Breaking the Surface

Rebecca Spears

After I graduated from sixth grade, my father and mother organized a family trip to New Mexico. This was quite a surprise. My dad, Big D, often seemed world-weary and as if he wanted to stay home, tinkering in the garage, fixing gutters, or smoking his pipe and reading. My mother, on the other hand, almost always loved a good adventure, and I can imagine that she was the one who packed the car, made sandwiches, and managed who would sit where. Then early one June morning, our family of six—my older brother Craig, younger brother Mark, baby brother David, myself, and my mom and dad—began our trip from Dallas, Texas, to the town of Roswell, New Mexico. Big D drove us nearly 300 miles through the West Texas heat, hardly stopping until we reached the “Land of Enchantment,” another hundred miles away.

Though the week-long trip fired my imagination for many reasons (I’d never even been out of Texas) our trip to the Bottomless Lakes, on the eastern escarpment along the Pecos River, continues to stand out today. One reason is because images have always captured my imagination and the spare desert landscape was strange to me with its cacti, silvery cottonwood trees, creosote bushes, and grama grasses. Naming things also fascinated me then—bottomless lakes, piñons, saltbush, diamondback—and still fascinates me now. Lastly, the word “bottomless” sounded other-worldly to me. The world, as I knew it then, was solid, tangible. A bottomless lake might be a chance to step off the edge of the earth. This idea made my heart pound with a thrill. 

Recently, after digging through some geologic facts to understand more about these lakes, I guessed that we had visited Lea Lake, one of the nine bottomless lakes. These lakes are part of a chain of huge water-filled sinkholes ringed with red sandstone and white gypsum cliffs. The lakes range from 17 to 90 feet deep, essentially bottomless when first sighted by vaqueros who tried and failed to plumb their depths, even after they had tied together several lengths of rope. Lea Lake is the only lake that allows swimming in a small roped-off area. When we arrived, only a dozen or so people were swimming in the lake.

Once I caught my first glimpse of Lea Lake, fear and attraction lit up every nerve in my body, and I gazed in amazement at the shimmering turquoise water, high craggy cliffs, and endless blue sky. I’d never encountered such gorgeous water and a dangerous chance to test my swimming skills. Craig, Mark, and I immediately flew out of the car and jumped in the water to swim and play. Soon I was paddling out to the farthest rope boundary, not so far from shore, where I discovered I couldn’t easily touch the bottom.

The lake stirred my creativity. Growing up I wanted to be an artist and often spent my spare time sketching. By high school, I realized that I probably didn’t have enough talent for that. At one time, I wanted to be a dancer, but my mother didn’t want me “to live that kind of life.” (So I found creative ways to get into trouble, like perfecting my mother’s handwriting to write notes for skipping school; climbing the public swimming pool fence to swim with friends at midnight; experimenting with magic mushrooms.) By the time I became an adult, I had all but given up on a creative life.

After high school, I studied Germanic languages at the University of Texas, got married in my 20s; then pursued a master’s degree in English, graduating with the degree, a son, and a daughter by my early 30s. In my mid 30s, we would add a third child to our family. All my creative energy went into raising kids and encouraging my spouse’s goals. Except—I had been, unexpectedly, hired as a writer and editor at a publishing company while my husband pursued medical studies. This new job allowed me to discover the pleasures of writing and to reconnect with my imagination.

So while editing, raising children, managing a busy household, and helping an entitled husband through medical school, I also began attending poetry readings with a friend and learning about the liveliness of contemporary poetry. Soon I took a risk and dove into creative writing, even though I feared I might fail. I began meeting regularly with other writers to share and critique our writing. From there, I found the nerve to submit some finished pieces. 

Now years later, with children grown and husband ditched, I’ve written on many topics from a variety of angles. Even so, I can fall into a funk when my imagination lags. What nearly always gets me out of the doldrums and back into my writing office is to leave the house. I start walking to see, smell, feel, and hear what’s going on around me, whether that means strolling the city streets or meandering in nature. On these walks, the memory of swimming at Lea Lake returns to remind me that I still want to explore, break through the surface of things, and plumb the depths, even when I don’t know where rock bottom is, even though I can never quite shake a fear of falling or failing. Curiosity still drives me to see where I can go when I open my laptop and pull up a blank page.