From Sunsets to Storm Clouds

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The side of love

November 30th, 2019

Back in August, someone asked me what I was doing for the holidays.

And I got angry.

The idea of planning that far in advance seemed a little crazy, given that I didn’t even know where I would be a week later.

But also…I didn’t want to think about the holidays.

The holidays were/are a looming symbol of how my family has changed over the past year. And not for the better. Since my grandmother died in February (and well before that), everyone seems to have been accumulating hurts. And holding on to them. Saying “everyone” might be a bit extreme. But the dynamic has shifted and we are no longer a family of which my grandmother would be proud.

At the service celebrating her life, someone said of her, “She always chose to be on the side of love.” I’ve thought of that often…trying to figure out what it means. It’s more complicated than it sounds. Because love is more complicated…maybe it’s a spectrum rather than two distinct sides. If love is a spectrum, how do I – despite the messiness and weightiness of the holidays – move towards the side of love?

I don’t know.

But what I do know is that I am an imperfect, messy human being trying to do life in the midst of other imperfect, messy human beings. I cannot promise myself or anyone else to get it right all of the time, but I can promise to try to work on it.
People pt 2

November 22nd, 2019

After traveling with another human being, I’m ready to go back to being a hermit.

I’ve grown so accustomed to moving at my own rhythm and pace…waking up at the crack of dawn to find the best coffee in a town and working my way down roads at leisurely a pace…waking up the next morning to find the nearest trail and taste the mountains and trees…then doing it all over again. Drinking a beer or two in between and going to bed early.

I figured that visiting Montreal with another human being would be fine. We’d wander around the city…drink things…see things…wander home…sleep and repeat.

We did all of that. And we crashed on the living room floor of friends of my friend. And we played Cards Against Humanity and we went to a trivia night and we saw a light show at Notre Dame (yeah??) and we went to Musee des Beaux-Arts and visited a speakeasy and we hiked to the top of Mont-Royal and we popped into used book stores where I read children’s books and we ate lots of bagels and our host made us fun cocktails and we hopped on and off the metro and I made a couple of batches of gluten-free mini pies and we bought extra bagels and I made breakfast sandwiches for dinner and I washed the dishes and and we stayed up late pairing wine with cheese and…

It was all wonderful. Every morning, I still woke up at the crack of dawn and worked for a couple of hours. I wandered around the neighborhood and found coffeeshops with Wifi. And those few hours of peace…quiet…when we weren’t trying to balance differing ideas and opinions and preferences…

That’s how I survived Montreal.

People can enhance an experience. They enrich it with their own perspectives and personalities. They challenge you to step outside of yourself and the way you see the world.

But it’s okay to be alone, too.

So I’m going to be a hermit in Vermont for a few days. There are worse places to do that.
People

November 15th, 2019

Wait where r u

That’s all he said. This random text from a Maine-friend …just after I’ve made it to Vermont and posted a picture of a snowstorm on Instagram.

Vermont. Where are you?

What else was I suppose to say?

Vermont…

Since leaving Nashville in July, I’ve met a lot of people. I’ve met them while hiking…or on dating apps…or couchsurfing…or sitting in coffee shops…or at conferences all about bread…or through work. And each of these people has enhanced my experience in one way or another.

But only because I’ve allowed it to happen.

Once upon a time, I wanted to become a hermit. With each new person that weaves into my story of this life season, though, I am more convinced that hermit-ness isn’t the best option (sorry, dad).

Throw pie into a wood fired oven? Sure!

Check out a climbing gym in Burlington? Sure!

Wander through GoodWill helping someone put together a Halloween costume? Sure!

Break a trail in snowshoes? Sure!

Wander through a state park and find things to climb? Sure!

Try every bakery in a small city? Sure!

I’ve learned that letting go of my need to control everything is essential for this process (I’m working on this…not there yet). I make vague plans, but remain open to pursuing new adventures and opportunities as they present themselves. People have been gracious enough to invite me into their lives and I’ve let go of my plans in order to dive in with them. It has been an honor and a joy to experience such hospitality and warmth (even though it’s 27 degrees outside…warmest day I’ve experienced in Vermont!).

And the beauty of this is that there are always more adventures to come…as long as I remain open to the possibilities.
Makes sense

November 8th, 2019

There are things in life that just make sense for some people. Tossing a ball into a basket. Crunching numbers in columns. Motivating people. Making music. Scaling rock walls. Getting a rowdy bunch of students to settle down.

And you can tell when someone is doing “their thing.” There is a sense of ease and grace about them…and they just seem to exist in this perfect rhythm. And it’s like this task, whatever it is, makes them feel most at home. It makes sense.

I bake with kids.

It’s weird and doesn’t always go smoothly. Over the past few years, I’ve lost eggs to floors and messed up recipes and guided students to bake things that they wound up hating. But that doesn’t change it for me. Given a choice, I will still bake with kids over just about anything else.

Translating that to the outdoors has been challenging. I wasn’t even sure I should try…fire scares me. But I couldn’t just walk away from this opportunity to do the thing that I love most because I was scared.

Each time I taught outdoor cooking, I got a little bolder. I started by using a pre-made mix for johnny cakes. From there, I did some research and Frankenstein-ed a “from scratch” recipe. And with every group, we got better at building and tending our fire.

Last week, we tried something completely new – pumpkin scones. I tweaked a “traditional” recipe to make it a little more outdoor-friendly. This recipe let us have conversations about kitchen chemistry and really get our hands into the food that we were preparing. And kids got to smell pumpkin (yuck!).

And I was entirely in my element. Over the past couple of months, there have been plenty of moments where I have felt joy and enthusiasm and even small tidbits of pride in the work. But it’s all been so foreign and new that it rarely feels “comfortable.”

Cooking scones over an open fire on a beach…it makes sense.
The privilege of conservation

October 29th, 2019
To discuss food waste. To carry a trash bag and pick up litter on a trail. To choose the fresh vegetables over the canned or frozen vegetables. To visit the grocery store with a reusable bag.

These are privileges.

To cultivate a permaculture-inspired garden in your backyard. To watch stars emerge in a pollution-free sky. To experiment with higher quality flours in baking. To take a seasonal job just to see what it’s like.

These are privileges.
Ever since leaving Nashville, I’ve come up against this idea of privilege in new ways. It is no longer just the “haves” vs the “have nots”…the people who gentrify a neighborhood vs the people who have always been there…the donors vs the recipients of the non-profit work.

It’s the people who can make conscious choices about preserving and controlling the environment – from a garden to their own body to national forests. Their resources allow them to invest in this work. They spend time volunteering on trail maintenance, allowing more people to engage with nature. They cultivate healthier user-land relationships through the application of permaculture principles. They teach other people how to recycle and compost and repurpose.

All of this is good. And the work that I’m doing now – hiking with kids, teaching them to waste less food, guiding them through a perch dissection, forcing them to practice team building – it’s good stuff.

But we all have the privilege of investing our resources – time, energy, money – into this good stuff.

And I’m constantly stuck in this battle between pushing forward into this world of conservation/environmental education/outdoorsiness and feeling drawn back to the work that I’ve always done in the face of poverty, diversity and social injustices. With the season coming to an end, I’m actively looking for “what’s next” and I haven’t been able to find a way to ride the line between those just yet.

And it’s a privilege to wait until I find that “yet.”
Take a Latch out of Arkansas…

October 21st, 2019

My parents have often been called “adorable.” People say that my mom is incredibly sweet and my dad has an amazing mustache. My mom is known to make friends wherever she goes and learn the life story of cashiers in the grocery store. My dad, on the other hand, is your classic introvert/hermit who is happiest sitting alone with a cup of coffee…preferably around nature. So, they have quirks (like most parents). And when they decided to drive up to Maine for a few days to join the “leaf peepers,” I braced myself for the quirks.

My dad picked up rocks all up and down the coast of our little island near Acadia. My mom rolled her eyes and added a few to his collection. We found fresh lobster and clam chowder…and my mom even tasted lobster (I know – right?!?). There were antique stores and bookstores to visit. Plants to identify and forests to wander. There was annoyance at people being in all of the places. And there was a stop at a lighthouse (and annoyance at people standing in the way of pictures).

They brought their quirks all the way to Maine with them…but if you looked at my car (and the list of places I’ve visited between here and Arkansas/Tennessee), you’d know that I have plenty of my own. And, as confirmed by all photographic evidence, our quirks prevent us from taking any sort of normal photo together.
The Maine Thing

October 16th, 2019

About last weekend…there was hiking and there was Maine.

I hiked on Saturday and Monday, with Maine filling the space in between. When you roll into a small town and your friends invite you to meet them at a brewery and then join them for a movie on permaculture, you know you’re in for a good time.

Saturday night I crashed in my favorite yurt. I slept “late” and savored the gentle morning light that streamed into the yurt.

Such a change from cabin life! A few weeks ago, when the temperatures dropped, we had to close up the windows to our cabin. The only natural light we have comes from the small window on the door. Some days, it feels like living in a cave.

The yurt was a pleasant change.

And the cozy, restful night left me prepared for the day’s adventures!

There was a cranberry farm.

Yes. I picked cranberries. And cranberries and cranberries. As we walked out to the field, another gentleman who was there with his wife asked if I had ever done this before.

“I’m from Arkansas. This isn’t really something we have there.”

And with that, we began picking. I filled a small jack-o-lantern bucket with cranberries. The official haul was three-pounds of cranberries. Now…what to do with all of those cranberries?

We started with cranberry-apple-pear hand pies. (And some savory pies with a roasty tomato sauce, buttercup squash, and rosemary…no cranberries.)

It was in part of an early celebration of “World Community Bake Day” (officially, it’s today – the 16th). The wood-fired stone oven was fired up and everything went it. Pizza. Vegetables. Naan. Bread. Hand pies. I was in my happy place.

I enjoyed one of the hand pies alongside a glass of freshly pressed cider. Because what else do you do on a brisk Sunday evening in Maine next to a wood fire oven??
Fall & 4000 Footers

October 16th, 2019

We had a three-day weekend. And after last week, I definitely needed it. (We’re not going to get into those details…they’re boring. I promise). So with three days opening up to me like an oyster, I decided to do some hiking and go to Maine.

First…the hiking.

For the first trail, I met up with a friend I met via CouchSurfing when I was in Maine back in August (AUGUST?!?). He spent the past couple of months traveling internationally and recently landed back in New Hampshire (Right?!?) to spend some time camping and hiking. So we tackled a fairly mellow 4000 footer, Mount Hale, with his dog (chosen because of the accessibility for an 11 year old golden retriever). The summit was somewhat anti-climactic, but the views along the way of fall foliage were spectacular.

The second trail was the opposite of a “mellow 4000 footer.” Mount Madison is a notoriously difficult hike. I did not know that…I chose it because it was on a list of “best hikes to view fall foliage.” It was beautiful. I thoroughly enjoyed myself. And I was thoroughly exhausted (my calves might take a week to recover).

It’s funny how two trails can land on the same list (4000 footers), but create such different experiences. Hale was accessed via a very mellow five mile trail; I came down a steeper option that clocked in right around two miles. As we hiked up the five miles, I had a hard time appreciating the colors because my hiking partner was a bit chatty. I wanted to stop and appreciate the smells and sounds and sights of the season; but I also didn’t want to be the classic “leaf peeper.” It was a slow hike, but not in a savoring sort of way.

Madison, on the other hand, was an entire day of savoring. Savoring colors and sounds and scents. Both ascending and descending the mountain were slow…delicately stepping over roots, balancing on boulders, and occasionally slipping on leaves. I was able to thoroughly appreciate the experience and celebrate the beauty. And when I met someone on my way down who asked about the view from the top, all I could say was “so worth it.”

It would be easy to write Hale off because the summit was just “meh.” But the colors along the way…oh my goodness! So worth it.

I never want to be a person that choose trails purely because of a summit or just to mark them off the list (been there, done that). Instead, I want to continue choosing trails because they’re worth it…whatever “it” happens to be on any given day.
Three months

October 9th, 2019
It’s been three months since I left Nashville. Here’s a look at that time in numbers:
- ONE – 4000 footers I’ve hiked
- THREE – fires I’ve built
- FIVE – different outdoor education classes I’ve led
- SEVEN – bags of coffee I’ve been through
- EIGHT – states I’ve slept in
- NINE – kitchens in which I’ve baked (ten if we count the beach)
- NINETEEN – breweries I’ve visited
- TWENTY FIVE- students I’ve had in field groups
This past month, in particular, has been rather challenging. Although my life has looked more stable than the previous two months, there have been so many unknowns. My day to day life has slowly found a rhythm…that continually gets disrupted. The weather, my site location, the students in my group (or not being assigned a group for the week), other people feeling chatty/catty.

It’s been a struggle to find the things that keep me sane in the midst of this chaotic life. I get up early to drink coffee and knock out work for Corner to Corner. My weekends are spent hiking (alone). And I randomly take off to explore new corners of the property. When life is chaotic and full of unexpected twists and turns, it’s important to find those things that ground you – whether it’s people, systems or habits. This month has been full of opportunities to hone in on each of those. Yes – even the people.
New Site

October 8th, 2019

Just when I started to get the hang of things, a group of us headed down to Massachusetts to work at our site “on the cape.” We spent the better part of last week trying to learn a new system and new trails and new expectations and new colleagues and…it was hard. Have you ever taken a bunch of kids on a night hike on trails that are unfamiliar? (We did NOT get lost.)

Every break and every evening was spent crashing into sobbing heaps on the floor of our cabin, wishing that we were back in New Hampshire. We missed the community that we’d built back “home” and the familiar rhythm of our days. And we missed knowing what was expected of us in each twist and turn of that rhythm.

It was rough.

But there was something comforting in knowing that we weren’t in it alone.

And…there was the half day we spent at the beach with our kiddos. (Yes – we all froze to death. But I was the “super human mutant” who wore shorts and Teva sandals.)

Also, best kid quote so far:

Do you have a ferret? Because you look like you would have a ferret.