Rock On

I spend my days wandering around the desert. I get paid to look at the plants, which is nice, but I spend all my spare time ogling at the ridiculousness of the rocks around me. It amazes me how diverse the geology around me can be- how much the rock-related scenery can change across a day's work. And of course, as the geology changes, the plants change, so really, it's okay that I look at rocks on the clock too.

Just in the past few weeks I've seen: Devil's Throat, a huge, pretty damn deep sinkhole that's slowing expanding to break-out of the BLM's fence, a red mountain and a blue mountain standing side by side, a new boulder-field cleaving perfectly square chunks about 10 ft tall, petroglyphs of people and sheep and squiggly circles carved in desert varnish on a sheer face about 15ft off the ground, mountains that raised up sideways- the rock layers jutting up 45 degrees off from horizontal, mesas held together by the solid slab on top while the slopes turn to scree and slide away, boulders with warts, new crystals and geodes for my ever-growing rock garden, pink gypsum soils that crumble under foot, red strips, cathedral peaks, cliffs, canyons, and a regular rainbow of soil samples.

Rocks were not this cool in Ohio. Or Virginia. Hell- we didn't even have rocks in Florida or out on the tundra. Perhaps that has something to do with why I'll never live in those two places ever again. There's just something...necessary... about topography.

So as I roam the desert, collecting data and plant specimens, I'm also collecting a list of rock-related questions I need someone to answer. I want to know the hows and whys of the my surroundings. I've been working my way through John McPhee's beautiful books on geology, The Annals of the Former World, and his descriptions pretty much make me giddy. I am in love with his love affair for geologist jargon.

But frankly, I don't really want to become an amateur geologist. My brain is too full of plant families, too busy half-consciously checking for stellate hairs and counting sepals. I just want to carry a geologist around with me to satisfy my curiosities as they arrive. That would be so useful. Lauren told me once, as we were mocking ornithologists' OCD and herpetologists' weirdness that I should marry a geologist. I think she's right- we could be the perfect play-outside couple: who really needs to know what kind of a rattlesnake it is anyways, right? Just don't piss it off.

I haven't quite decided to start hanging fliers to advertise myself around the geo building at UNLV, but I think I probably should. As far as I know, there's only one geologist likely to be reading this blog, unless Nancy forwards it to her nephew in another attempt to set us up, so Perry, I hope this doesn't feel awkwardly like a marriage proposal. Unless of course you'd be interested.

My desperation aside, the real point is that the rocks out here really rock. It's hard to resist getting to know them, photograph them, climb them, claim the small shiny ones for my collection. I'm looking forward to the arrival of some visitors these next few weeks, to show off all of the beautiful places I've discovered. I still don't know the hows or the whys, but i feel like the where is a pretty great place to start.