I’m hiking with Matt Seats, one of my orientation leaders. We pass the wilderness boundary and head down into Wet Beaver Creek canyon. We are transported from the heat of the semi-high desert (4000 feet) in late-April, surrounded by mesquite, juniper, prickly pear, Mormon tea, into the cool creek, filled with cottonwoods and willows on both banks. We wade in the water when it’s knee-deep and pack-swim when it’s deeper, calmed and comforted by the sound of water flowing, brought back to the Virginia woods we both grew up by.

Desert oasis
Wrens sing and trout swim downstream
Our home keeps moving