From the Pages of The Pieces We Gather

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There’s a lake in northern Tanzania, near the Kenyan border—Lake Natron. It sits in the East African Rift, where tectonic plates pull apart and the ground leaks heat in response.

The lake is shallow. A few feet deep, at most. It’s fed by mineral-rich streams and runoff from a nearby volcano—water swirling with chemicals that were never meant to stay. The pH hovers near ten, the same as ammonia. The temperature climbs near boiling in places.

Water flows in, evaporates, and leaves everything behind—salts, sodium carbonate, heat. There’s no outlet. The lake keeps what it’s given.

It wasn’t always like this. But ash settled. What started as fallout became sediment. What seeped in became structure. Over time, the chemistry changed. Nothing was neutralized, only absorbed. 

And from a distance, it looks perfect.

Still. Reflective. Beautiful in a way that feels intentional. The water glows in shades of rust and rose. But the vibrant, red shimmer isn’t an invitation – it’s a warning. 

Natron is one of the most caustic lakes on Earth.

It doesn’t kill with violence. It kills with saturation.

Not loud, not brutal—just corrosive. A slow acid. Hardened by pressure, reinforced by habit. Get too close, and the water strips flesh. Preserves bodies like cautionary statues. Fixes things in place—not as they are, but as they were the moment the harm reached them. 

Birds that land by mistake are coated in salt and lye. Wings, if they linger too long, stiffen mid-beat. Bodies calcify, preserved in perfect, motionless detail. Bones become sculpture. A still life of what couldn’t make it out. Nothing leaves untouched. Anything that doesn’t belong quickly dies.

And still—some birds live here.

Lesser flamingos build their nests on salt flats near the center of the lake. Their skin is tougher. Their bodies, more alkaline-resistant. They stand where nothing else can, legs braced in shallow water that would dissolve most living things.

They eat the red algae that grows in the brine. Raise their young in a place that should be uninhabitable. They find freshwater springs, tiny safe zones scattered across the edges. They know where to land. Where not to linger. Their survival depends on precision.

Because this is not a lake built for living things. The birds just learn how to survive inside it. And they carry the cost in their bones.

They wade. They balance. They stay. But they don’t thrive. They adapt. Carefully. Reluctantly. Always on the edge of ruin.

But adaptation isn’t safety.

It just means they’ve learned how not to die.

And in places like this, survival asks more than it should.

It changes the body. Alters instinct. Forces you to believe that not dying is the same as living.

So you build callouses instead of boundaries.

You bend around the damage when you want to stand firm.

You flinch more gracefully to avoid an attack.

You stand still for so long you stop recognizing your own reflection.

But it doesn’t make you safe. It only makes you practiced.

The lake didn’t change.

It just stayed corrosive long enough that something else had to.

Adaptation isn’t a compliment.

It’s a consequence.

Proof that something hurt enough to require a strategy.

Just because someone can survive you

doesn’t mean they should have to.