Can anything be truly empty?
We consider a glass empty even when it is entirely filled with air. Air is often dismissed and considered nothing. Yet, it is vital for our survival. Only a few moments go by without it and we are desperately searching for it.
We refer to ourselves as empty when we are feeling down, alone, depressed. The word itself has a sense of sadness to it. A negative connotation that is intrinsic in its definition. Empty means without, containing nothing, lacking meaning or sincerity or having no value.
Which brings us back to the start, is there anything that truly has no value?
We put in late.
The drive to the middle of nowhere followed by shuttle setup had taken most of the day. And the Alliance has a hard rule that any Indian food place in the middle of nowhere must be experienced. Bicknell wasn’t a place we expected good food, but it turned out to be another reason that hard rule exists.
We knew we weren’t going to put in many miles this first day, but we were all anxious to get on the river and experience this place. The Alliance had this trip fall through multiple times this year due to weather. We never expected to be able to float it in July because that typically isn’t possible.
The rafts were packed, shoving all of what we would need for a couple of days inside. The Forerunner was left parked in the flood plain and off we went. The river, while “doable,” wasn’t exactly rippin’. A couple of hours equated to a few miles and we found a giant sandbar to camp on. It was the kind of sandbar you hope for when you are in the middle of nowhere and you need a place to throw down. It was big, flat and had some pretty rad views.
Obviously, we were stoked. Not only were we finally on this trickle of water that is referred to as a river, but we had just scored a killer spot for the evening. It took a few minutes, but it quickly became clear that this place was empty. No trash. No red ants marching directly at you to get the crumbs you inevitably drop on the ground. Not even footprints. Nothing but the natural landscape we had come to observe seemingly untouched by other humans.
Empty.
The desert is often referred to as empty. Being my favorite ecosystem within which to roam, I can assure you there is no part of it, not even a tiny section of it, that is empty. Categorically speaking, it contains all kinds of things, it means more to those who get to know it than most other things and it absolutely has value. Even if you only consider the mental health healing properties it possesses, it is, as Visa taught us, priceless.
Maybe that is why it is called empty. Maybe it’s a ploy to get us to think that this land has no value, that there would be nothing lost if it were paved. Maybe that is the point. If something is viewed as negative space, we won’t ask the question of what is being lost when it slips away. Empty land is cheap. Why would someone buy land that was empty?
Maybe they know more than we think.
Alright boat, let’s go for a walk.
It became our mantra. A bit of sadistic humor mixed in with reality. The little beta we could find on floating this desert stream told us that the current flow was the sweet spot. Our experience was that said sweet spot meant floating for 20-30 yards, hitting a sandbar, getting out of our boat to drag it for 20-30 yards, flopping back into the boat to repeat.
It was not easy or quick going. The wrong person in this place could have completely ruined this trip. Had we come with the sole expectation of floating a river, the attitude of the trip could have quickly turned to pissed. Luckily, floating the river was the chosen method. The goal was to experience a place. And that meant dragging our boats for ten hours on day two.
It also meant camping on a tiny sandbar at the mouth of a slot canyon after 10 hours of moving only to have the wind pick up and rip through camp making it impossible to do much of anything beside getting sand in and on everything.
But when you give us a shitty campsite, a fierce wind storm and sand, we just go for another hike.
It all kind of makes sense.
The empty cup contains the one thing that we cannot survive without. That one thing that is abundant until it isn’t. That one thing that can cause the most violent panic in a human when it is denied. It’s the most valuable thing we have. Yet, we assign it no worth and could care less if it is clogged with the residue of our convenience. The cup is empty.
The desert is empty in the same way. I’ve come to the realization that without it, I’m not sure I could exist. Experiencing these empty places keeps the demons in my head from pulling that trigger. Know that when I disappear into the desert, it’s not because I want to be dead, but rather I wish to keep living. When I’m empty, I go to the desert to be filled with its emptiness. When I say that I’m deeply concerned about the paving of the desert, it’s because it is essential to my survival.
For that reason, I can only hope the desert stays the way it is. Empty.
P. L. and R.
