Being Different

What's wrong with being different?

Perhaps it depends on your reason for being different.  Or for being the same.

For many, lacking any rationale other than different for the sake of being rebellious, there is no real justification.  And if you are the one sticking your neck out, you risk having your head chopped off.

Following rules and conforming to norms is not a bad thing.  But being different as a way to show off may lead to adverse consequence.  As long as we have confidence that doing something different is the result of a wise decision, it will probably serve us well.

There are sometimes problematic circumstances when being different is not altogether a choice.

An example from an earlier post...

A few years ago, when I was more able, I was hiking cross-country from the east side of US 89, out across the pinnacles area, through the Buggy Wheel Springs access. See the Birdseye comment for more detail about that area. Anyway, as I approached the pinnacles from the west, I was watching the elk. I stayed far enough away that I did not think I would spook the herd, but they obviously spotted me moving in  the scrub, and started browsing away. Suddenly I noticed a WHITE animal, far on the outskirts of the herd. It was a very large herd at the time, several hundred animals, more than I could reliably count heads with my field glasses, because they were moving. But the one animal was so obviously WHITE from top to bottom that he stood out starkly in contrast to the others.

Apparently, he was albino. I watched until they browsed across the ridge and I could no longer see them.

One of the most remarkable things I noted while watching the herd was that they seemed to shun the albino member. He stayed on the outskirts of the grazing area, and the other animals shoved him or shouldered him away when he attempted to graze into the area where they were browsing. I didn't watch long enough to make any real conclusions or studies other than casual observation, but if I was making a guess, I would say that the other animals of the herd discriminated against this white colored animal because he was superficially different from them.

Draw your own conclusions.

Utah Snowpack 2017 - 1 April Edition

Utah Snowpack in our mountains continues to pile on as the season nears closing.  Some of the snow totals indicated by Snotel monitoring are quite prodigious.

The Mammoth-Cottonwood monitoring site on the Sanpete Skyline has been my reference point since I lived near there, starting 15 years ago.  This graph plots Snow Water Equivalent and Precipitation Accumulation for 2017 and 1016.  Indication is that although significant snow melt has already started this spring, the accumulation amounts to about twice as much as last year at this time. A spring melting trend started about mid-March, but was then halted in the last week of March with an upward trend from new spring snow.  More than two feet of snow water equivalent remains to run off.  The steep rise of precipitation accumulation continues as it compares with last year's data.

This comparative graph from the South West corner of Utah shows tracking for Gardner Peak, which is still significantly ahead of last year's accumulations, but not by much.  There has always been a great deal of local variation across the State of Utah.

This awesome plot compares Snow Water Equivalent from the Mammoth Pass area of central California.  Every indication is that California with simply wash into the ocean with the spring runoff, which has not even commenced at this location.  The Snow Water Equivalent is more than twice the maximum from last year, and shows no sign of slacking off yet this year.  The current snow pack will yield more than six FEET of water when it melts.

We are not embarrassed by the huge snowfall accumulation in California.  In the Utah mountains north of Ogden, the station on Ben Lomond accumulated some of the highest totals.  An early meltdown reduced the total somewhat, but it still shows an enormous runoff potential, nearly as great as the California snow pack.

Get ready, 'cause here it comes!