Desert Graves (2021)

I looked up Barbara and Ray Hovatter and found this sad court case:

https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1172360/hovatter-v-she...

Apparently they were burned by an exploding butane tank.

Interesting post. I occasionally encounter signs of violent death while hiking in the woods. Where I live it is usually most obvious and dramatic during the winter, and usually caused by coyotes. Thankfully none of the remains I have discovered were human. The chaotic scenes left by our local coyote population is usually pretty shocking, even if you’ve seen it before. It’s a reminder that nature is both beautiful and brutal. Fortunately it’s usually pretty easy to avoid this kind of encounter; I am usually way off-piste when I stumble across them.

Lovely piece.

> Maybe it’s just me, but I find it kind of sad to think that you got buried in a grave with no headstone, no marker, no indication of who you were.

I appreciate this melancholy - even a compassionate wistfulness.

Conversely though - For me, it just feels part of an Ozymandian futility. If the suffering of dying + the suffering of others' grief are removed from the equation, it feels like there is an elegance to just dissolve back to the environment without a struggle, in a certain graceful way.

A headstone in that context is a 'struggle'.

To me, graves are for the living and never the dead.

In Ed Abbey's book, Desert Solitaire, he writes about a search mission to find a lost hiker somewhere in Canyonlands National Park, who was ultimately found dead, dying of heat and/or dehydration. He goes on to give some advice if you ever get caught in a similar situation, and, unlike this man, no one knows where you are and thus no rescue can be expected. In that case, wants to congratulate you for your noble death—it is good luck to die out in the open, alone, instead of under the “leech and priest.” Your bleached bones will remain where you died for some hiker to find someday and marvel at.

Sobering stories and photos. There is a beautiful stillness in the desert. Thanks for reminding me how much I miss it.