Green Gal

This post is the second part of a series about my weekend. Yesterday I went on a hike with other women to learn about and engage with nature connection. You can read about it in part one of this series here . Today, day two of this beautiful, sunny weekend, I woke up early and fortunately on time because my cell phone automatically switched for the time change. The things our technology can do these days! After a quick breakfast in the dining hall, I flew down the hill on my bike toward town. I say flew because today I was going to be a "SOUP'er Hero!" I was invited to an event a few weeks ago titled "SOUP'er Heroes Bike Ride & Food Distro," and after reading the description, I was souper stoked to partake in such a great cause by bike. The description read, "Join us for a day of community service, food and cycling! Together we will ride to local farms and secret gardens, harvest veggies, make soup, and distribute it to feed the hungry masses...

I love it when the weather supports my plans to spend time outdoors by brightening the day with sun and a gentle breeze and clear skies. This weekend I felt very supported by the weather because I planned on being outside for a total of at least seven hours this weekend. Yesterday I participated in a women's nature connection hike that I co-organized with a fellow residential adviser, Sonja, and my friend Collette, who is a nature mentor . The, this morning and early afternoon, I participated in a bike ride to a local farm to volunteer. The sun shined down on me and my fellow community members both days, and it allowed us all to feel comfortable and engage with the activities we were doing together and develop connections and have fun! Nevermind that it's nearly finals week and I have work to do--the sun doesn't always shine like it did this weekend, and nighttime is for homework, right? That's why we have light bulbs (CFL of course). Yesterday's hi...

Here is an assortment of random facts and thoughts on nature that I've learned so far this summer at camp: Capturing Animals as Pets You never want to capture and take home with you an animal or insect or fish from nature to make your pet. Each has its own role in that habitat, so to remove it makes it harder for that ecosystem to thrive and harms the animal you're removing. If you want a pet spider or snake, look for captive-bred animals, not live-bred animals because this means the animal you're getting was not taken from its natural environment but was raised in captivity from birth. Another thing to realize is that putting sticks and leaves in a jar does not recreate a habitat. Ecosystems are diverse and full of organisms big and small that animals and insects depend upon. Observe and learn from animals in their habitats, but leave them be. If you really love them, leave them. Baby Snakes are More Poisonous than Adults Fortunately, I didn't learn this from e...

Our backpacks were full of dehydrated food, trail mix bars, warm clothes, and all the fixins for a weekend away on Mount Tamalpais. We already had our hiking clothes on, and we were looking forward to spending the evening outdoors and falling asleep in my new backpacking tent. We didn't have a campsite reservation, but we figured it would all work out. The weekend was ahead of us in all its unknown adventures. After driving for about an hour, we got onto Highway 101, excitement setting in because we had just had our first glimpse of Mt. Tam. A few minutes after getting on the highway, though, Green Guy tells me the car has stopped working. It felt unreal to me--we were so close we could see the mountain! We pulled off to the shoulder and Green Guy checked under the hood. Unsure of what it was that had happened, he got back in the car and started it back up, driving us safely to the next exit. You could feel it as the car died on the off-ramp. Using gravity, we ro...

It's only the second day of nature camp, and as a counselor I have already spent many hours of my free time after work studying things that I have missed so much during the past school year of papers and assigned readings... Last night, I studied Ohlone culture for an hour or two, taking notes for a lesson that I am facilitating on Friday about technology (mortar and pestle, bow and arrow, nets, snares, hot rocks, etc.), the natural landscape as it was 200 years ago in my hometown and surrounding area, and medicinal and useful plants. These are topics I avidly studied in high school on my own, back when I had more free time. Once I create the lesson plan for Friday, perhaps I'll post it here so others can use it, too. Tonight, I spent some time re-reading the biography of Opal Whiteley, an inspiring American nature enthusiast and writer who at the age of 5 began writing a nature diary in the woods near her home in Oregon. She was a remarkable person, and I remember being ve...

In addition to being great exercise and a way to get to really awesome places in the world, hiking is also one of my favorite social activities. Since the time I was old enough to hike around Pinecrest Lake, I was making the trek with my family, trying to keep up with uncles and cousins in my little hiking boots and sunhat. I've always been a hiker, and I continue to be one, especially since I live in a hilly forest off the coast of the Pacific Ocean. How can you not be a hiker when you live two minutes from hiking trails and views of the ocean? Given this interest in hiking and the opportunities for social engagement and community building that it offers, this past fall, a fellow student sustainability leader at UC Santa Cruz and I organized a hike into the Upper Campus trails that meander through forest and meadow above our university home. The goal was to bring together students, staff, faculty, community members interested in sustainability at UC Santa Cruz for a day hike to ...

We were supposed to bring a "talent" into Spanish 5 class today para el final día de clase. A poem, un canción, a drawing, a skill. My Spanish professor and I hemos hablado sobre poetry y traducción on a few occasions, y por eso decidí que I would bring in some of my own poemas, translated into español. We didn't end up sharing the talents, but we did sing La Bamba and eat cake that the professor brought para nosotros. Era delicioso. But now I have some translated poetry of my own, and I would like to share it with someone. I suppose since you're reading this, that someone is you. I just have to say that the process of translating my own words into Spanish was illuminating. It taught me that I don't know what many words really mean in English. My assumptions about connotation and my understanding of certain nuances have been shattered and rebuilt for some words. I am learning how to say what I really mean in English while simultaneously learning new wo...