And Now...

Staring into nowhere, North Dakota

A lot can happen in one year. In just twelve short months a man's life can dramatically transform itself not just once, but a seemingly endless number of times through a number of epic stories and adventures. It's not until relatively recently, perhaps now, that I am finally taking the time to begin to reflect on all of it. There are a few devoted friends who occasionally hop on Homegrown to check out the latest, and for quite a while there has been little more than a few meager posts that do a rather terrible job at depicting some of the experiences I've had in the past year of my life. In a little more than a year's time I did the following:

Unearthed the vagaries of mountain top removal coal mining in West Virginia, spending weeks sleeping in an abandoned cabin, and nearly dying going ninety in a Suzuki Sidekick with a guy named 'Crazy Charles'. (May 2008/2009)

Drag Line on Kayford Mountain, West Virginia

Traveled to Colorado for two weeks kayaking (June 2008)

Avalanche, Oh be Joyful Creek, Crested Butte

Traveled in Peru for a little more than a month, living in a small rural valley name Chilca for three weeks with 11 students building a guinea pig barn out of mud bricks. At one point I spoke to myself on fairly frequent intervals while driving through the Atacama Desert overlooking the Pacific Ocean to break the silence of no radio. (August, 2008)

Somewhere in the Altiplano, Peru

Traveled to Ecuador with my amigo Billy Blanco, otherwise known as Captain Strong Arms (he attempted to start his own blog called Strong Arms, but do to competing readership from the Perpetual Flow, he was unable to keep his ratings up and discontinued his writings) We evaded falling to our deaths while climbing out of the Oyacachi River on a mudslide, and crashing dirt bikes in the shadow of a fiery volcano. (December 2008)

Street Scene, Quito

Toured Ushuaia, Argentina in Patagonia for a week before hopping on a boat with a bunch of crazy wide eyed folks from all around the globe, and tooled on down to Antarctica with Robert Swan and 2041. I learned what it felt like to dance in blue underwear and ski gloves after vomiting in fifty foot seas. (March 2009)

Flew to Mallorca for a wedding atop a cliff overlooking the Mediterranean, and became violently ill eating mariscos (shellfish) on a pizza in a small town, vomited and diarrheaed my way into a local urgencia where the doctor took a large gauge needle and shoved it in my ass check to keep me from dying (May 2009)

Mallorca

Jetted down to Belize with twelve students. Swam into a cave filled with skeletons of Mayan princesses, paddled a dug-out canoe, sank to the bottom of fifteen foot deep pot-hole in a river, and was foiled by the ganja ninjas of Dangriga.

Big Rock Falls, Belize

Bought a tiny house in suburban Maryland (never in a million years imagined I would do this, but I must admit it has worked out quite nicely) (June, 2009)

The new spot under renovation

Attempted to restore the grease car to good health, but failed miserably after making the bad choice to once again have someone else look at the car because I could not find the time to do it myself. The 'repairs' did not pan out, and I found myself setting sail across the country for a month and a half in a Jeep, kayak on top, and bikes on the back. At one point I filmed a terrorist completing his morning training exercises near the South Platte River in Nebraska. (June and July 2009)

Great Sand Dunes, Colorado

Spent three weeks in the Thousand Island Region of New York at an old river house, decided it was in my best interest that I buy an antique diamond engagement ring at a local antique show, take the girl I want to marry out in a tiny old Boston Whaler under a full sky of stars in a shallow bay, shined a flashlight in the water, pretended I saw something in the water, dove overboard, emerged soaking wet, and asked her to marry me. She promptly replied, 'no way', but somehow we are getting married anyway. (August 2009)

The River

Return to Maryland and start the 2009/2010 school year.

I have spent the past several months:

Remodeling my house with Kerry, crashing my kayak on Great Falls and swimming out of the most dangerous drop 'Grace Under Pressure', contemplating returning to graduate school (application is due March 1st), walking out of the Big Sandy because it was ten degrees and I could not put my spray skirt back on after hopping out at Wonder Falls, loving one of the greatest additions to my life, my dog 'Mogul' (yes, named after ski bumps), fearing my grandmother's nearing death, obsessing about how to make my life more sustainable because I had a larger carbon footprint in the past year than most people on the planet do in an entire lifetime, and finally but not least, generally reflecting on my own sanity.

Mogul in his usual sleeping form

Phew! That is quite a lot for a little more than a year's time. I started 'Homegrown' long ago. It was originally entitled, 'Kayak Harder' after a little joke between me and a buddy of mine when we decided to run the half marathon shuttle for the Upper Youghiogheny River before we boated. I was mildly hypothermic before we put on the river, and had to spend thirty minutes bringing my blood back to normal temperature in the passenger seat of some generous soul's mini-van.

I started writing for the simple reason that I like to write. This has always been reflections on my life and its various diversions. Somewhere along the way, I felt I needed to have a cause, a greater message, something that I was trying to say, something that I felt deeply that I was trying to show other people. I wrote a mission statement.

Rereading the 'mission' of Homegrown Locals is warming, but alas in the end, it is simply just me. The idea of Homegrown has always been notional. My attempt at making sense of a world that offers very little. It is me, the people I love and care about so deeply, and the cleansing, nurturing power of the great outdoors, rivers, rocks, trees, caves, snow, and sky. It about trying my hardest to live my life with a little soul, and an undying sense of adventure, whether it's class V, or a walk with my dog.

So, for all my well intended words of inspiration and environmental awareness, Homegrown is much more. Sometimes maybe it's enough just to be me. My thoughts. My truth. I am going to keep giving it my best shot.

And now...

It’s time to catch up on some story telling.

Enjoy, and keep it Homegrown.