driving our car in the Cedar City neighborhood where our in-laws live. We gave a friendly wave to a nice looking retired couple walking in the street. The poor woman started to wave and then took an involuntary step back, clutching at her throat with a look of horror. The car has multiple dents, broken headlights, dangling license plates, and just one hub cap. Moreover, the birds who have nested in our yard were using it as their potty. I laughed, and told Valerie, "Our car is covered with bird poo."

I was thinking about that incident last Friday while I drove the car over Bear Valley. On the way up the hill, the odometer rolled to 190,000. What a beast. In addition to that, the Chev turned 160,000 last month. By my calculations, those two vehicles have traveled 350,000 miles in a combined 35 years of existence.

When I was a kid, in the 1970s and 1980s, "Ford" was considered to be an acronym. It stood for "Found On Road. Dead." I remember carrying a shop full of tools in every vehicle because breakdowns were not uncommon. But, something had clearly changed by the mid-1990s when our two vehicles were built (1993 and 1995). Ford and GM, at least, added something called "reliability" to their manufacturing process. I still carry tools, but I seldom need to use them. How about a new acronym? "Forget abOut the wRenches, Dude."

Black Widow

When Rural Ways was located in Escalante, we were plagued with Black Widow spiders. In our first year, I killed probably a dozen of them inside the house. Parowan seems to have fewer of them, but there has apparently always been a nest right by the kitchen door. In the past two years, I have soaked that entire corner of the porch with "Home Defense" insect killer. I've soaked the ceiling, the walls, the window frames, the door frames . . . everything. Each time, the pesticide has killed the visible Black Widows, only to have them quickly return. Where are they coming from? This picture is of the current resident, sleeping a little late this morning.

Sleeping on Slickrock

I left my camp at the mouth of Steep Creek at 7a yesterday, headed for Water Canyon. Unfortunately, in the morning stillness, I neglected to consider the effect of the day's wind on my tent. What a rookie. Is it ever windy on a hot, sunny afternoon in southern Utah? On my way back down the Gulch later in the afternoon, the gusts were working me over and I started to worry about my camp. Rightfully so. The wind had picked the tent out of the little slickrock alcove in which I'd left it, rolled it across the cliff wall, and dropped it into a garden of prickly pear.

Now, hopefully you've never personally encountered a prickly pear, because it has more than a few two-inch spines as sharp as needles and as strong as nails. When I got the tent free, the inside of it looked like the mouth of a piranha. I spent a long time picking prickly pear spines from the tent and getting it ready to use again. Sleeping without it was impossible because the gnats were bad. Finally, I managed to contain the damage, pile some rocks on the tent, and make some dinner.

When I went to bed, I noticed that the slickrock felt a little harder than usual, so I put a couple of extra puffs of air into the Therma-Rest. After a while, I started feeling a rock against my back again, so I turned over and ran my hand down the pad. There it was: A prickly pear spine the size of finishing nail driven straight through the Therma-Rest. The pad had been in the tent when the tent set sail and must have landed directly on the thorn. Sleeping on slickrock is great when you have a pad; sleeping on slickrock when your pad has been punctured is like, well, sleeping on slickrock. Or, rather, it is like laying awake on slickrock until it is time to start the coffee.