There is nothing spectacular here. It’s mostly sand, creosote bush, and rock with a few hills thrown in. We are about 10 miles north of Yuma, camped out in unregulated land owned by the Bureau of Land Management, BLM land. The lake was created by a dam, probably for the purpose of agriculture. Most of the winter greens we find in our supermarkets come from this area. The lake is a side show of the Colorado River as it makes its way toward the Sea [though as we have learned it never quite made it all the way there]. Just north of the lake area is a military base and target area. Sometimes in the morning you can hear bombs explode as pilots practice their deadly craft. We are set up in a dry area which was once under water, when the water was abundant here. That was a long time ago. It doesn’t sound like a place one would want to be, but we drove 2300 miles to get to this spot and we have been right here 4,5 times before. Why here?
Mittry Lake is spectacular in its ordinariness. The lake is fairly large and surrounded by reeds 6-8 feet high. Feeding on the water are these little black duck with white bills. They cruise this way and that looking for whatever tasty morsels they can find. From where we are camped, we can’t see the lake, but we can here the birds, feel the gentle afternoon breeze and smell the moist air. Not your typical desert stop, but this place has roads to walk and hills to climb. But mostly what it has is peace. It’s the kind of peace that only nature provides. Quiet, ordinary, and familiar. In the warm sun, peace floods the heart beckoning your inner calm to come out and play. It pulls you into an ease of thought and body. It washes over the mind until all that is left is a simple awe inspired stare at the wonders of this planet.
Take this picture for example. What you see looks like a mountain with a butte on top. But that isn’t the mountain that was there. It is the remains of a volcano much higher than the pile of rocks you see. The central core of that once active vent filled with lava becoming solid rock over time. The butte we see on top is really a core of solid lava turned to stone. It’s the plug, if you will, that remains after the softer rock around it wore away. Think of the majesty of time involved in opening the earth; spewing out hot rock high enough to make the original monster; then cooling solid; finally, to be warn away by water until it is as we see it today. But it’s just ordinary, there are SIX of those buttes – those ancient volcanic vents- in that little mountain rage alone.
Our day begins at 7:00 AM it’s feeding time for the cats and they will not wait longer. I meditate for 30-40 minutes while Stacie reads, or pets our little friends, exhausted from their feeding frensy. Then I make coffee, lattes really, and we catch up on the morning news discussing this and that guessing the impact of the day’s events. After that we repeat our daily affirmations and say a little prayer to start the day. It’s 9:30. Nothing moves fast in the desert. We get ready for the day doing our “have toos” [brushing teeth etc.] It’s a coordinated ballet in a 19 foot can with only12sq. feet of actual floor space. But we have worked it out; dishes washed; trash removed; litter box cleaned. Around 10:30 we take the cats for a walk, or rather we follow them around for ½ hour. On their leashes they ramble through the sights and smells of the desert. A moth here, a ground squirrel hole there, and they are in heaven. Running as only young cats can, here, and there until there is nothing more to do. Everything is in its place. Its lunch time for me, gotta keep fire in the furnace you know. And when lunch is done we walk. We walk on the road; up the hills; close to the lake. Two miles or three, maybe even more. As we walk we share progress in the books we read, we share the silence, and we share the majesty of walking along a perfectly ordinary road, in a perfectly ordinary landscape; filled with perfectly ordinary wonder. Back at the Trek, we read, Stacie
might use her metal detector, maybe take the cats on a second walk and before you know it five o’clock; feeding time once again. But this time we eat as well. We eat less meat than we used to, last night for example we had sweet potatoes and a salad. It’s really all we need. Nighttime comes about six. We roll up the lawn chairs and anything else outside. Keep the cats inside and away from wandering coyotes. Read some more of our favorite books. Lastly, we watch a movie or a series episode we have downloaded and gently fall asleep.
That is a perfectly ordinary day, in a perfectly ordinary place. And we wouldn’t miss it for the world.
