Professional Development

I have spent the last three days with my people. My people are guides and nature teachers. They are risk managers and Wilderness First Responders, medics, EMT's and WEMT's. They are dreamers and visionaries, logisticians, and fecal technicians, They are adventurers and storytellers, mothers, fathers, lovers, feelers, tree huggers, mountaineers, explorers, scientists, compassionists. They wear puffy down jackets, river sandals, and take notes in small notebooks, they wear sunglasses and warm hats, and drink tea and coffee from re-usable mugs encrusted with stickers about things they use or believe in or both. They are free spirits that sleep on the ground with regularity and take care of their clients and students in the most adverse situations. They are my people. I am proud to be among their ranks. I got to be with them this weekend here in Bend, Oregon in a barn and the surrounding grassy forested world of a city park. We were there for three days, practicing our skills and honing the craft of keeping people safe and well cared for when exploring and learning and growing out beyond the THRESHOLD, We learned what to do in case things go wrong out there— how to reduce dislocations, build splints for broken arms and legs, how to stay warm, to stay cool, to stay calm when helping someone injured, afflicted with anaphalaxys, ectopic pregnancy, epiditimitis, asthma, abrasion, laceration, avulsion, viper or brown recluse bite, burns of all kinds. Together we gathered and we reviewed and we trained and we learned, writing SOAP notes, evacuation plans, and email addresses so that we might stay in touch and keep learning from eachother in these moments that come after - after we leave eachother's company to go to the far corners, to Smith Rock, Yosemite, Joshua tree, Antarctica, Denali, Greenland, Sierra, Wind River, Nova Scotia, Sisters Oregon. Now we are finished. Now we go on to do our work the way we do it in our communities that are lucky enough to have us. We go out and we go forth to do the WORK. The WORK of guiding and teaching and holding the space for others so that they might find the peace, the connection, the truth of membership in this great fluid filled body that we share called EARTH.