Gratitude Practice 2015 Day #1: The Great Salt Lake
On occasion, Burke and I have the opportunity to dive west on a stretch of I-80 from Salt Lake City to the homey hamlet of Stansbury Park to visit family. I always enjoy these family visits which are bookmarked by a scenic view of the Great Salt Lake. Last night, as we made our way to Halloween Hotdogs and Hot Chocolate I was struck once again at the beauty of this iconic Utah landmark.
According to the Great Salt Lake Advisory Council website "Great Salt Lake is of hemispheric importance as both a refueling stop for millions of migratory birds and a nesting area for others. Eighty percent of Utah's wetlands surround the lake. The mineral extraction industry, duck hunting clubs, and the brine shrimp industry are dependent on the vitality of the lake. Nature enthusiasts flock to the lake because of its ecological importance. Utahans draw a significant amount of their heritage and identity from the lake."
And according to me, the Great Salt Lake is as weird as it is large and beautiful. If you catch it in the right light, usually close to sunrise or sunset, the surrounding mountain ranges paired with the billowing grasslands create a perfect container for miles and miles of shimmering glistening water and it takes my breath away...every time. It's murky and salty and smelly and strange and magical. For those not familiar with our most famous pond, it takes some real effort and planning to actually get into the water to float not swim and requires an immediate shower or bath once you exit the salty briny stew but it's worth the effort, at least once in your lifetime. Home to a handful of mountainous desert islands complete with roaming buffalo, microscopic brine shrimp, oolitic sand, and a world famous art installation, this salty puddle anchors Utah on the map and can be seen from space. It's massive beaches and sparsely shallow depths can be a bit deceiving even as there are deep wide sections that welcome sail boats and catamarans and only the most courageous kayakers.
As a child, my bedroom window faced west and I would look at the Great Salt Lake and one particular section of a mountain range found on Antelope Island morning and night as some kind of childlike safety ritual. From as early as I can remember, I claimed that one part of the far off mountain was...mine. Is the lake out there today? Can I see my mountain? Yep, yep, it's still there, we are good and all is well...was my ritual that I repeated morning and night. I always felt a strange sense of comfort and stability knowing it was...well, always there...right where it should be...down the big hill and directly west...its steady peak providing a western bumper and border to the world I knew as a child. In a sweet disconnected yet connected way the Great Salt Lake is a part of me...a tiny chunk of my heritage and identity and development is strangely connected to a large body of really salty water and accompanying island mountain peaks. It was not until my twenties that I had the means or wherewithal to venture beyond this western border but that is a story for another time. As an adult, I don't frequently recreate in the Great Salt Lake but I do search it out every time I fly in and out of the airport or drive northwest outside of the Salt Lake valley. I still look west at the massive water and searched to see if my section of the mountain is still there... and the lake and my mountain continued to stand courageously by. Today, I'm grateful that members of my family live in a small tucked away community nearing the banks of the Great Salt Lake so I can marvel at its grandeur from time to time and I'm grateful that I still feel connected and strangely comforted knowing it's always there.
P. S. "Hemispheric importance" will absolutely be my new favorite term going forward…
