06.20.13, Denver, CO: 12:03PM
These days, it’s in vogue to rave about baseball; and we honor its forbearers and superstars by chiseling their form from granite, which was mined at a Midwestern quarry by giant yellow machines manufactured by the Caterpillar Company. Afterward, we place these figures, hewn from rock, on pedestals with the inscription National Pastime burnt into bronze placards by lasers that were drilled into marble bases, which someone stole or appropriated from other monuments dedicated to our former leaders and politicians.
Like the Great Pyramids of Giza, those who benefited least from the successes of the men to whom these memorials were erected broke their backs to build them.
Famously, Jack Spicer wrote poems about baseball. He died at the age of 40 from health complications resulting from alcoholism.
It is a documented fact that fans who rabidly follow the game of baseball have a 175% increased chance of fatally abusing alcohol or other intoxicating substances.
Chris Robinson, the leader singer of The Black Crowes, a band that attained huge commercial success in the 90s with hits such as “She Talks To Angels” and “Jealous Again,” once told an interviewer that it was his life goal to trip on LSD in every MLB stadium in the USA. Yet, most people who watch baseball will note how taking in a game can be a relaxing way to pass a summer afternoon or evening. 
On June 4, 1974, the front-office suits for the Cleveland Indians thought 10-Cent Beer Night would be a great way to fill an always empty stadium with fans of an always failing MLB team. They, of course, were correct; but they did not account for the fact that, once smashed, fans would storm the field, bloodying players, coaches, and fellow spectators alike, in one of the all-time great melees in the history of American sports, thus reinforcing the city’s already embarrassing moniker: The Mistake on the Lake.
Many people not from Cleveland incorrectly believe that our lake caught on fire. But they would be wrong. It was, in fact, the Cuyahoga River, which flows through the downtown area, that caught fire. And, in all fairness, it was only the surface which set aflame.
What most people, even Clevelanders, don’t know, is that Cuyahoga is an Iroquoian word meaning crooked river; and it actually caught fire a total of 13 times from 1868 to 1969; and environmentalists, at one time, considered it the most polluted river in the United States of America.
The Hoover Dam, which is our nation’s most expensive and largest public works project, regulates the flow of the Colorado River. 112 men, mostly migrant workers, died during its construction.
The Colorado River cuts through deep canyons carved out during the course of several thousand millennia, offering enthusiasts of the natural world spectacular views of steep cliffs and rushing water. For outdoor adventurers in search of an adrenaline-soaked thrill, there are whitewater rafting excursions. If you scan the riparian zone along the river’s edge, you will see any number of birds nesting in the creosote, saguaro cacti, Joshua trees, ponderosa pine, or Douglas fir that line its banks and support one of the most bio-diverse river basins in the nation.
Edward Abbey, Robinson Jeffers, John Muir, and Lorine Niedecker all wrote in praise of the natural world. And, just like Jack Spicer, they are all dead.