Day 2 -- July 10, 2017

Lava Land

Deschutes National Forest

Bend, OR

Seven thousand years ago, the Newberry Volcano erupted, covering the cascades with steams of molten lava. Today, there is still large areas of black earth that nothing grows in, still reminding us that sometimes nature will always trump nurture.

Today our rag-tag group spent the morning with the rangers and employees of Deschutes National Forest (DNF). While we were able to hear the origin stories of several individuals who told us their background and journey, one conversation stuck in my brain more than the others.

Fire Manager. Jeff Babb, above right, spoke to the group about his job working as a Fire Ecologist. 

Jeff Babb works in DNF as a Fire Ecologist, a position he told us has a fairly recent origin. Starting in the 1980s, scientists like Babb started thinking about forest fires differently. What if instead of trying to completely control a fire (think Smoky the Bear, all fires are bad), they started thinking of fires as something that needed to be managed? Maybe they could work with the fires, rather than against them.

Within the last few decades, Fire Ecologists have been taking this idea and allowing fires to do what they do best: reset the ecosystem. By managing these flames, they have been able to makes the forests as resilient as possible, allowing them to grow better and stronger than before.

Lava Butte. While we only had a few minutes to enjoy the view from atop Lava Butte, it was worth it. The 360 view was breathtaking, and being able to see the effects of the volcano from 7,000 years ago was amazing.
Left to right: Judy, me, Christina, Jayenell, and Jessica. 

Hey, look at me! Left to right: Joel,
Judy, Sidonia, and Jayenell. 

And as I sat there thinking this idea of management vs. control, I thought about my own experiences. I like feeling like I’m in control, even if it’s in the smallest ways. I control the radio when I drive. I control the books I read. I control the clothes I wear.

I wish I could control how things happen to me. How people interact with me. How they respond to what I say and do.

I wish I could control even a little bit of my student’s lives, just things like if they do their homework or not. Or the kinds of homes my students go home to. I’d even settle for being able to control if they eat breakfast in the morning.

I can’t control any of these things. And I know that.

But what if I looked at things more like management? Coming up beside and supporting, finding ways to work with the natural progression of things? If instead of trying to control how someone reacts to my opinion on a matter, what if I managed my half of the conversation, making sure that instead of jumping in, I was thoughtful and used well-reasoned ideas?

River Goddess.  Judy never shies away from the water, even
when it requires a balancing act on fallen trees to get there.

Would this shift be enough to help me loosen the reigns of control and be more at peace with my natural environment? I really don’t know, but it’s something to think about.

-KT