Foiled! Before I left the hotel this morning I started a post about my week. Saved it on blogger and planned to finish it at the airport…forgetting that El Paso does not have free wireless internet! I’ve been here often enough in the last few months you’d think I’d remember that. Oh well. I guess I’ll just start over in my word editor and upload it again when I do have internet. It may show up slightly out of context, but whatever, this is a pretty random blog anyways.
It’s national park week. Or, the end of it at least. I was unaware of this fact, it seems that our president does occasionally do something I can get behind, go figure. In my ignorance, I managed to celebrate appropriately although accidentally. 4 parks/monuments/memorials in as many days. Finally, a one to one ratio I can get behind. Given my recent mutterings, you, my faithful readers may think that I despise traveling. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. I love to travel. It is actually one of my life passions. I want to see and do everything the world has to offer. I do despise traveling against my will, to places I’ve been, to do useless things, which has been the bulk of my recent miles. But, the traveling for fun, that I love. I seem to have inherited this particular love from my Dad, who absolutely cannot stay home by himself for more than two days. So this is how I ended up accidentally celebrating national park week. Mom and Dad had different school vacations this year, and their loving eldest just happened to be inhabiting a city within striking distance of three parks Pops had not yet visited. (aside: Dad is on a quest to visit every NPS location available and he’s presently sitting somewhere in the 80-90% range). So he cashed in some miles, came on by and off we went, old school road trip style.
This is a good time to mention that the NPS has played an important role in my life. In some way it has shaped the person I am today. The experiences I had on our numerous family trips in pursuit of Dad’s quest have inspired my love of travel, my love of nature, my love of science, and countless other loves that are a key part of whom I am today. More importantly, the family memories these parks created are priceless, and we are a stronger unit because of those times. Pretty much, they are a good thing all around, so it’s not like Dad twisted my arm on this trip, even though I had already visited these parks when I was here three years ago in an attempt to share my love for all of the above with my husband.
When I was a kid, I wanted to be a park ranger. For some reason I did not choose that particular career path for reasons I can’t remember, although I suspect they had some practicality behind them. Instead I started my career pursuing life, following another path, one as far away from park ranger as you can get; an electrical engineer doesn’t see much outside time. As I progressed I ended up finding this niche that miraculously combines both: I get to use my fancy electronics to measure nature. So somehow I ended up right where I belonged….or so I thought.
Recently the job search has put me in the position of re-evaluating the above mentioned life choices, the emotional consequences of this are too great for me to talk/type about yet, so they are for another day. What is relevant here is that I’m in an odd place right now, lost in my own thoughts and questioning many things. The future is a bit muddy for me right now, and not in the way I like, when the unknown can be slightly exciting, but in the way were the floor is slowing creeping out from under you and you have yet to find the rope to grasp hold of. So it is from this new perspective I approached these parks this time around.
Dad was determined to make sure we did things I had not yet done yet at every park and this involved some ranger led activities. Including the sunset stroll at White Sand National Memorial. As we walked along, I managed to get my head out of the job mess and actually pay attention to the Ranger. As he told us about life in the dessert, I notice his uniform, the one that sparks all those good memories. The ranger uniform that I once hoped to wear has not changed a bit in the last 20 years, right down to those belts with the pine cones carved in them, they are as constant as the natural wonders they strive to protect. Anyways, it brought me back, and I found myself totally intrigued in what he had to say, finding his talk about how the sand moves in the air very relevant to what I do and for the first time in a long time I remembered how lucky I really am. I remembered that childhood desire to be a ranger, and realized that in a way I am. I help make the science that someday a ranger may apply to protecting/understanding their parks and spread to the public. I’m pretty damn lucky, I guess I should stop with the self pity routine. And then, there in the quiet beauty of the sunset over White Sands, I truly felt, for the first time in a long time, that it would all turn out OK.
So that is the story f my park trip, the parks can be many things to many people, or many things to one person. Go visit them, any one of them, they are all great. Take the spirit of National Park Week with you whenever you have the chance, and find you’re moment of peace. Or maybe just find the time to watch a sunset and achieve the same effect.
Ok, I’m off to meet my husband in Florida. Yup, you read that right.
* I apologize that these pictures are from the trip I took 3 years ago (top is white sands, lower is Guadalupe Mountains), trust me these places are preserved so not much has changed. I have new pictures but the cable for my camera is at home, and the card reader is at my apartment and I’m currently in a state different from either of those locations, headed for yet a different state. You’d think with all this traveling I would be better with the packing by now.
No comments:
Post a Comment