Baby Boomer Ranger

Last week I was reading the Bee Bloggers and I realized, wait a minute, I get to go to the Wilderness next week! Silly me. So, now I have my three lists of things to bring and I dusted off my tent, ground cloth, down bag, thermarest pad, Colorado cup and hiking poles. It is now very obvious that I bought this stuff when I was working on the district and getting my things packed by Debbie McDougald. This isn’t going to be pretty. I don’t know how I am going to carry this stuff and my camera, lenses, extra camera battery and water. Do I really need to put all that on my back? Dang, where are those mules when you need one?

When the going gets tough, the tough get whining… In my best ‘Friendly Ranger’ persona, I call Rob Mason. “Rob, is there a possibility, that if I get my stuff to you early, you could have it packed in with the Student Conservation Service stuff? I could get it to you this minute if you could get it in.” I’m thinking ‘please, please, please… and trying not to cry on the phone.

Rob is very gracious and has agreed to help me save face. I’m still carrying a pack with my personal gear, but I am relieved to see on a map that it is less than a four mile hike to where we are camping. I was hoping for five nights in the wilderness this year, but I’m thankful that I will be getting in two days. In the end, I may be thankful that it is only two days! My husband reminds me that my job really isn’t in the wilderness. I should be thankful for two days after all, two days more wilderness than many of my co-workers will see!

Now the trick is to get back without injury, and my ego intact.

Front page of the Fresno Bee Sunday, August 6, 2006:

“This week, Fresno Bee journalists begin a four-week journey on the John Muir Trail. Along the way, they’ll explore why people seek out the trail, how it changes them and how they change it.

They’ll blog from the trail. After they return, they’ll share stories in a September series.

We don’t know for sure where all of this will take us. But an adventure, by definition, has no certain outcome. We hope you will join us.”

Because they are not us, and because they are us, we should join them. I think everyone on the Sierra should be following the Bee author’s blogs and their adventure. They are talking about things different from what we talk about. . We spend too much time talking to ourselves about what we are doing. We would be wise to hear their language, feel their sprit and risk some change.

The Power of Language

Look at their first discussions. They are not using the same words we are using, but we both are talking about the wilderness. At a recent Sierra Recreation/Lands coordination meeting, I noted what we were saying about the wilderness. Our Wilderness language within the Forest Service sounds like this:

NEPA – EIS – EA – DM – CE – IDT
CEA
ARR – SHPO – 106
FOIA
GAO – OGC – DOJ
WO – RO – SO
EBLI – NFRW – CMTL
LEO – FPO
SUP

Cumulative Effects Analysis, Content Analysis, Monitoring, Implementation Team
Appeal, Lawsuit, Litigation, Court Order
Earmark, Job Code, Budget Request
Deciding Officer, Line Officer, Permit Administrator,
Operation and Maintence Plan
Stock Nights, Visitor Days, Quotas

I bet that we will not see the above in any of the forthcoming Bee blogs. Watch and see. I also bet they couldn’t understand us without a specialized lexicon or a translator.

They talk like this:
“We were sleeping in the backpacking camp near the trail. At first – note the first – the day started with delicious promise given an extra trickle of spice with just the right note of apprehension. I woke up to a soft, colorless dawn. Just a subtle lighting behind the tree branches above my tent skylight.” Diana Marcum, Fresno Bee Writer and Blogger

“Now, more than ever, the John Muir Trail beckons as a season in life gradually changes for me. All I need now are freeze-dried dinners and plastic snacks…” Mark Grossi, Fresno Bee Writer and Blogger

“When we first hit an elevation of 9,000 feet and I saw my first alpine lake, I was awestruck and I stayed that way for the next two weeks. The granite boulders really do glisten and glow ion that mountain, and the sky seems so blue and close.” Angela Ballard Editor of the Pacific Crest Trail Association’s magazine

Can we understand their language? I expect that we all used and valued their idiom at one time, but do we know it now? Did we bury the words in their wilderness dictionary under our piles of acronyms and bureaucracy?

Can you remember a time when you used those words? Expressed those thoughts? We should to hang onto being bilingual. We need to go to the field and listen to what we say.
Speak our speak, but also talk their talk. We must not loose their perceptive of what the Wilderness is all about and language is key to communicating, understanding and empathy.

Read the Bee bloggers and listen to their language. Here is a link: www.fresnobeehive.com/jmt/

P.S. I’ve got to find out, how are they blogging from the trail? I gotta do that! Stay tuned…