EDEN: Earth's Directory of Environmental Narratives: May 2012

Cierra Cole
Bill Gholson
WR 460
Paper #2
2 May 2012

    It was a cool morning in September when our hike began. As I hoisted my heavy pack onto my shoulders, I took one last glance at my car. If there were anything that I had forgotten, I would have to do without for the next two days. I glanced at my two companions. One of them was named Jason, he and I had been married three months earlier. The third companion was Jason’s youngest brother, Erik. Erik was the reason we were there. That week was his sixteenth birthday. Since he lived alone with a severely disabled father, Jason and I had decided that a little freedom was the perfect birthday gift.
    The trail into the Cudyhys was staggeringly difficult. Most people who live within 200 miles of the Oregon and California border know of or have heard the name of the Marble Mountain Wilderness. However, only a very small minority has ever been there. The high country is noted for its pristine alpine lakes, majestic mountain peaks, and most famously, an entire ridge made of solid marble.
    After 30 minutes of hiking I am struck with the reality of the kind of trail I have embarked on. Already, in what Jason is calling “the easy flat part,” there is a steady incline. The frequency of packers traveling with horses and mules has maintained the trail for years, freeing it from brush and obstructions. The trail splits early on, the lower path for people with four legged friends, the higher path for people with too much ambition. We took the higher path.
    After lunchtime we arrived at the stairs. Within the last fifty years, the Forest Service had dug out the steepest and most slippery part of the trail and placed slabs of rock as makeshift stairs. At first mention I had imagined, with some hope, that these stairs would be like those found in a household – small. The steps are made of stone slabs 18-24 inches wide. I was forced to stagger and lean forward while taking steps, stumbling all the way up. I knew one thing for certain; the next two days would at least be sweaty.
    After 45 minutes on the stairs and another hour on the trail, we arrived at our campground. On the far corner there is an old cabin that is reserved for Forest Service use. It has a green roof and old, splintery sides. The cabin seems a pioneer, a stalwart old soul left to face an unrelenting wilderness that few men enter. Inside I can see bear traps, old saws, a wiry cot, and a few collapsing shelves. In my heart I wonder if I will survive this place as well as the cabin has.
    At the farthest edge of the campsite there is a ditch that stands as border to a giant bustling meadow. The flowers are unlike any I have ever seen and they grow with a ferocity that is shocking. Indian Paintbrush, and other wildflowers, stands furiously erect, like static hairs on the meadow’s back. If I were to venture there, I would be lost among the foliage. As I approach the creek the marble ridge comes into view. It stands, seemingly, just beyond the meadow and a stretch of trees. Thousands of feet up this giant body rests upon the green crest of the wilderness. The great mass of marble lay like a slumbering giant; chest falling and rising with enormous gusts of pristine air whooshing in and out.
    The boys are bouncing around the campground now, having rested their heavy sacks, snacked, and emptied several water bottles. “When can we go to the cave? We can make it before it’s too dark, yes?” I ask, willing to sacrifice the burning relief that is pulsing through my entire body. We hastily filled our daypack, trying to suppress our giddy anticipation of the adventure ahead, and head to the ridge in search of a cave.
    To my dismay, the last hour of the trek to the cave is harder than the preceding three. After a few minutes on the trail, Jason swerves dramatically and begins marching right up the steep mountain incline. Erik and I blink at him.
“Jason, where are you going?”
“Remember? We have to go off the trail to get to the cave. It’s straight up from here.”
    It turned out that the phrase “straight up” wasn’t much of an exaggeration. We hop scotched for thirty minutes through thick layers of brush. Everywhere the forest floor is littered with the dried, decaying bodies of old trees that have collapsed. Their corpses lay as though resting; peacefully assimilating into the ground.
    We come to a stretch of rocks, rising up like a parking lot of stone-age minivans all crammed into a single tiny lot. Getting atop the first boulder is difficult, but soon we are all making our way like eager Billy goats, leaping from rock to rock. At last we break into the final section, a meadow. The incline is now steeper than it has been for the entire trek. Thick bushes have overwhelmed the ground, their roots sunbathing contently. When the bushes disperse, a magnificent grassy plain appears. Pristine skies and endless mountain peaks are visible now, spanning hundred of miles.
    Atop the meadow is a gravel ridge that is lip to a limestone bowl. Like a wrinkled bed sheet the limestone lay with great crevasses and ridges for a solid mile. I imagine myself bounding across the wide expanse, disappearing easily into one of the hundreds of divots.
    We scale down the lip and land on the lowest point of the bowl. To our left is a giant snow bank, still a good fifty feet thick and melting slowly into the cool limestone.
“It might take us a while to find the entrance. Last time it took me and the guys a couple of hours.” Jason recounts. Two weeks prior he had come here with a group of high school buddies. Even after looking at a map, they still took half a day to find the cave.
    Fortunately, we found the cave much sooner that anticipated. After another 45 minutes, we find the entrance. A deep, wrinkly orifice stands as a welcome mat to any who dare.
“You expect me to crawl down there?” I ask, slightly alarmed at the sight before me.
“Yeah, it’s not too bad. You will get dirty, though.” Jason says, adjusting the contents of his pockets and turning on a headlight.
    Once inside, we come into a large rectangular room that is wet and cold. There is no flat surface, so we crab walk down large boulders and leap frog the spiky rocks that line the floor. I glance down at a boulder I am scaling and notice something startling. A tiny microorganism has sprung up right on the ledge of the boulder. I pivot and shine my light on it to get a closer look. Sure enough, some little critter left his dropping on this rock, and beautiful bacteria has consumed it. The pile is about the size of a peanut, and is covered in clear, shiny membranes. Hundreds of flagella stand erect; a little crystal forest atop a monumentally small form. I am astounded by it. So far I have not seen any vegetation in the cave, only wet rock faces and colorful bacteria. I whip out my camera and take a snap shot.
    ‘Hey Jason, Erik, check this out!” They turn and come to see what has left me so enamored.
    “Hey, it’s shiny poop! Cool!” Says Jason. I frown.
    “No! Come on, it’s totally a little life form that is fighting to survive the freaky cave! It’s awesome. Also, I got a picture, which makes me awesome!” I am ecstatic about my poop findings.
    “Okay sweetie, you scored a picture of poop. Good job.”
    We leave our fascinating little specimen and soon the chambers narrow. I see a wall ahead. Sitting on the balls of my feet, I watch as Jason and Erik step forward a few yards. Sure enough, there is a gap in the wall at ground level. The cave looks like a sandwich with no filling. I realize that I will have to crawl for who knows how long between these two pieces of cave bread; I will be the filling.
“Hey, do we have to crawl through that?” My nerves are already uneasy from the darkness, freezing drafts, and strange noises that fill the cave.
“Yep, for about fifteen minutes you’ll have to crawl. Just follow me.”
    I bite my lip. No one mentioned tiny crawl spaces. Well, Jason did mention it once or twice, but he definitely never articulated how tiny. “It’s a good thing I am not claustrophobic…” I tell myself as I lay on my side and begin to crawl through the gap.
As I crawl I focus on taking slow easy breaths. Even though I’ve never experienced symptoms of claustrophobia, I am certain that I don’t want any to manifest now.
    The ceiling of the crawl space looks like a mottled and dilapidated painted canvas. Tiny droplets of water hang like stars suspended in the sky. There are hundreds of different bacteria growing all over the place. They do not resemble the kind of mold we see on bread or rotting fruit. Rather, these bacteria are flat and smooth, almost like acrylic paint that has been smeared across the rough cave surface.
    When I reach the end of the crawl space, Jason is waiting patiently for Erik and I. We continue forward and come to a dead end. To our right is a shelf, which extends for a few feet before dropping off. It is only six inches wide, but stands about five feet from the ground.
“What do we do now?” I ask, feeling more nervous than I have since we started.
“Well, we have to get onto this ledge and then climb through that opening,” he says pointing to a three-foot wide tunnel that begins just above the shelf.
“That’s really funny. Okay, what are we actually going to do Jason?”
He turns and looks at me with mud and sweat on his face, his eyes are serious. “I’m not kidding. We have to get onto this shelf and go through the tunnel.”
    Suddenly I feel a flash of anger. I have no memory of being warned about this. I hate heights. As my husband, he should know this about me. I resist the urge to start yelling at him for being an idiot and having an empty head that is stuffed with bad ideas. Then I turn to Erik.
“Hey, maybe you should go first. I know you are a really good climber. You try it, that would make me feel better about going up.”
    Erik shrugs and steps forward. Jason gives him a boost and he scrambles awkwardly onto the shelf. The first part of the shelf, which is only two inches wide, is the most accessible. For a moment, Erik is laying flat against the cave wall, with only two inches of rock to stand on, suspended five feet in the air above a jagged rock bottom. My heart stopped. Then, with grace and ease, Erik leapt to the wider section and began to fit his lanky form into the tunnel.
    Jason turns and looks at me. It’s my turn now. I feel vulnerable, and for a moment I attempt to resume some rationality. As I consider the emotions that are pulsing through me. Anger is still very near the surface, ready to snap at him. I consider the fact that something bad could happen while we are here, and I would feel worse if the last thing I did to my spouse was moan about how unaccommodating caves are.
“You ready?” he says, smiling softly. He knows that I am nervous.
“Oh heck.” I say, and shove my flashlight into my back pocket.
    The rock is drier here, but still very cold. I grip hard with my fingers and hoist myself up as Jason pushes from behind. Erik is scuttling around the other side of the tunnel making a loud racket.
“Oi! Erik! Where ya be? I am entering the tunnel…” I holler as I peak through the opening. To my dismay, it is not even a nice tunnel. It is the mean kind. The bottom is rough and has sharp edges protruding. It is also narrow, and filled with an extremely cold draft. With my flashlight I realize that the other side of the tunnel appears to be a sheer drop off.
“Erik! Where are you?” I am starting to feel short tempered again and increasingly nervous.
He hollers back. “ Here!”
    I shake my head in anger. I have no idea where “here” is. For a moment I picture myself as a dot on a map, like a tiny probe descending into Hades; except it is definitely too cold. Maybe it is a short cut to China? I weasel through the tunnel and discover the end is only a 3-foot drop. I land awkwardly while Jason comes up close behind me. The ground I am standing on is the peak of a tall mound of lose rocks and boulders, which descend into what appears to be a shallower, lower passage of the cave. I try to not look down. If I slip, I will disappear into the gaping jaws of the cave floor. We continue forward and come to another narrow, hall-like space. Jason tells me that he needs to be in front so I can follow him. I oblige happily. After a few moments he stops; his body is blocking my line of sight.
    “What is it?” I ask, not sure that I even want to hear the answer. I’ve already resolved that this has been my first and last caving excursion ever.
    “We have to jump.” He turns and looks at me. I lean around him and make the enormous mistake of looking down.
    “Holy crap, Jason! You did not tell me about this. You never said I would have to jump over a two-foot wide space onto a tiny rock that is above a forty-foot ravine that is narrow at the bottom and WILL KILL ME IF I FALL! You never said that!!” I am almost crying now.
    Erik has climbed back down and is standing behind me now. His hands are in his pockets and his brow is furrowed. The unease on his face makes me feel even less comfortable.
    Jason takes a deep breath and looks me right in the eyes. “Sweetie, listen. I did this just a little while ago. All of us did. And we all did just fine. I’m going to go first, okay? And I will stand right there, close to the edge to catch you if something happens.”
My head nods against my will. I look down again, trying to see if there is another way to do this.
    Erik and I step back and give Jason a few feet of hurtling space before he leaps gracefully to the other ledge. Below us the ravine narrows dramatically, the bottom would probably mean death if one of us fell, or worse, broken legs.
    I stood on the ledge for a few minutes. Both Erik and Jason were quiet; they stood like guardians on either side of me, waiting for me to leap. I started to cry.
“I really don’t want to do this.” I said, looking pleadingly at Jason. In all honesty, the extremity of the cave had not been articulated to me before I had agreed to come. I had not been mentally or emotionally prepared for the danger I was facing. Inside, my will to conquer the entire trek through the cave battled ferociously with my fear of injury. I began to wonder if it would be too pathetic of me to turn around and just go back the way I came.
“I’m so sorry. But it really is the only way. And I know you can do this. It’s easy. I know it looks really scary, but it is easy. You can do it.”
    Erik shifts behind me and nods his head, “Seriously, all the women I have ever met would have turned back a long time ago. It’s impressive that you have made it this far, because this is really hard.”
    “Okay, I’ll try.” I say.
    I shove my flashlight into the back of my jeans and pull up my sleeves. Then, I hurtle myself across the dark cavern below me. Jason grabs onto me as soon as my feet hit the other side. I yelp and lurch forward, wrapping my arms around him. Then he turns and begins scaling the shelf’s narrow width. I follow close behind, still hyperventilating and a very shaken.
    Soon the cave widened, stretching at least one hundred feet from ceiling to floor. Light became visible as we approached the edge of the cavern. When we get to the end, the cave opened up in the shape of a doorway. Beyond the doorway is a ledge covered with car-sized boulders standing like a gate around the edge. We climbed onto the boulders to see the view. We had come out at least 1,000 feet high on the mountainside above a grassy bowl. We could see for miles, but our starting point was not visible. We have literally crawled through the mountain from one side to the other.
“So, how do we get down from here?” I ask, legitimately curious about what kind of rock climbing skills my husband has assumed I possess. Everything around us is sheer, loose, and too high to risk falling.
“What do you mean?” He asks, frowning at me.
“Well, how do we get back?”
“Um, the same way that we came? Back through the cave.”
    I gasp, not having realized that my only way home is to return through the dangers we’d just faced. Every time that I had heard of the cave, it had never been articulated that there was only one entrance, which served as the default exit. My heart sank as I realized that I had to go back and do it all again.
“You really didn’t know that?” Jason looks worried and sorry.
    Suddenly I am crying again. I shake my head and swallow my pride. After a few minutes of sitting in the sun, we turn and head back through the way we came. We made it back out safely, and I managed to keep my emotions together.
    The cave to me became an important right of passage. Brothers and strong parents had raised me in the wilderness; I was used to not being cut slack. But that cave became a symbol to me of my own understanding; that there is always something more to learn about and experience. Caves represent this idea in so many ways. They are like the caverns of thought and fear that we keep in our minds; rarely touched or encountered. They are like the dark, unseen spaces within all of us. But when we enter that unseen world, it can prove more refining than most of what we experience in the seen world. By venturing into that new realm we allow ourselves to discover more about who we are, and the world we live in.

1. Aprovecho’s mission is “Living, Learning, Organizing, and Educating to Inspire a Sustainable Culture.” Thirty years after its founding, the center serves as an inspiration for the hundreds of students, visitors, and volunteers that make use of its facilities.

http://www.aprovecho.net/

2. The Coast Fork Willamette Watershed Council is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization that strives to enhance and restore habitat for fish and wildlife, our community, and for future generations.http://www.coastfork.org/

3. At Umpqua-Watershed, our goals are to advocate sound stewardship practices that sustain biodiversity and restore degraded lands and waterways.http://www.umpqua-watersheds.org/index.htm

4. Lost Valley, we host courses, workshops, events, a conference center, and the Meadowsong Ecovillage residential community, which are all contexts for world view changing and interactive, experiential learning. People who come through any of those avenues will grow in their ability to be positive agents for change in a wide variety of work settings, social action groups, living situations and life paths.http://lostvalley.org/

5. Klamath-Siskiyou Wildlands Center is dedicated to preserving and restoring one of the most important wild places in the world, with its rich web of unique life, was born almost 30 years ago near Bald Mountain in the Kalmiopsis. Lou Gold, Pedro Tama, and Romain Cooper formed the Siskiyou Project to ensure that future generations of all species would enjoy this special place. Over the decades the work of Siskiyou Project inspired thousands to take a stand against the destruction; together we worked to reverse course, seeking a sustainable coexistence with our wild lands and rivers.http://www.siskiyou.org/index.shtml

6. Clean Forest Project, with the help of our army of volunteers, has taken on the task of removing garbage and hazardous waste from forests, deserts, and beaches to restore our fragile watersheds and eco-systems. Since 2007 Clean Forest Project has removed over 680,000 pounds of illegally dumped trash from our beautiful public lands. Clean Forest Project operates in many states, and is taking our mission nation-wide.http://www.cleanforestproject.org/

7. Cape Arago Audubon Society’s mission is to promote appreciation and understanding of the birds and natural environment of Coos County through education, field trips, and local restoration and conservation projects that enhance our community.http://www.capearagoaudubon.org/index.html

8. Nearby Nature is a non-profit education organization based in Eugene, Oregon. Our staff and volunteers lead nature walks, teach SUMMER DAYCAMPS, host school programs, sponsor special events, teach adult workshops, and work on environmental restoration projects, primarily in the Whilamut Natural Area of Alton Baker Park. Nearby Nature also serves as the City of Eugene's official Park Host in Alton Baker Park, maintains an educationalhttp://www.nearbynature.org/

9. Cascadia Wildlands educates, agitates, and inspires a movement to protect and restore Cascadia's wild ecosystems.http://www.cascwild.org/

10. Good Company is a sustainability consulting firm that provides analysis, strategy and implementation services to help clients better their performance. Our clients share our mission of making sustainability work and value both critical and creative thinking for their operations, their projects and their new ventures.

http://www.goodcompany.com/

11. Founded in 1974, Oregon Wild works to protect and restore Oregon’s wildlands, wildlife and waters as an enduring legacy for all Oregonians.

http://www.oregonwild.org/

12. The Walama Restoration Project (WRP) is a community organized non-profit, founded in 2001, and dedicated to the enhancement, rehabilitation, and restoration of the waterways, forest, and grassland ecosystems within and adjacent to the Willamette Valley. In addition to ecosystem restoration, WRP facilitates environmental education and the fostering of connections between people and the bioregion in which they live. http://walamarestoration.org/

13. Lane County (Oregon) Audubon Society is a chapter of the National Audubon Society and a non-profit organization dedicated to the conservation of and education about our natural environment, with a primary focus on birds, other wildlife, and their habitats.We seek to develop a culture of conservation that protects and preserves the earth's biological diversity.

http://www.laneaudubon.org/

14. The Mission of the Southern Oregon Land Conservancy is to work cooperatively with landowners, partners, and communities to protect high priority lands in the Rogue Basin for current and future generations.http://www.landconserve.org/home

15. Northwest Youth Corps was created in 1984 to offer teenagers an education-based, work experience modeled after the historic Civilian Conservation Corps of the 1930's. In 1984, support from Oregon's forest products industry and grants from four northwest foundations, allowed NYC to start its' first program and serve 52 teens.

http://www.nwyouthcorps.org/index.html

16. The Mission of Cascade Sierra Solutions is to conserve natural resources and enhance public health through freight transportation energy efficiency improvements and emissions reduction.

http://www.cascadesierrasolutions.org/homepage.aspx

EDEN: Earth's Directory of Environmental Narratives

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

MycoRiseUp Foundation

Doug Elliott, Herbalist, sings about dandelions

If you want a real downer.....

Nature Writing Essay: The Great Marble Ridge

Life's Breath Lost

Mushrooms Are Awesome

Cierra says

Local Environmental Web Sites

Contributors