The Great Salt Lake Analysis

It seems to me that Refuge is more than anything else, about confronting death. In the very beginning of the book the author says “most of the women in my family are dead. Cancer. At thirty-four, I became the matriarch of my family. The losses I encountered at the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge as Great Salt Lake was rising helped me to face the losses within my family. (pp. 3-4). The book tells of the time before the death of the author’s, Terry William’s mother who was struggling with cancer. It also tells her story of the flooding of the Great Salt Lake, which coincided with that time, focusing in especially on its effects on the birds of the region. Together these stories intertwine, and we see a clear picture of the effects of death and disaster, and the steps one takes to accept them.
To begin, I would like to examine those ties between the flood and accepting death.
Many times, in the book, the author is confronted with dead birds. During her childhood, the author spent much time with her grandmother out bird watching and while her mother was less involved in this, it is that the author very much connects birds with her family. We see the result of this connection when we see her encounter a dead whistling swan, “I knelt beside the bird, took off my deerskin gloves, and began smoothing feathers. Its body was still limp— the swan had not been dead long. I lifted both wings out from under its belly and spread them on the sand. Untangling the long neck which was wrapped around itself was more difficult, but finally I was able to straighten it, resting the swan’s chin flat against the shore”. (p. 121). The author and her family lived their entire lives at the Great Salt Lake. It seems to me that if the author felt such respect for a single swan, then how she felt for the area must have also been quite a powerful feeling
indeed. In many ways, it feels like the author accepts the flood, the swans ceremony felt much like a funeral, which in the end are for accepting death, and it is through the acceptance of the flood that I presume she will find acceptance of her mother’s death. But the author also give us an example of peoples’ inability to accept. The government of Utah plans to remedy the flooding “In 1975, the Utah State Legislature passed a law stating Great Salt Lake could not exceed 4202′. Almost ten years later, at lake level 4206.15′, Great Salt Lake is above the law. What lasso can you use to corral the West’s latest outlaw?” (p. 58). This shows man’s attempts to defy nature, and what force of nature have we tried to defy more than death? So, what do I think of death? To me there has always been a feeling of detachment to it. But in the end I know it is inevitable and learning to confront it is something every person must do. This is just a great example of how to do so rightly.