camp:
Baker National Forest, Baker County, Oregon
context:
After a week in Wallowa County, where we talked to ranchers about the negative
impacts wolf reintroduction has had on their livelihood, we moved to Baker
National Forest to do a week of ecology-related fieldwork with Suzanne Fouty,
of the US Forest Service. Much of our curriculum, centered on the importance of
having wolves in ecosystems to maintain natural balance between wolves and elk,
which in turn keeps streams healthy. Also the coldest week of the
semester—slicing cantaloupes for breakfast in 15 degree weather, anyone?
It’s
about 9:30pm and there’s already ice on my sleeping bag. FML.
Anyway…now
we’re hearing the other side of the wolves, and whole ecosystems, and I wonder
what we want to accomplish. Is our goal, as young people, to take in as much
information as possible so we can eventually form a firmly held opinion and be
split into a side in the debate? Or do we learn this to learn the art of
compromise, so we can make half changes and accomplish things without having that
fire burning inside us? I guess it’s not that black and white, and I hope more
than anything else that we’re learning how to be good people, even with our
convictions. I want that fire, but maybe without the certainty. I’m not sure
that’s even possible, and I feel too in flux to say anything certain about what
I believe. Some days, I think a creative team of economists, environmentalists
and politicians can save us from our own hubris. Some days, I think Western
Civilization is going to collapse under the mountain of trash we’ve been
building. Some days, I wish I had a chainsaw and dynamite so I could fight.
Other times, I give up, go back to ordering drinks in single-use cups and
running the AC in my car. Some days, I think eating real food is the most holy
thing I can do, and some days I’d just rather be a person, with all of the
privileges that entails. And no matter what, I’m never sure.
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