People envision a lot of weird things when they think of Utah, such as dirty old men that accumulate wives like I accumulate shoes. While Utah is not the polygamist paradise of imaginings or much like what most outsiders picture in many other regards, it does contain a lot of secluded locations with distinctive flavors worth a second take…or a double take.
Since I started attending photography classes last year, I have documented, via snapshot, a few of Utah’s strange habitats and unique quirks as I’ve come across them. Although I’m sure that this photographing will continue as I find more wacky spots, allow me to share some of the uncommonness, and bizarreness, that I’ve found within Utah’s borders thus far.
Elberta, a tiny town on the far side of Utah Lake, is a real throwback down to its vintage gas station.
This shoe tree can be found out in the desert near Delta.
Delta’s shoe tree is covered in everything from ski boots to Converse sneakers.
Antelope Island, on the Great Salt Lake, is home to a herd of bison.
These Antelope Island bison weren’t particularly eager for human contact but they weren’t too shy either.
We journeyed onto the Great Salt Lake via Farmington Bay last January. Talk about some serious oddballs! Spheres of puffy snow rumpled the lake’s surface and dumbfounded us.
The Great Salt Lake doesn’t freeze in winter due to its salinity but its surface ices enough for current rivers to emerge.
The snow near the Great Salt Lake crystallizes peculiarly. Is it the presence of sodium chloride or could it be Metachlorians? You got me.
The town of Thistle was wiped out in a landslide in 1983, the most costly landslide in U.S. history. This house has remained submerged in that ghost town’s muck ever since.
These bits of deteriorating stone and rotting wood are all that remain of the Thistle schoolhouse after 30 years of abandonment. It was one of the few buildings left standing when 65,000 acre-feet of water flooded the town in ’83.
Technically, I came across this conglomeration of signs just beyond Utah’s boundaries but, in my opinion, it was close enough.
Yes, Utah’s got some weirdness but who’d want to live in a state devoid of eccentricity and headshake-worthy places?
If you are like the average person, you probably think about your teeth roughly four minutes a day at most…unless you are the unfortunate victim of a toothache, in which case you may find it difficult to think about anything else. Yes, most of us only give our chompers a passing thought in the morning and evening as we do our ritual brushing until something goes horribly wrong…or even a little wrong. Teeth, like that grouchy old man next door, are easily irritated. Recently I’ve had some ill-fated misfortunes in the molar department. Since February is a time for gushing tales of star-crossed lovers, in that celebrated tradition I humbly present to you this riveting story of my star-crossed teeth.
On New Year’s Eve I noticed that one side of my mouth seemed unusually sensitive but I didn’t give it much thought. (I suffer from a wanton disregard of pain.) However, later that evening, when Jason and I got home from our revelries, we decided to have a little snack and a few nibbles into that pizza my mouth got mean beyond even my ability to ignore. It suddenly hurt to bite on my left side, which started throbbing. I noticed, upon tongue probing, that there was a jagged spot on one of my molars. It felt like a crack. Oh hateful fate!
I nearly swallowed this chunk of faux-enamel.
Seeing as it was New Year’s, there seemed to be little I could do to remedy the situation immediately but the day following the holiday I called my dentist. Of course, as luck would have it, he was out of town and wouldn’t be able to see me for almost a week. That delay didn’t seem too grievous. So what if I had to bite on one side for a few days or so. No biggie. Until…
That evening I was chewing some gum, only on my good side of course, and I must have just barely brushed the questionable part of my maw with it because all of a sudden I found myself chewing on a large chunk of tooth. When you’ve just spit out a big piece of molar and you have no idea what pain’s got in store for you and no help is imminent, panicking is advisable. (Ninety-five percent of those polled agree.) That’s exactly what I did. A restless night followed as visions of unmentionable toothache terrors filled my anxious head.
Biting on my troubled side had already been out of the question but I now found that drinking was also a big problem. Anything liquid coming into contact with the exposed area of my mouth made my nerves light up like a Christmas tree from hell. So I resorted to drinking gracelessly through a straw crammed in my good cheek. Yes, it was as awkward and inefficient as it sounds. Hence, I was perpetually thirsty and probably perpetually ornery. Within a few days, I realized that I could drink without a straw by holding incoming liquids on the roof of my mouth with my tongue, shepherding them away from my problem spot. As excited as I was about this breakthrough, my newfound method of drinking proved only slightly less annoying than my sucky one.
Drinking lopsidedly through a straw was neither convenient nor dignified but, in the interest of pain prevention, it was necessary.
When my big day with the dentist came, as suspected, he told me that a crown had broken but that the tooth underneath looked perfect. He didn’t have time to put a new crown on right then but he didn’t seem too concerned with the situation. He rubbed some sort of desensitizing agent on my tooth and told me that I could bite on that side and drink like normal until my next appointment in another week. Sounded pretty good…in theory.
I had confidence in my dentist’s judgment and faithfully tried chewing on my broken side after that first meeting but, surprisingly, it still hurt like the dickens to do so and I soon had to abort the notion. Drinking was slightly better than before with the desensitizer but not much. I wondered why the dentist’s estimations were so far from my reality. The engrossing answers to these perplexities were all revealed at my next appointment. Read on fair readers, read on.
When I went in the following week to get my broken crown removed and a temporary one put in its place, and had a whole herd of hands in my mouth, I noticed that the dentist got a surprised look on his face at one point and asked one of his assistants for some sort of something in a hurry. I didn’t know what it was all about but it didn’t seem like it could be good.
It turns out that the tooth underneath my shattered crown was cracked. When the dentist removed the broken porcelain, this became apparent. After being bonded to fix that crack, temporarily crowned and then permanently covered, my molar is now back in action. It took five weeks in total for this all to happen and yes, there was a lot of agony involved in those procedures so ouch, ouch, ouch for the record.
For the curious or the likewise injured: pain when biting and sensitivity to liquids are both symptoms of a cracked tooth. Yes, the grand plan of the creator completely makes sense now. X-rays may not show a tooth crack incidentally, which was true in my case. Cracks can cause any crowns that cover them to fracture but crowns don’t need any help in failing apparently; they break on average every five to fifteen years. If one lasts a decade then the dentist can pat himself on the back for a job well done. I guess that means I can look forward to repeating this woeful experience at least a few more times in my life. Is there no relief for the star-crossed?
It’s hard to say goodbye to an old friend, especially when that friend has carried you through many highs and lows, from dipping arid wastelands to lofty peaks. When that buddy has been a part of the happiest adventures of your life, separating from them is painful.
Jason and I purchased my trusty Mazda Protégé, Roxy, used shortly after we got married. Before we bought her we were sharing a car, which was highly inconvenient since my workday started at 5:00 AM and his began a few hours later in the opposite direction. We had to come up with an elaborate drop off scheme to get to our jobs. Needless to say, we were extremely grateful for a second car. We purchased Roxy for very little but, to a couple of poor newlyweds, she was the height of sophistication. With power windows, electric door locks, cruise control, and comfy seats she felt like a Rolls-Royce to us. Over the years Roxy proved herself far more valuable than her cheap price tag would suggest. Besides a couple of small AC and CV joint repairs, she never really asked us for anything so I was in no hurry to swap her. Although most of our friends kept changing vehicles and nagging us about trading up, I was prepared to hold onto that car until her bumper fell off but I guess all good things must eventually end.
It’s hard to believe that these dings represent $1600.
Roxy was aging very well but Jason and I decided a couple of years ago that we should start saving for a new vehicle since there was no telling when she’d begin to break down. We intended on replacing her roughly sometime this winter. This plan sounded reasonable in theory but Jason may not have ever been able to convince me to go through with it if it hadn’t been for an especially snowy winter day. That particular December morning I-15 hadn’t been plowed even though about 4 inches of snow had accumulated on it. Jason was driving Roxy to work and, like most of the other commuters, he was moving at only 15 MPH due to the slick conditions but, leisurely pace notwithstanding, about halfway through his travels he suddenly started sliding into an adjacent lane. Despite his best efforts, there was just no going back. He ended up hitting a large truck that was inconveniently in the exact spot Roxy was destined to occupy. Roxy only had cosmetic damage from this incident but it was enough dints and dings to total her. Rather than paying to fix her up, we decided we’d keep her until she hit 200,000 miles, a target she was quickly approaching, and then sell her to Jason’s brother. That meant it was time to shop.
We reached 200,000 miles on Roxy with barely any repair bumps along the way.
Jason and I are not the type of people that purchase cars on a whim. We look up as much information as possible on the vehicle class we are considering and then we test drive like crazy, examine additional figures, and ponder some more. This style of shopping is time-consuming but it has served us well. Since we’ve been extremely happy with the cars we’ve purchased using this method, we weren’t about to alter our system. Hence, it took us months to decide what we wanted to buy this time.
Our new vehicle needed to be a small or crossover SUV with 4WD or AWD. We were done skating on freeways and we wanted something hardier for our biking/snowboarding adventures. We were also looking for a car with good gas mileage that was little enough to fit easily into our cramped garage. Room to load up our bikes and boards was also a requirement. We are usually used car people, new cars really are a waste of money, but in this particular case, with our specialized needs, we found that the contenders in the used arena were pretty limited and not much cheaper. We realized that in order to get what we wanted we’d have to buy new.
As we began searching lots of spanking new vehicles, we discovered that it’s harder to shop for a new car than a used one. With new cars the selection is plentiful and the options are many: makes, models, colors, innards…we were a bit overloaded. After weeks of researching and test driving, we finally focused our attention on the Subaru Outback and Forester. We debated back and forth between these two for days but in the end I just couldn’t say no to the Forester’s large windows and spacious interior. (And Jason just can’t say no to me.) So the 2014 2.5i Limited Forester it was. The 2014 model, which has improved gas mileage, better torque, a streamlined exterior, and a swankier interior compared to the 2013, had only been shipped in restricted quantities to dealers two days earlier. Ours wasn’t even technically on the dealer’s lot when we bought it. We had the distinction of owning the only 2014 Forester on the road in Utah when we drove that baby home, a distinction I’m sure we’ve already long lost at this point. It’s barely 2013 so it doesn’t make sense that the 2014 is available at all; just try not to think about it too much. I’ve named our Forester Woodford, or Woody for short. (It’s a Forester and its name is Woody. Get it?) I love how open this SUV feels with its giant windows and huge sunroof. Woody already has quite the fan in me.
Woody is a cute and friendly car. He’s just what I was looking for.
But alas, with Woody purchased it was time to part ways with Roxy. Jason’s little brother was very excited about having a car of his own; however, I wasn’t very excited about letting her go. I’m only a little ashamed to say that before we dropped Roxy off at his house I cried. I know, with my many layers of sarcasm and constant teasing, I don’t seem like the sentimental type but deep in this complicated heart is plenty of emotional turbulence that usually emerges at embarrassing times.
Roxy has not only been a very reliable car but she’s been part of a lot of wonderful memories. My whole married life, which has been extraordinarily happy, has passed in the presence of that vehicle. Her aging is a reminder of just how much time has elapsed for me as well. Where have the years gone? It was hard to say goodbye. I’m sure Matt will take good care of her and she’ll be as dependable a friend to him as she was to me but I’ll miss her still. Here’s to Roxy! My classy girl that has far outlasted many “superior” vehicles!
Roxy is my kind of girl: steady, comfy, small but gutsy.
A post script: I miss the straightforwardness of older vehicles. What happened to the days when a power door lock was as fancy as it got? When you would turn the heat on if you got cold and the AC if you got hot. Now cars practically do everything automatically, even if you’d rather they didn’t, and there are so many knobs on their control panels that you need to pass a NASA course just to figure out how to adjust your radio stations. It’s funny how complicated we’ve made “simplicity.”
And what’s up with recent car models’ tiny windows? So many of the vehicles we test drove had such small windows that you could barely see the road from their stuffy interiors. They made me feel like I was driving around in a coffin. Claustrophobics of the world unite! Sure, from the outside their designs looked sleek but I think I’d prefer being able to see traffic to having aerodynamic windows. Carmakers, let’s not sacrifice functionality and practicality just so our vehicles can look like spaceships. Remember: the only flying cars can do currently is into pavement so it would be nice to be able to see that pavement before takeoff.
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