Sitting at the full-size bar on the deck of this 200 thousand dollar houseboat watching the sunset over the red rocks and gentle waves kicked up by a 92 degree wind I am typing these words, I’m interrupted by the sounds of a drill and electric saw cutting a whole in a boat for a new subwoofer and Lady Gaga’s Poker Face being poorly sung by another boat full of drunk people who definitely think they are sexier than they really are. Next to me, not 50 feet away, is a family playing Settlers of Catan on their top deck, just like they played here on this very bar last night and the night before. This is lake life on Lake Powell.
People trek for five hours to arrive at Glenn Canyon Recreation Area to pay their 30 dollars and gain access to their extremely expensive boats. My friend, a surgeon, is part owner with his uncle and another who time-share this one but the opulent ski boat and the two jet skis are his. On the first day, I helped him a bit but mostly watched others assist him like nurses in an operating room to figure out why the engine just would not start. The next morning it simply turned over no problem.
The mostly college-age kids living here with me temporarily are good company discussing what they want to do with their lives, popular culture, good music, and teaching a old guy like me new games (like Castle) all while wearing their bikinis and board shorts. It’s fun, for sure. It’s just so bizarre, to me.
I deeply love and respect my friend so saying that I appreciate a different approach to life in general is not meant to be critical of his choices at all. It’s something we probably very much disagree about but never needs to be a subject of conversation. He respects me and even brags about me, embarassing me to his kids. The feeling is mutual. He is one of the hardest working, kindest humans I have ever known. I’m proud to call him my friend. But I can’t help writing my observtions as much as they might sound critical.
One word: why?
I’m quite sure my friend would answer: “family” because that is his heart and soul. He dedicates so much of his free time just enabling supremely amazing recreational possibilities for those he deeply loves, and even adopts, like he and his family did me when I could not abide being with my zealous, clueless Mormon family all those years ago (none of whom are now members of the church at all, ironically).
Perhaps I have been corrupted by living on Lake Norman. I go out from my patio, walk a few yards, and get my paddleboard on the lake. There’s no real fanfare, no day-long shopping excursion, no six-hour drive. It’s just there. Our apartment is humble, my rent is probably the cost of gasoline for one week of exursion in beautiful Lake Powell, not to mention the cost of maintenance and travel to get here. Other people on Lake Norman have multi-million dollar homes that they barely sleep in. I’m sure these same people would be playing Settlers (or something) here with us tonight if they grew up here.
What do the rich lake people from the East and West have in common?
A common disregard for spending exorbetent amounts of money on activites that could mostly be done without the boat or the lake, just being together, and a rather shallow view of the pristine nature all around them.
There went a jet-ski with what looked like a father and his two kids. The youngest was driving.
After we went to climb up a very intereting narrow canyon, and a few did some nice cliff jumping we came back and played some video games on the big screen TV in the boats fully air-conditioned main family room. On the way to the excursion we stopped and had soft-serve ice-cream from a tourist-trap shop in the middle of nowhere floating on a large dock that smelled like shit from all the stuff being pumped out. When I went to the visitor center I was locked and had spider webs on it.
“The what?” my friend said, when I said I wanted to check it out. It was like none of the three dozen people on the dock ever new it existed. They were there for the schwag and ice cream, which is absolutely fine, just so different.
It might just be a different personality and way to appreciate all this, but I am blow away by how disconnected most of these people I observe are from the incredible natural beauty all around them. Maybe that wore off after the first three days of a ten-day time-share rotation. My preference is to be entirely engulfed by nature (just not eaten), to be completely reminded that I’m just another animal on this planet at the fundamental level and really should remember how to act like it. For example, the moon and stars and meteor shower are visible to the naked eye in this beautiful place, and yet other than a “woah, look at the moon” moment here and there the desire to just sit and take it all in doesn’t seem to be present, in any of them. I’m the guy who ultimately gives in to the convenience of sleeping on the top deck of the house-boat rather than sleath camp under the stars someplace near the marina just to get as much view of that moon as possible. At least I get to enjoy the warm night breezes instead of freezing with the AC cranked inside.
As the setting sun sets ablaze the wispy clouds in the distance, just over my laptop screen, I look forward to meeting more like-minded nature lovers like myself on this journey. No amount of bad news, drama, or politics can taint the ominous beauty–in all it’s variety–of this wonderful country and world. That’s the reminder I constantly need.