desert rattlesnakes are different

the view from Grandma's living room

I stayed with my grandma in the Mojave quite a bit when I was a kid, and I have memories of being terrified and feeling radically alone in the desert, during storms or when the Marines were bombing down the road. The desert opens up like the ocean, and Grandma's house used to seem like a tiny boat, far from land. 

You couldn't really go out at Grandma's house, either, because of the snakes. That was ok, mostly you wouldn't want to go out-- it was nice inside, sitting on the couch while Grandma put her hair up in curlers, the living room smelling like coffee, squishing the curlers between your fingers and making them bounce. When you would go out Grandma would yell after you, "watch out for the snakes!" 

I went to visit Grandma by myself when I was about 25, and at one point she mentioned offhandedly that she's only seen about five rattlesnakes in the 30+ years she's been in the desert. This was a bit surprising to me, I'd kind of imagined a snake shading itself next to every rock at Grandma's.

Not long after that visit I was in Joshua Tree National Park, camping with Jared. Joshua Tree is right down the way from Grandma's, and when we told her we were going she was like, "Oh, honey, I don't know why you'd want to sleep on the ground with all those snakes." 

It's strange with fear– it's not something you can just banish at will. You'd think you could just have a rational conversation with yourself and that would be that, but fear does, in fact, tend to shade itself under every rock and corner of the psyche. So I sat there in Joshua Tree on a big smooth golden rock, I wrote in my journal and watched chipmunks. I felt pretty comfortable on the rock, but I kind of clung to it like a raft. There is so much space in the desert, each sound has space around it, each thing is distinct, and my snake fear started to feel distinct as well, with its own texture and specific dimensions. It felt too big, and kind of silly, like an ugly heirloom that didn't fit with the rest of my emotional decor. 

After a while of starting at this thing, this big stupid fearball, I hopped up off the rock and told Jared I was going for a little walk by myself, and I headed out to find some snakes. I picked a path that looked promising and went. 

I grew up hiking around Northern California by myself, out in the foothills where we have plenty of rattlesnakes.  You keep an eye out for them but you go anyway. It was just in the desert that I felt paralyzed by them.

So I went, taking my throbbing fearball along with me, and walked down the trail alone. I kind of called to them–the snakes– with my mind, and sometimes whispered down at the rock shadows asking the snakes to come out. I just wanted to see one. I just wanted to see one and look it in the eye.

After an hour of rattlesnake hunting, I started thinking of rattlesnakes more like shooting stars, like something rare and exciting. None came out.

teeming with

Last weekend my mom and I were back in the desert visiting Grandma. When my mom and I went on a walk late in the afternoon Grandma called out after us, "this is when they like to come out and cool down!"

And it sucks, because it's not like you have this big rattlesnake-hunting walk in the desert by yourself when you're 25, learn the shape and texture of you fear and then that fear of desert rattlesnakes is just gone. Not quite like that. I went out, though.