Rattlesnake Lake is pretty gorgeous isn’t it? It gives me great joy to live so close to such natural beauty. Well, several years of drought and two winters where the polar vortex seemed to suck all our snow off to the rest of the country and it doesn’t look like that anymore.
No, now it looks like this.
Shocking isn’t it? We drove up there over the weekend just to see how the lake was doing during the drought. Tourists have increased dramatically so its not always easy for locals to get to the lake, even when they live as close as us. It floored us when we drove by, and we just had to stop and take a closer look. I was partly in awe of the unnatural, otherworldly beauty, but mostly it was a horror at how our lake had been so devastated so quickly.
The surrounding forest is holding up surprisingly well. The autumn rains are helping the grass, which had mostly died, to rebound quickly. A few people walked along the lake, doing what we were, gawking at this strange sight. The only people not quiet and somber were several very excited children and the parents and grandparents trying to explain the gravity of what they were seeing.
Walking out on the dry lake bed was haunting and ethereal. We were walking through a giant tomb that the drought had laid bare for our prying eyes. I was seeing things I wasn’t meant to see, and my presence felt almost disrespectful.
There was a grunged beauty the lake had carved into these tree stumps over the years, but I hope to not get too accustomed to it. Cross your fingers and pray that this season we have the heavy winter we so desperately need.
Thomas Alexander Books 