One of the chief gifts my father gave me was his continual support of my interests, even though they were different than his. While he was an engineer who excelled in math, I - during my growing-up years - was interested primarily in geology and ecology. In fact, I got "D"s in math, even though I aced all of my other classes. Because of me, Dad started a recycling program at our home in Pennsylvania. This took considerable effort on his part, since not many people were recycling in the early 70s. When he took our family of five on vacations, Dad always made sure to include something he knew I would enjoy. For example, we prospected for emeralds in a mine in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, looked for agates and tree fossils in Nova Scotia, and collected plant specimens in Colorado. Increasingly, our vacations took place in the West, where I found myself gripped by the beauty and majesty of the landscape. When geology was clearly my primary interest, Dad set up an appointment for me to talk to a geologist at his workplace about career possibilities. Then, when my interest shifted to forestry, he had me talk to a forester he knew. The forester recommended that if I wanted to work as a Park Ranger in the West, I should go to school there. My dad didn't balk when I got accepted at a Western university, even though that meant he would be paying out-of -state tuition. I moved here after high school, and have engaged in a love affair with Western landscapes ever since.
Photo: Snow and Cryptobiotic soil, with the Needles in the background; Chesler Park, Canyonlands National Park, UT; December 1, 2013
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