Comments on: Perspectives on Water Conservation in Arizona http://fourcorners.blogs.plymouth.edu/2006/04/21/perspectives-on-water-conservation-in-arizona/ a bio-geo-outdoor course on the Colorado Plateau Mon, 24 Nov 2008 21:24:30 -0500 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: mmcgarry http://fourcorners.blogs.plymouth.edu/2006/04/21/perspectives-on-water-conservation-in-arizona/comment-page-1/#comment-5 mmcgarry Sun, 07 May 2006 15:34:56 +0000 http://fourcorners.blogs.plymouth.edu/2006/04/21/perspectives-on-water-conservation-in-arizona/#comment-5 I’m originally a westerner having grown up in Colorado and then I lived in Arizona- near Flagstaff, in Beaver Creek Canyon south of Flagstaff, in Oracle, Tucson, and Winkleman- all arid places, compared to New England. So, I forgot about the transition for Plymouth State University students coming to a high desert for the first time. Alyssa’s reflections on the sparseness of vegetation, especially while visiting schools on the Navajo Reservation, reminded me of one of my favorite authors- Byrd Baylor and his book, ‘The Desert Is Theirs,’ in which he writes about the Papago Indians near Phoenix, Arizona, but he could be writing about the Native Americans and animals who live in the high, arid country of the Colorado Plateau (1975, Aladdin Paperbacks, New York, N.Y.). Baylor’s poetic message is, “This is no place for anyone who wants soft hills and meadows and everything green, green, green… it's for strong brown Desert People... So from one short trip to the Four Corners, the PSU students might not fully appreciate that the ‘Desert People’ "like the land they live on" and they and the animals “share the feeling of being brothers in the desert, of being desert creatures together." I remember the first time I drove to the Colorado Plateau from Grand Junction in May ‘04 after a long absence, the globe mallow was in bloom everywhere and matched the surrounding sandstone spires, buttes, mesas, and canyons. All this color was so striking compared to the mud season in Maine I was leaving behind, that, like one of the lines in Baylor's poems, I could fully appreciate, "Where else would Desert People want to be.â€? I’m originally a westerner having grown up in Colorado and then I lived in Arizona- near Flagstaff, in Beaver Creek Canyon south of Flagstaff, in Oracle, Tucson, and Winkleman- all arid places, compared to New England. So, I forgot about the transition for Plymouth State University students coming to a high desert for the first time. Alyssa’s reflections on the sparseness of vegetation, especially while visiting schools on the Navajo Reservation, reminded me of one of my favorite authors- Byrd Baylor and his book, ‘The Desert Is Theirs,’ in which he writes about the Papago Indians near Phoenix, Arizona, but he could be writing about the Native Americans and animals who live in the high, arid country of the Colorado Plateau (1975, Aladdin Paperbacks, New York, N.Y.). Baylor’s poetic message is, “This is no place for anyone who wants soft hills and meadows and everything green, green, green… it’s for strong brown Desert People… So from one short trip to the Four Corners, the PSU students might not fully appreciate that the ‘Desert People’ “like the land they live on” and they and the animals “share the feeling of being brothers in the desert, of being desert creatures together.”

I remember the first time I drove to the Colorado Plateau from Grand Junction in May ‘04 after a long absence, the globe mallow was in bloom everywhere and matched the surrounding sandstone spires, buttes, mesas, and canyons. All this color was so striking compared to the mud season in Maine I was leaving behind, that, like one of the lines in Baylor’s poems, I could fully appreciate, “Where else would Desert People want to be.â€?

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