The Path Less Traveled

The quiet revelation that came of my trip to Heritage Farm has turned out to be the only one I would have time for, as the Universe does not run on my time schedule and has seemed to judge my whiny cries for contemplation a nuisance.

But I'm getting ahead of myself, and this story requires a short trip into the past.

My love for the outdoors can be blamed on a handful of people: My grandfather and uncle who showed me how to fish in my aunt's pond, and my parents who took me to Dillon Nature Center in my hometown.  Every summer I was signed up for Adventure Camp and spent my days rarely seeing the inside of a building.  I wrote a short post on it in December if you need more of a backstory.

Flash forward twenty years, and I'm two weeks into the summer season at Effigy Mounds when by luck, chance, and/or planetary alignment, a former director of DNC comes walking into my Visitor Center.  His wife would later describe this event as synchronicity, and I couldn't agree more.  The former director of DNC is now the current director of Indian Creek Nature Center in Cedar Rapids, which became my next destination on this little self-imposed journey of (re)discovery.

The visit was everything a gal could hope for, and I not only got to meet up with The Director again, but also met a lot of the wonderful and friendly staff.  Then I got a personal tour of the major restoration projects, starting with the hillside. 

There are a lot of pictures of wooded hillsides out there in the world, but this one is special because the trail is actually an important boundary of intense ecological restoration proportions.

The best way  to see the difference is to compare the left side of the photo with the right side.  The right side, which is the sunnier side, is the result of years (possibly decades) of prescribed burning which has kept back a lot of woody growth and made it more of an oak savannah.  The left hand side has not been subject to burns and so has more shrubs, bushes, and shade-tolerant trees like maples.  Regular burning is quite a project, and turning a dense wall of tangled shrubs and trees all trying to choke each other out into an open space dominated by oaks is pretty impressive. 

And easy on the eyes.

But not quite so impressive as the restored prairies.

You've heard my rambles on prairies before, so I'll only say this: It took a decade to get the pictured prairie to look like it does today.  Collecting and planting seeds, burning year after year, and keeping those fingers crossed. 

As the old saying goes, If you burn it, they will come. (or something along those lines)

Aphrodite Fritillaries on Common Milkweed

There were dozens of these flying around a patch of milkweed, it was a little surreal.

Purple coneflower

Daisy Fleabane

Rattlesnake Master (super badass)

Twelve-spotted Skimmer (female)

Tallgrass prairie plants are well-adapted to disturbances like fire, grazing, and wind, and it can be said that they may even thrive on periodic destruction.  With this in mind, the folks at Indian Creek have come up with an absolutely ingenious way of bringing both disturbance and people to the prairie.

A Prairie Labyrinth

As much as I'd love to delve into the philosophy and history behind labyrinths, I'll simply let the nearby sign do the talking:

I really liked the labryinth, and it might have even been my favorite part.  In so many places, a prairie trail is straight, and you only get to see what's on either side of you.  Here, your path goes into a prairie, winds around, turns in on itself, and allows you to see more of the plants than you would with a traditional straight path.  And the red-winged blackbirds have more opportunities to dive-bomb you.

After having my fill of scenic beauty, the Director and his wife invited me to dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant in Cedar Rapids (where I had some of the best spring rolls of my life!).  Afterwards, I headed homeward.

Stone steps over part of a slightly dried out wetland area.

Maybe it was the quietness of woods, or the prairie pulsating with life, or maybe it was the inward circle of the labyrinth where I didn't have to choose a path, but somewhere along the way, a sense of calm and assurance crept up on me.  As I drove home my thoughts drifted to where I want to be in five years, and I finally felt myself pulled more in one direction than the other.  I had begun to almost imperceptibly lean towards going, rather than staying.

This shaky insight was tested the next day, as it was brought to my attention there was a small chance my term would be extended to two years.  The emotional hurricane that followed as I decided whether I would even be interested in something like that left me both exhausted and resolute:  For my own sanity, I will choose the path(s) that lead to permanent employment in environmental education/outreach, preferrably closer to my family in Kansas.

Or I'll just build myself a house in a prairie and call it good.

As things worked out, the extension was deemed unneccesary, and I'm fine with it.  My boss/mentor, who by then was aware of my hesitation, called me into his office for a good ol' fashioned talkin'-to.  I'll only relay one line from the hour-plus conversation, but it might sum up his advice fairly well: "...it seems as though you know what you want to do, but you need a kick in the butt to do it, and if this is it, well then so be it."

So there it is folks, a cautious step forward on a new path, followed by waves of intense fear and unsteadiness, and a swift kick back on the trail from someone who has traversed those mountains before.  I know now that one day I will pack my bags and not return, and while that makes me very sad, it means that I'm ready to let go of the Driftless and find my new place in the world.  The rivers and bluffs may no longer hold the same sway over my heart as they have in the past, but the Driftless will always, always be a part of who I am and who I want to be.

The next stage is, of course, deciding exactly where to go, but I as I look through job boards and graduate programs alike, I can't help but feel the small spark of excitement that comes with knowing you're headed into the unknown.


Or headed right where you're supposed to be. 



Heritage Farm and the Best Museum I Never Saw

I had this whole trip planned down to the hour.  One day, four stops:

9:00am: Seed Savers Heritage Farm outside of Decorah, IA
12:00pm: Lunch at the Angry Pickle
1:00pm: Vesterheim Museum
3:00pm: Dunning's Spring Park

But in true Drifter fashion, I made it through exactly half of that list, before abandoning the Vesterheim and Dunning Springs to another trip scheduled for sometime in the future.  I know, I know.  No trip to Decorah is complete without a stop at the Vesterheim, and Dunning's Springs is the little-known jewel tucked away in the town.  For all my talk of exploration, how could I just not go?

Quite simple, really.  The weather was perfect for strolling downtown, window shopping, and people watching.  And supporting the local Co-op, of course.  The Vesterheim and Dunning's Springs aren't going anywhere for the time being, but days like that are quickly slipping behind as we move into the heavy-hot days that are the hallmark of an Iowan summer.

But let's start from the beginning, shall we?

At this rather remarkable place

Heritage Farm is part of the Seed Savers Exchange, a collection of gardeners, farmers, and heirloom enthusiasists who are devoted to the practice of keeping the seeds from their garden produce for planting the following spring, and consequently preserving the genetic biodiversity of garden species.  A tomato is not just a tomato, you see.  Hybrids are sometimes sterile, and incapable of producing fruit the next year, and some species of plants are genetically altered so they will only produce one time, forcing gardeners to rebuy stock year after year.  Heirloom species are different in that the seeds can be planted and will produce year after year. They have been preserved by their keepers for generations, and Seed Savers created a large seed bank of those species and varieties and distribute them to others. 

Just one of the many gardens on site.  My visit was quite early in the season, but in the next
 month or two there will be a proliferation of greenery and blooms and produce.

The Farm is a kind of demonstration, with gardens full of more kinds of tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, squashes, and beans then I thought possible. 

Like these really pretty Christmas Lima beans!

They also are keepers of a decent herd of the ancient White Park Cattle, which apparently was prevalent across Britain over 2000 years ago, but now are so rare they must be carefully managed in order to maintain their genetic diversity.

I learned all that from this interpretive sign, but then had to slowly back away.

Note: This is not a petting zoo, this one was huffing and gruffing
and freaking me out.  Plus, one of the office buildings was
right behind me, and I didn't want to be accused of enraging
ancient cattle.

We were maintaining a safe distance from one another.

Baby cows! Really adorable.

In addition to preserving the diversity of food plants and pre-Christ cattle, they also have a few pigs and chickens.

The above sign scared me into not taking pictures or even spending that long looking at all the baby chickens in their coop.  But they are there, and they are very cool.

But the sight-seeing doesn't end there.  There are miles of trails, including one leading to their orchard with hundreds of varieties of apples.  I went on a few of the shorter treks and was blown away by the idyllic scenery at every glance.

Along the Valley Trail.  Perfect weather.  No bugs.  Slight breeze that smelled like flowers. 

I imagine this is what the land must have looked like before our population exploded.

This is what lined the path along the Oak Woodland trail.

Overlook along the Oak Woodland trail just to the east of the Lillian Goldman Visitor's Center.
And yes, that is one of the white cows in the left-hand corner.

Before I knew it, three hours had slipped by and my stomach had begun trying to eat itself.  I made one last stop in the Visitor's Center to buy a few tomato plants (Black Krim and Gold Medal), peppers (Purple Beauty and Orange Bell), and the Dark Opal basil plant I've been coveting for some time.  After all, I should do my part to enhance biodiversity at every opportunity, right? I also somehow ended up with free seed potatoes which are now resting in a friend's garden.  Then, a last gander through the flower garden.

I left the Farm and headed back into Decorah, and it took a couple of spins around the main drive to locate the Angry Pickle, and then a few more to find a parking space.  Inside, only a few tables were occupied, and I spent a leisurely thirty minutes munching on my Jump & Shout sandwich with a side of the famous spicy pickles and perusing through the pictures on my camera.  Sometimes (okay, all the time), I wish I could get paid for being a tourist.

My plan was to go to the Vesterheim, the museum dedicated to the Norwegian immigrants coming to America, after lunch.  But, if you'll remember from the intro, I didn't quite make it in there.  Well, I mean, I was there, but I just didn't go in.  I can't decide if I metaphorically rejected my Norwegian heritage by walking away from the imposing building, or embraced it by pioneering into the unexplored downtown.

I did, however, go to the nearby museum gift store, and had something of a museum-esque experience as I looked around at books, carvings, jewelry, dishes, toys, and specialty food items in a silence only broken by soft music.  Emerging back into the bright sunlight, I took myself on a tour of downtown Decorah, and was happy to see so many people out and about.  Of course, I had to stop in at the local food co-op, because who can pass up buckwheat flour sold in bulk? Or freshly baked bread? Or raspberry struesel?

Not this girl.

So did I learn anything about myself, the whole reason for this series of trips, during this particular meandering?
 

Besides that I want to live here.

Kind of.

I was sincerely hoping for a bolt from the sky spelling out what where to go from here, or if I should go at all.  But no such luck, and I drove home more depressed than when I had left that morning.

It really wasn't until a few days had passed and I was planting the tomato plants that I let my mind go back to what part the Farm had to play in my little, temporarily dramatic, life.

What finally came, was not solid direction, not a decision to stay or go, but a very simple and obvious revelation:  I don't have to save the world.  I used to really want to, and I'd still like to, but sometimes saving it is a simple as planting a tomato plant that hundreds of others have planted that year, and that thousands of others have planted before me.

No, nothing earth-shattering. But, it does take some of the pressure off of the inevitable choices I have to make.  I used to think I had two options: stay where I am, or go back to school for something else.  I had somehow forgotten there are other paths.

Whatever I decide, the sun will still rise in the east, the birds will still sing, and the Black Krim cares naught what I do, as long as I keep her watered and in a sunny spot and promise not to forget to plant her daughters again next year.  That's something that is immensely comforting.

Dear Internal Crisis: Eat my dust.

Notice anything different?

Here's a clue

I've been feeling very dramatic lately, and decided I would allow The Blog to reflect my recent brooding.

I'm sure you're asking yourselves, what could a privileged, educated, and employed woman possibly brood about?

In short, I've been brooding about my life.  I believe the term is "quarter-life crisis," and I've diagnosed myself based on the following symptoms:

* Uncertain and wary of my own future,
* Feeling lost and unsure of what I want,
* Frustration that life has not turned out to be a bowl of cherries.

I also did some light perusing of the internet, and came across this article on the subject, and the last line certainly seems to ring true:

The researchers say that idealists who also want to achieve conventional success—marriage, children, corner office—seem to be the population most affected.

I would agree that I'm part of that popluation who'd like to leave the world a bit better and still enjoy being a part of human society, except replace "marriage, children, corner office" with "health insurance, acreage, and boyfriend willing to put up with me."

I don't suffer from dull routine, nor am I plagued by questions of career choice or what my passion is. I know all that already. I work as a naturalist and I write a blog about my time spent in nature, I'm pretty sure I've got my passion figured out.

But friends, there is a mighty big difference between knowing what you want to do, and being able to actually do it.

So what has happened to this idealist? A cold, hard, steel punch to the gut from reality.

Truth: I love my job. No joke. I live in one of the Most Beautiful Places I've Ever Seen, within walking distance of the upper Mississippi, surrounded by wooded bluffs that are noisy with the sounds of the wild. I wear a hat like Smokey the Bear and convince kids that basswood fibers would've been just as soft as the clothes they're wearing, and I have the tree cross-section (aka tree cookie) to prove it. I love the people I work with and I learn from them everyday. I love my family here, and wouldn't trade any of them for the world.

Truth: It will be nearly impossible to stay here.

That, dear friends, is a bitter pill to swallow, and I've spent the past week or so with it stuck in my throat. The first blow came with being told a simple observation: When I first worked at the monument, all those years ago, the number of employees hovered around 50. Today, it hovers around twenty. Realization of the significance of that number came like poison ivy, delayed and painful. There are no permanent Interp positions at the monument, save for the Chief's, and it is unlikely there ever will be. My season can be extended and stretched, the last hours rationed over a pay period or two, but by November or December, the sand will have run out and will stay empty until the hourglass is tipped over again next summer. And the story will be repeated into infinity. No health benefits, no yearly salary, and that means no bank in their right mind would back my venture into country-livin'.

There it is. The idealist thought she had worked it out, a meaningful career in a beautiful part of the world. But the "conventional success" proves elusive still. Yes, I would like to have my cake and eat it, too.

Preferably one that tastes as good as this one looks

Traditional QLCs arise from an internal source, a displeasure deep within one's mind and body. Mine arises from an external source, the reality of the economic times we live in. Nevertheless, we all converge into the same type of distress as we are faced with the same terrifying question:

What do I do?

That question is not one I've fully answered yet.  But here's what I've come up with so far:

Enjoy the hell out of it.

Of all the advice I've collected and gleaned from others, this seems to be the most common sentiment.  I've been told to "just ride it out," and to "be glad you're facing this now,"  and that I should "take the time to really reflect on what I want from life," because I wouldn't be feeling this way if there wasn't something missing.

Rather than sink into a depression going round and round with worries and fears, I've decided to find out exactly what the missing puzzle piece is, or at least what colors are on it or what shape it's in.  Because my "true passion" has been called into question, I'll be hitting the highways and byways near and far to re-evaluate everything I thought I knew about myself.  From career, to family, to lifestyle, to what I want out of the next ten years, and any miscellaneous insights I collect along the way.

First stop to be posted soon.  Until then, just hit this link.

A Woodland (Re)introduction

Well friends, last week I arrived in the Driftless after just under 11 hours in the car with the Kansas wind at my back.

Secret of surviving long-distance road-tripping: Always have the necessities close at hand, like your cell phone, chapstick, energy drink, beads from the previous weekends' Ke$ha-themed party, gas receipt to remind you that you're back in the real world, and tissues because you've been balling your eyes out for the past twenty miles.

I was a Drifter then, and I'm a Drifter still, and we all knew I would come back to these bluffs.  For the next six months, I'll be working at Effigy Mounds National Monument, and have once again have taken up residence in my cousin's basement. 

While I am glad to be back, and have for the most part fallen into old patterns and routines, I'm still in the transition period.  It's almost as though we all must reintroduce ourselves to one another.

You didn't think I was talking about people, did you?

The last of the spring wildflowers are blooming, like the Wild Geranium above, and I spent a long time up on the hillsides of the monument getting reaquainted with the oft-overlooked blooms:

Wild Geranium

Virginia Waterleaf

Red Columbine

Wild Blue Phlox or Wild Sweet William

May Apple

Blue-eyed grass, one of my favorites! Often mistaken for grass, it's a member
 of the Iris family.



 Rue Anemone peeking out from the shade

Perhaps I'm being misleading.  There are not fields of colorful blossoms waiting to greet visitors. When you walk along the trails, this is what you're really seeing:

A sea of green.  But those are May Apples in the lower right-hand corner, and there are clumps of
Blue-eyed grass along the trails that small dogs might be eye-level with.

Not all spring woodland wildflowers are dainty and pretty.  Others are straight-up weird.

Like the Jack-in-the-Pulpit, which seem to grow to a monstrous size at Effigy Mounds.

Weirdo #2: Pussytoes, with its dense white flowers.  This is going to seed on one side.

All of the wildflowers were growing along the trail up to Fire Point, the most popular lookout point in the monument.  It doesn't take a naturalist to figure out why people find it breathtaking.

Fire Point, May 10

Wildflowers and vistas aren't the only curiousities out and about.  The Eastern Tent Caterpillars have found their way to this area, and they can be found crawling on every surface, whether it be the ironwood railings, the building, or various people. 

The caterpillars have an interesting life cycle.  Everything starts out as a black and slimy egg mass, which then hatches into dozens of caterpillars who then communally spin a "tent" for themselves in the branches.  They will come out of their little abode to feed on yummy leaves, and then will return home to snuggle up with their brothers and sisters.  Yup, social caterpillars.  They can easily defoliate an entire tree, and maybe some of its neighbors, too, but the whole event occurs so early in the year that the trees usually grow new leaves by mid-summer.  The tent caterpillars then transform into ordinary brown moths, and since moths aren't known for staying the same place, they will flitter about on the wind and be carried to a new patch of forest to lay their eggs.  So the big increases in population, "invasions" if you will, are a naturally occurring phenomenon.

They're cool little things, but it is disconcerting to stand quiet in the forest and actually hear the sound of all of them munching and pooping.  It sounds like a gentle rain.  A gentle rain of digestion.

I also have big, important news!  Remember in this post I let loose the secret I had never actually seen a Cerulean Warbler, the bird I would go on and on about whenever the word "conservation" was brought up?

As of May 10, 2012, I can say this with full confidence: They do exist.  And they are just as awesome as I had imagined them.
Sorry, no photo was possible as the long-awaited viewing was through binoculars and the tiny bird liked to hope around the tree branches and hide behind leaves.

The Hard Goodbye

This Saturday morning, I'll leave once again for the Driftless, that distant place in northeastern Iowa and southwestern Wisconsin where tall bluffs covered in forests rise up from the upper Mississippi.  I'll be working the usual gigs: naturalist, interpretive park ranger, and data entry for some of the birding surveys.  As excited as I am, I know it means saying a hard goodbye.

 Especially to Tiger-Puppy and his owner.

From Kansas to Wisconsin to Missouri to Wisconsin to Missouri then back to Wisconsin and finally back to Kansas, over and over dozens of times, I once thought of myself as very good at saying goodbye.  I said it so often, so easily, always expecting to return.

My head knows that it's time to head down that dusty trail again, to get on with life, for real this time.  When I imagine all the things I'll be getting to do over the next six months, I start getting really amped.  The lay-at-night-awake-but-in-a-good way excited.  But then I'll be riding broomstick-horses with my oldest nephew around the yard, trying so hard to memorize every detail and burn it into my heart's memory, and the inevitable bloom of sad wistfulness will rise in my chest. 





It's not the leaving that I'm sad about.  It's the fact that time won't stop while I'm gone.  I know I will always come back to Kansas, but things will never be the same.  My nephews will grow up whether I want them to or not, my parents will take trips and buy a new car and keep remodeling the house, my sister's family will spend their first summer in their new house. Slowly, but surely, we will change.  I know that for the rest of my life, I will look back on the past six months and wish with all my heart that I could go back.  This, this right here, is what I will want to return to, because even with the struggles and the bad days and the waiting for better days, these are the good times.

When things start feeling too bittersweet, I start imagining what the day will be like when I come for a visit again.  I will marvel at how much my nephews have grown, I will tell my friends and family stories of the Driftless, I will cook again in the kitchen with my mother, and I will lazily stretch out on my sister's couch and listen to my sister's tales of being an elementary teacher. 

That will be a good day.

Forever Young in Tornado Alley

This past weekend, family from far and wide descended upon our little corner of the world for a momentous occassion.
My uncle went and got hitched!

My uncle is more likely to ask you where you're finding your happiness these days than how your job is going, and my aunt is famous for accidentally calling coyotes into their yard in the country.  They are both the epitome of drama-free living and seem to have found a peace and happiness that runs deep.

"Forever Young" was chosen as the recessional music, and I think we had all forgotten what damn good song that is:

Words and pictures can only go so far in describing the feeling of seeing two loved ones, who normally shy away from the spotlight, say those vows out loud with their nearest and dearest in attendance.  But I can say that it's a good one.


"May the good Lord be with you down every road you roam...



...and may sunshine and happiness surround you when you're far from home."


After the ceremony, we headed to Dyck Arboretum of the Plains for the reception. We feasted, we laughed, and feasted some more.

Feasting and laughing is thirsty work.

The reception was very lovely, with delicious food, champagne, and of course, wedding cake. 

But oh, there was much more in the air than love, my friends.  And we had been feeling it all day.

Kansas, like most of the Midwest, is not known for steady weather conditions.  That's because the plains is where warm, humid air from the Gulf of Mexico meets up with cooler, dry air and cause a whole lot of atmospheric instability.  Wind and moisture get sucked up into ever growing clouds and thunderstorms are born.  Thanks to the magic of radar and weather monitoring, we know when such a collision is going to occur, and even if we didn't we could still feel it in our skin. 

For example, while the view outside at the reception was this:

It felt like we were looking at this:

In fact, we were currently sandwiched between two supercells (your above average thunderstorm that is usually the giant in the sky spinning off tornadoes), with a smaller storm headed our direction.

Image courtesy here.

The bottom supercell is the one that dropped a big ol' twister on Wichita causing about $283 million in damage.  Thankfully, there were no deaths in Kansas despite the powerful storms, and that's being attributed to advance warnings, better radar, and people taking the warnings seriously.  Last year's outbreaks, especially in Joplin, is still fresh on our minds.

While we escaped any really severe weather ourselves, that didn't stop me from imagining the worst possible outcome for the rest of the evening:

Worst outcome: Suddenly being a tween with a baby facing the terror of a night
filled with successive tornadoes.

To sum up: There was a lot of family, a lot of marriage, a lot of love in general, and a sampling of the raw forces of nature. 

It was a pretty good Saturday.