Response to RED

I don’t think I have ever read a book like this.  The collection of short stories of short stories and poems are perfect for describing the wilderness.  Her description of wilderness as being erotic, almost sexual, was novel and believable.

I found the sections titled ‘Perfect Kiva’ to be eye-opening.  The first half of the section describes a group of people searching for an alcove which was used by the Anasazi. The first question I had was — Who are the Anasazi? I did a little extra reading on Wikipedia about the Anasazi. I really like how they build their houses (pictured below). It makes sense to live that way in the desert. I gather that they are a very ancient people, ancestors of the Pueblo Indians.

As I continued to read the section, and learned that the ancient ladder had been removed and placed in a museum, I was kind of disappointed. I think if I were to go to the museum and see the ladder, I would appreciate it. However, after reading this section, I agree with the author in that the rightful place of the ladder is truly in the desert. It makes me wonder about the other artifacts in the museums and how long they were preserved in their rightful place before we decided they needed to be protected in a museum.

I became more interested in what it would be like to live in the desert, when I read about the couple who left their fast paced lives in order to live in the desert I was impressed. I think I could come up with a similar was of describing my fast place life. Wake up, hurry to work, hurry to class, quickly eat lunch, hurry to the next class, try and finish as much homework as possible, hurry to the barn and complete as many barn chores as I can before dinner, eat dinner, study some more, go to bed, wake up and do it again. When you put it in that context, you really do wonder if you are missing something else.  Further along, I was put at ease when the couple were dealing with the windstorm. In an0ther section, a woman was carried by the rapids of a flash flood. To me, it seems that  in the city you are struggling to make time and understand life, in the wilderness, you are simply struggling for life.  The idea of being caught in a flashflood is really frightening – although pretty like in the picture below. I just wonder if the choice between living in a city or in the wilderness is simply a choice between two evils. Maybe, Maybe not. Personally, I choose a little bit of both.

Now I’m done with my blog and I am going to hurry and eat breakfast, go to work and go to the barn for a few hours before going back to work.

Ah, life