Aridification

It had rained hard. Of course, that's what we were told. Enough water to turn tracks into creeks and dune swales into lakes. Rain had been expected for a while. Expected for longer by the land. We weren't there to see the aftermath firsthand. The creeks and the lakes. It was too wet to work.

7 days later was ok though. Just manageable after a long anticipated event. Flying over salt lakes filled to their shiny edges, plumes of dust could be seen in between. Trucks on the move through dry, engulfed in wet. I still expected ducks on the road.

There was not one. The plume of dust briefly pausing behind us as a reminder that it had rained. It had been wet. Sprays of green had taken advantage but as the sun set and the mosquitoes rose, not so much as a bleet from a frog settled the evening soundscape.

Morning felt the still chill and downhill movement revealed puddles and the smallest waterfalls you've ever seen. A patchwork across a parched landscape. With some steps the ground cracked. The next they silently slid. No frightened buttonquail exploding underfoot, just hiding, frozen behind hummocks.

That ground speckled with indentations. Holding onto the imprint of the rain rather than the water itself. Those speckles would stay for weeks as the sliding resided and the dust plume became a permanence. They crusted, not interspersed by the tracks and traces of exploding life. Not so much as a boom before bust. A fizzle.

It had rained. But that impressionable landscape fleeted through its moments. It had been in drought for many years. It might have been too dry to respond.