Abbey Close Reading

      Abbey is extremely detailed in his observations of Utah’s desert. The reading starts of with him arguing with a man from Cleveland, which if you know your geography is located right on banks of Lake Erie. Lake Erie is a fresh water lake along with the 4 other great lakes. The man from Cleveland says that if Utah had a lake like Ohio it would be green and you would never have to worry about fresh water. Abbey goes on to describe some of the ponds and bodies of water in Utah that are very strange and unusual. Abbey describes some of the dangers of the desert like flash floods and quicksand. He tells the reader about his own experiences with these and some other second hand stories. Abbey does a great job of painting the landscape with his words.

Some of my observations were:

-     -  They are in the desert

-      - Its extremely hot and dry so maybe it is the dry season

-      - It seems as if Abbey is having flash backs to other times he has been at the desert and tells his reader of them.

-     -  He got caught in a flash flood once

-      - He helps a friend out of quick sand

-      - He is very much like jack Kerouac in that he loves the vastness of an area and is against the urbanization rural area

Patterns:

-      - the dry and extreme heat

-     -  the dangers of the desert

-      - the flash backs of other occurrences of being in the desert

Meaning:

       - I think that Abbey is trying to defend a land that he believes is so precious. The beginning of the story starts with him arguing with a man from Cleveland who is a tourist. The tourist does not take a great liking to the landscape where as Abbey is in love with it and he says to the tourist that is why I live here and you live there and we are content on where we live. He goes on to tell the reader of the dangers of the desert but they are only dangers to an outsider. Abbey knows the dangers of the desert and accepts them for what they are not what they can do. Lastly, Abbey tells us that he doesn’t think corporate America should be building metropolises in these areas because of the things we have to go through to keep a certain quality of life.