Let The Lawns Die
The HOA says they know it must be hard to see the neighborhood grass looking like straw.
But the ditch water is coming soon! They say. And we’ll be green and lush in no time.
It’s actually not hard at all to see the grass like straw. It’s quite easy when Colorado had its lowest snowpack in recorded history this year. It’s a joy to see grass like straw when we usually reach peak snowpack around April 12, with 17 inches of snow water equivalent—but this year we hit peak snowpack on March 17 with only around 5.5 inches of snow water equivalent.
Grass like straw is a gorgeous sight when normal peak flows for the Colorado River are sometime in June, when the snowpack melts off the mountains, but experts think we hit that peak already this year in March.
Grass like straw is a prayer when every 1 degree Fahrenheit in rising temperatures means a 4-7% decrease in streamflow. Each blade of straw-like grass is a choir singing in a stained glass cathedral when Lake Mead and Lake Powell—built to hold 50 million acre feet of water—today sit at just 28% of their capacity with only 14.2 million acre feet.
We know it is hard to see grass like straw…
No.
What is hard is knowing that the Upper Basin and Lower Basin are not on speaking terms. What is hard is knowing Lake Powell is 40 feet from being unable to produce power. What is hard is carrying the knowledge-burden that we flood irrigate alfalfa fields and essentially export the Colorado River to other countries, then gnash our teeth over the “unexplainable water crisis” we find ourselves in.
What’s hard is crossing the bridge into town and seeing every smooth edge of every rock in the Colorado River, visible through a car window, 30 feet above the river, because the water level is so low.
Give me grass like straw all year long if it means the Colorado runs a little thicker and my weary mind can rest a little easier.
If you have even an ounce of compassion or two brain cells to rub together, you know it is the easiest thing in the world to see lawns dying and your neighborhoods turning pale shades of yellow.
Let me rewrite that email for you, oh great and holy HOA: “We’re sorry that we knew this was coming and did nothing to stop it. We will let the lawns die this year in solidarity with the crisis we created.”
That’s what I would be sorry for. But I would never apologize for the lawns looking exactly as they should to indicate exactly how bad we let things get.
