Postcards from Real Life: Water

Estimated reading time: 2 minutes

Water transforms our landscapes every day. And the geomorphology nerd in me loves every minute of it.

I have a lot of strong feelings about water being a geology nerd. If you want to get more specific, I go full-dork for geomorphology. It’s the study of surficial processes to oversimplify a bit. And I get fuck-all giddy over it.

And water is huge operator in geomorphology. It transforms our landscape every day. Sometimes in big, sudden events—floods and tsunamis for example. But mostly in little ways every day like freeze-thaw cycles that slowly break down massive monoliths. Or rivers that slowly carve their way through ancient rocks like in the Grand Canyon.

I could go on and on—there are endless examples of how water shapes the world. And I’m trying to rein in my geomorphology dork right now because this is supposed to be a short post, not a ten thousand word love letter to water as a geomorphological agent. The struggle is real.

Anyway, feel free to join me in marveling at what water is doing all around us in our everyday lives. Most of the work it’s doing slow and imperceptible unless you’re paying attention. Water likes to play a long game that way.

So if you see anything cool you’d like to share, drop a comment. I’m here to dork out with you.

As for this week’s image, it’s from the Columbia River Gorge at Multnomah Falls. Talk about a dramatic example of the power of water to shape our world.

Peace out!

Bluesky Art Show

This post is inspired by the Bluesky Art Show, a challenge to share artwork surrounding a weekly theme each Saturday.