Downriver

Heather Hansman, Downriver: Into the Future of Water in the West, 2019. 

Life in Vernal ticks by hot and slow.  I eat gas-station burritos, drink weak Utah beer, and run the mountain-bike trails outside of town at dusk, when it gets cool enough to move in the desert.  I camp on chalky flats of BLM land alongside the river and spend a lot of time in the air-conditioned public library and recreation center, which both seem unnecessarily big and glossy for a town this scratchy. [p.104]

COMMENT

   The author is writing a book about the Green River, but she says she goes to the library for the air conditioning.   Though she is camping recreationally, her need for a cool-shelter is essentially the same as is experienced by homeless people.  The library is a benefit of boom-and-bust oil and gas money, but this was written during a bust.