Mountains out of Molehills

It happens. A nice weekend, with splendid weather [the exception and not the rule], comes about and it’s overrun with work.

Sometimes, I get jealous of people’s grand weekend plans. All the elaborate adventures they take part in, filling their conversations for the next week or so. Two days never seems like enough to have an adventure. When do you catch your breath??

While my weekends are a little on the bland side at times, I feel a twitch of embarrassment when I work all the way through them.  Why yes, I did happen to get up at 6:45 am on my weekend to catch a webinar on social media and am trying to write up a training on how to give interpretive walks.  In the grand scheme of it all it, it’s all molehills, not mountains. As long as I don’t let work overrun *every* weekend, and as long as I don’t “NEED” to have an adventure every weekend to feel like I am validating my life, either, I suppose keeping a good sense of perspective and loosing my weekend to work is a decent trade-off.  Come the end of summer, I’ll be wondering where all the work went to anyway.

Anchored for A Spell: Ode to My Dog

My husband and I have been thinking about the process of moving lately–or to be more specific, NOT moving. It would seem, with the way our offices are shaping up, we might be sitting tight for a while [until his office closes, perhaps].  Oddly, this is almost a relief: I hate the application process, the waiting, the research and “what ifs”. California is our seventh state [not counting home states or natal states], I guess moving is less enticing the 12th time around [if you count trips to and from parks at the beginning and end of each season]. While I don’t find this area to be a perfect fit for us, it is beautiful, dramatic, and entertaining. On top of that, something is different this time around.

We were walking the dog the other day and spoke about the fact that I’ve been a little more content, in a sense, here. It seems that in the past, if I felt that I wasn’t being productive job-wise, I threw my frustrations at the location [Kansas got a lot of hate from me, even though, looking back, it really wasn't Kansas, it was me]. Unemployment doesn’t sit well with me, I guess. But it was also more than that. Reading Richard Louv’s book, The Nature Principle: Human Restoration and the End of Nature-Deficit Disorder, it seems that perhaps I had nature-deficit disorder!

We had a park close by, a pond near our apartment, and we took little trips around the area [not to mention, tornado chased], but it was like I was not getting enough nature somehow. Or perhaps, I just felt out of place, a self-conscious shadow following me as I poked plants and frogs. Moving to South Carolina, we went to the beach a lot, watched alligators, and even tried to take up running. Still, something felt off. While I have yet to test my theory in other locations, I hypothesize that having a dog was what was missing.

Happy in the Park

I don’t mean to suggest that the dog equals nature, but that the dog forces me outside at least a couple times a day and offers an excuse to poke at a plant or bug for a while. Instead of “What is that crazy girl looking at?”, I feel more like it’s “She must be bored waiting for her dog to finish sniffing.” And while this dog is not the ideal athletic partner [getting her to run? Ha! I'd have better luck winning the lottery! She's bred to sit with sheep, not herd them.], I lost all the weight I was trying to run off in South Carolina just milling around with her.

Haha, it’s funny, I didn’t set out to write a post about my dog, but I guess she’s got a spell on me! I look forward to our future walks, and if we move anytime in the next few years, exploring a new place with her. Eventually, I know we’ll have children to share our love of nature with, but for now, an old ranch dog does just fine.

Being Bashful

Walking the Line

I generally don’t share too much of my personal life online [believe it or not], just the ‘front-line’ happenings that most people would see anyway. This past work week was a rough one, though.

I started the week out normally enough, but by my Tuesday night I had nearly sparked a missing person’s search by finishing up my campground rove an hour late. Luckily, most of law enforcement was busy with a real emergency, so not a lot of manpower was wasted on my negligent behalf [P.S. 'turn on your radio' was the moral of this story].

My Wednesday went quietly enough, besides the ribbing about the previous night. Thursday seemed like it was going to be quiet, but a rove with a coworker turned into us helping to respond to a medical emergency at a remote campground. While my medical skills are low, I am not bothered by the scene I saw. What got to me the most was the emotional toll that the family had to go through during their 6 some hours at the park. The images that haunt me from those 6 hours are not gruesome ones, but of tears running down someone’s cheeks.

By the time Friday rolled around, confusion was the color of the day. I decided I much rather deal with the petty stuff like printing off more permits and trying to sort out mixed up locks with visitors staring over my shoulder at a gate than watch innocents deal with the emotional strife that goes along with family tragedies.  That kind of drama coupled with the generally happy setting of a park’s campground redefines the extremes of a family vacation.

I thought about the family as we drove out that road and past the campground on my Saturday. Pounding out 7 miles on a trail would be of some benefit, I reasoned. Stopping at the gate, I spoke with someone who had been there, too. I was relieved to know that it sounded like all was going to be okay with the family, but I was troubled to hear that the person I was talking to was still shaken up a bit also.

My group and I headed out on the trail. We talked a little about hypothetical trail emergencies and tsunami routes, mountain lions, elk, moose, and bears. I got to thinking about how law enforcement folks deal with all that stress on a daily basis. I’m not an adrenaline junkie and I don’t feel that I need to be involved in the big dramas of the day, and while I understand wanting to help people, I can’t fathom a week in that line of work.  And to be honest, empathy is probably one of my bigger faults. After 7 miles, I’m still  not able to wrap my head around how much there is to deal with when being the line between life and death.

I’m hoping for a quiet spell this coming week. Of course, Robert Burns summed it up well in 1785:

“But little Mouse, you are not alone,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes of mice and men
Go often awry,
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy!

Still you are blest, compared with me!
The present only touches you:
But oh! I backward cast my eye,
On prospects dreary!
And forward, though I cannot see,
I guess and fear!”

The Rainy Season

This is our first winter here in the North Coast. We are at nearly the same latitude as Salt Lake City, Omaha, and Indianapolis and yet have no snow.  Thanks to the Pacific Ocean, we often don’t see temperatures below freezing. While that could be a consolation for some, we also get the majority of our precipitation during this time of year. Winter has been replaced with the rainy season.

The rainy season is beckoned in by radio ads talking about getting the greenhouses up as to not get caught off guard [certain cash crops can be severely damaged by the slightest rainfall], spiders disappearing, worms appearing [inside!], and birds coming down from the higher altitudes to stay warm.  I rather enjoy having company at the feeders, but I’m not too fond of peeling half desiccated worm bodies off the entry floor.

Glad to have enough light to catch this "Oregon" Dark-eyed Junco finally!

When the rains and wind let up, everyone floods outside. It is strange one day to walk the dog and see very few people moving about, and then the moment the sun breaks, people pop up like mushrooms. I guess it’s not so bad though, since looking like a drown rat walking something that looks like a drown polar bear isn’t really what I want everyone to see, just the other drown rats.

Chickens Enjoy Sunshine, but Most of All, Bugs

On a couple of fine days in between storms, we joined the crowds and headed to the beach. We really like walking around the beaches of Trinidad, and since in North Coast California, a busy day really isn’t all that busy.  The only place that has felt busy recently was Moonstone Beach with its dog walkers, rock climbers, hula hoopers, tight rope walkers, bocce ball players, kayakers, surfers, and general beach goers. Every time we go there is someone doing something you wouldn’t expect. And it’s not a developed beach, it’s a little cove blocked by cliffs on one side and the Little River on the other. It’s just easy to get to and has a cool name, I guess.

Anyway, we made it to Trinidad twice now between the sputtering showers and heaving, wind-driven downpours. 

It is one of my favorite places to mill around because of the color in the rocks. I feel like every time I go, I see a new rainbow in a rock. I believe most of that can be attributed to the hodge podge geologic composition of the North Coast Range that butts up against the ocean. Farther East you have mountain building due to volcanic activity. Out here, the North American plate is scraping against the Pacific plate, peeling off sea floor sediments and piling them up as the Coast Range. It’s essentially like mounding up what you can scrape off the top of a gravel road; it’s going to be a mix of whatever is in the way.

A Rainbow Rock in College Cove

Getting past this geology tangent, it is the rainy season when the land and sea really battle it out. Large waves are more frequent, chipping away at the cliffs and bluffs, but the rains do their part to put as much of the earth into the sea as possible.  All this sediment contributes to our murky seas, and possibly to the higher rate of shark attacks here. Since the visibility is reduced, sharks likely rely more on their electromagnetic sense than sight. Obviously, sharks don’t have hands, so they ‘feel’ around with their mouths.  There aren’t many people in the water, thankfully, but if we were as busy as southern California, yikes!

The Creeks are Swelling Fast

It is a dynamic coast that seems to be caught in a never-ending cycle of washing away, scraping up, and washing away again. Of course, it’s not just the rock sediment that gets caught up in this battle. On Pewetole Island, Sitka Spruce hangs on precariously to what used to be connected land. I’m not sure what species of tree that has been wedged between the boulders, but it attests to the force needed to place it there.

Pewetole Island Between Boulders

Waves Crashing on Pewetole

Remember when I mentioned that people pop up like mushrooms when it doesn’t rain?  The same fair weather rules apply to the crab fishermen. In the summer months, you hardly see a boat on the water [if you can see the water through the dense fog], but come the rainy season, boats line the Pacific’s horizon like streetlights on a major highway.  They have to battle the waves [most of the boats are fairly small], plow through the rain, and avoid the sea stacks that guard the rocky cliffs.  While I am sure they have a lot more on their mind, the crab fishermen can likely thank the rainy season to rush sediments down to the ocean where the prey items of the dungeness crabs feed, allowing the crabs to feast on the small, well-fed  shrimp and fish. From there, the now well-fed crabs are traded for bills to land on a plate. Cycles within the cycles of the rainy season.

Crab Boat Horizon

 

Conflict: How Best to ‘See’ Nature

My job doesn’t often involve conflict, but I often feel divided on how to approach certain subjects. One subject that I feel is ever-difficult to tackle is if someone has very little time, how should they best ‘get a feel’ of a place: driving all of it, or hike one single, short trail. I find myself agreeing more and more with Edward Abbey. Of course, not fully; I don’t find it necessary to include blood in hikes and travels.  I do appreciate those [i.e. tourists and visitors] that want to marvel at something natural, because that is the path to understanding and appreciating a resource, but I do often disagree with the manner in which people prefer to ‘take it all in’.

It is hard to dispute that America is a car culture. It is equally as hard to dispute that what you see from your car isn’t even half of what you see on foot.  Some folks do feel that just driving through an area means they have ‘been there’ and they can mark it off their list. The loss is theirs, to an extent. I won’t even go into the benefits of physical activity and what the car and television have done to us.

Abbey, while extreme, brings up a good point in his quote below long before cars were so climate controlled, equipped with entertainment centers and pleasant to sit in for long periods. Imagine what he’d say if he found out that children in the future will no longer look out the car window, but instead stare at yet another screen!

Boy Scout Tree Trail

“Do not jump into your automobile next June and rush out to the canyon country hoping to see some of that which I have attempted to evoke in these pages. In the first place you can’t see anything from a car; you’ve got to get out of the goddamned contraption and walk, better yet crawl, on hands and knees, over the sandstone and through the thornbush and cactus. When traces of blood begin to mark your trail you’ll see something, maybe. Probably not. In the second place most of what I write about in this book is already gone or going under fast. This is not a travel guide but an elegy. A memorial. You’re holding a tombstone in your hands. A bloody rock. Don’t drop it on your foot – throw it at something big and glassy. What do you have to lose?”
Abbey, Edward, Desert Solitaire Introduction page xii, Ballantine Books, New York, 1967

I don’t know, I do rather like people coming to visit National Parks. I be out of a job and entertainment otherwise. But Abbey’s point boils down to the fact that you will glean nothing substantial [aside from treasured family memories, which he doesn't care to acknowledge] from a place you visit just in your car. And even if you hop out onto a trail, you will still likely not “see anything”.  In order to understand a place, one has to become infused in the essence, character, and rhythm of the place, and that takes time. More time than downloading an app and snapping some shots.

I feel that I accomplished that in the Badlands. It was almost an insult to hear someone condemn the place as ‘snake infested’ and ‘hell-like’ after I had spent hours listening to meadowlarks and grasshoppers and the wind whisper through the prairie grass like frolicking kids playing muted flutes as they skipped around with abandonment.  Such quick judgments without a second thought! But they had no time to investigate, less than an hour was allotted on their trip to pass judgement on a place, check-mark it, and then move on to the next item on the list.  Hard to compete with Wall Drug these days.

Redwoods on Lost Man Creek Trail

The Redwoods are no different. They are an area most people have on their lists, but frequently as just a stop over or at worst, something to drive through on the way to another destination. The only difference is that I myself haven’t had the time to get to know the forest, only to do recon so far.  I had the advantage in the Badlands of living in them, hiking around every evening and day off.  Here, I haven’t made it past my to do list; haven’t had the time to just sit for hours on end with my face in the duff, watching as the mechanisms of the forest move like gears in a giant, fern-covered watch.

The number of trails I’ve hiked is far overshadowed by the number I haven’t, but I rather walk them purposefully than merely check them off my list. Boy Scout Tree Trail was a very nice hike. There are lovely trail descriptions on the web already, so I don’t need to rehash any of that. In my opinion, the best part are the unique and characterful redwoods dotted along the trail side.  The oddness of each hints at their interesting pasts and makes one wonder at their future.

Twin-like Trees on the Boy Scout Tree Trail

I also managed to squeeze in a three hour mile of the Lost Man Creek Trail. Once a logging road, the trail leads along the creek as well as redwoods that show obvious signs of the recent past. Scars from passing logging equipment not only expose the inner layers of the tree, but also the carelessness of our use of vehicles. I’m sure the thought was that the trees will come down,  so no bother. I try to bite my tongue at the irony that the same mindset occurs today even with the trees protected. The same carelessness is facilitating damage to the trees that were spared the ax and saw. Are the redwoods that remain just elegies and tombstones?

Scarred Base

The Old Logging Road

Scarred and Gone on Lost Man Creek