It took me a long time to realize that Colorado was home. I had to move away, go to college, visit several times, study abroad (twice) and then graduate for it to really sink in—Colorado is my heart. Growing up my mailing address was Colorado Springs but my real hometown was Monument. Over the years I got to know the Springs and Denver and Boulder and Fort Collins and Pueblo. Those were the cities I visited and came to know. I lived on Colorado’s Front Range for 14 years before moving away. I knew it, I liked it, and I would eventually miss it.
So here I am back in Colorado, only it’s not the Colorado I knew. And not only is it not the Colorado I knew, it was different in a way that I hadn’t anticipated. I had visited Monument after moving and it had exploded with growth since I left. Untamed open spaces had been paved and Home Depots and coffee shops had sprung up. A second middle school was built, then a second high school. Monument was a rapidly growing city in a rapidly growing county in a rapidly growing state, but this was not the Colorado I found when I came back this time.
After I plowed through northern New Mexico during the night I woke the next morning to a Colorado I’ve never known. I had fallen in love with Colorado’s Front Range when I was growing up there, but in Durango I was introduced to the Front Range’s beautiful little sister, the Western Slope. She was smaller, quieter, prettier, and the kind of girl who didn’t shave her legs.
Durango is tucked away in the southwest corner of the state in the Animas River valley. A quick glance at its Wikipedia page would tell you that the word “Durango” is a derivative of “urango”, a Basque word for “water town” but it would be impossible to understand what the Animas River means to Durango in the summer without being there.
The first day I was in Durango one of my oldest friends took me to Baker’s Bridge to jump into the river. The summer runoffs had swollen the river and its muddy waters ran cold and swift. I watched a new friend contemplate the distance from the bridge to the rushing water 30 feet below him. After hearing that a few people had already died in the river this summer I was comfortable to watch him from the safety of the rocks 15 feet below him (but still 15 feet above the river).The considerable spring run-off meant that here at the bridge the water would be deep enough so he wouldn’t touch the river bottom. He took his time, 10 minutes or so, until he stood. Painstakingly he first removed his sunglasses, then his hat, then his shirt. Then he jumped.
The river carried him 10 or 15 feet before his head broke the muddy surface. Even with the quick current he was able to get out of the river with some strong strokes. How was it Johnny? we asked him. Cold, and pretty fast he said. I watched another new friend jump from the rocks. Then my old friend jumped. Then it was my turn. As I stood at the edge of the rock I thought about what everyone had said when we told them that we were going to Baker’s Bridge. “Swim hard it’s really fast right now.” Was I a strong swimmer? Swimming in my parents pool that bottoms out at 6 feet doesn’t really count does it? The Animas was churning brown below me and I tried to gauge how fast it was by watching sticks floating along the surface as they made their way downstream.
Two steps backwards, one big step forwards, airborne.
It’s hard to say what sensation hit me first (or harder for that matter) the cold or the current. No matter what the sensation was that drove me, before my head broke the surface I knew that I did not want to be in the river anymore. As it turns out, I am a strong enough swimmer and made it to the bank with nine or ten strokes and hauled myself out of the river and onto the red rocks to dry out. I did not jump in again.
The rest of the week that I was in Durango followed the tempo that had been set that first day. Rope swinging into the Vallecito reservoir, day tripping to Telluride, bar hopping , days flowed into each other as naturally as the Animas. Yet, by the end of the week I knew I had stayed long enough. Durango is a town that I should love. It is progressive (people who practice what the preach when it comes to organic living and sustainability—right down to solar powered trash compactors), liberal (4 marijuana dispensaries for a town of 15,000 in 2005), and in an absolutely stunning location nestled in the La Plata mountains, but I didn’t love it.
This realization unnerved me then and still does now. I didn’t think that living in St. Louis and Ohio had changed me as much as it did. On more than one occasion I found myself joking with people that I was a city slicker knowing full well that there was at least a little bit of truth in the joke. On the drive to Telluride at about 10,000 feet I got my first ever case of altitude sickness. It wasn’t serious, a minor headache and a bit of nausea, but it was enough for me to understand the message: I don’t live here anymore. It’s an easy message for me to reconcile—it’s been 6 years after all since I officially lived in Colorado and 10,000 feet in the air is no joke. But I can’t shake off one lingering thought: if my love affair with the Western Slope wasn’t meant to be; what of my first love and the only place I feel that I can call home? What of the Front Range and I?
I left Durango with Colorado dirt under my fingernails and, with all the hope that earth can hold, it is still there. I haven’t cleaned it out yet.
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