POBR 2024 A's blog

  6-21-24  POBR Warm water on a cold morning blesses the hands of the dishwasher. Today’s adventure was in service of the Forest Service and our mission: locate the elusive Pumice Moonwort of the Pumice High Desert. I asked the Pumice Steward why. Marlo Fisher replied with a, "No clue,"; it's truly the appendix of Mahogany Butte but its recent disappearance is a sign of an imbalance in the ecosystem. To further understand the minuscule world and the forces that govern our giant-infested landscape, we went to work on our water samples. To test water, one must be one with water, so we went to our friend Joy Rochester's house to shower. A can of sparkling water down the gullet transported me to the lake of Crane Prairie. She offered her life force and gifted us a grand view of The Three Sisters. The agar plates containing our previous bio-samples were distributed to become subjects of our microbiology experiment. A surprisingly simple process revealed our gram-negative b...

6-20-24 POBR Just when I thought the day couldn’t exceed expectations, a pianist by the name of Hunter  Noack  lit the fireworks of a hard day's work. Hours before our silent-disco-esc piano rave, we started our day with a journey to the lava river of Bend, Oregon. We walked for a round trip of 2.2 miles with our tour guide Sophia Zoll through the stagnancy of a lava tunnel’s cold air. I was handsomely rewarded with a sticker page for finding the elusive white-blinded cave centipede. Our Forest Service Coordinator Cynthia Anderson pained our calves further and took us to the top of a volcanic butte. I had to call my family to show them the majestic site of the entirety of Oregon. I felt like the thread from my eyeballs flew so far over The Three Sisters, they began to unravel. With my newfound familiarity of the lay of the land, I was still so unbelievably unfamiliar with my position on any map. When lost, follow the river. Deschutes River was a menacing force of nature, the m...

  6-19-24 POBR Blowing away mosquitoes while I warm up from a cold shower. Today I sat and sat until my sciatic nerve pinched, the most downtime we’ve had all 4 days. It was a five-hour curve shot from Bird Creek and now we are stationed in Crane Prairie. I remember nothing - waking up, I remember waking up. The trees shifting from dense full-grown trees to even denser young trees accompanied by their chaperones. I realized that once again I had no clue where I was, and yet I was ecstatic enough to start up conversation. As fun as it is for me to talk decolonization, my most memorable moment from today was walking with Sandy to a dock and feasting our eyes on The Three Sisters: the guardians of the forest. Our stomachs full, we rushed our chores and ran to the campground shower. The maintenance man saw us rushing in, and turned around in compliance of our tardiness.   From The Drive Down (Graphite drawing of a road with trees surrounding it)

  6-18-24 POBR Today our professors took us to become scientists of the creek. We headed out pretty early to charge up, publish these blogs, and stack up on snacks. We rolled up to the first creek by foot of the ranger, a 6 seater side by side. All of the students piled in and Dr. Schuster led the unknown path for the day. At the first creek Snowplow Lake Creek, I was restless and got up to draw a scene, wishing I felt comfortable enough to walk around with my toes on the recently burned forest floor. Wishing I had brought a water filter, we took our water samples and dipped into our next creek. If the last was the fire of the forest, the next was the air. “This is it!” “What that hole?” At Bird Creek, Dr. Schuster showed us a volcanic vent that shot out cold air, my mind was blown. To end off the day, we scienced our science and cracked open a cold water sample to test for bacteria.   Lost my lead (Charcoal tree print. Used charcoal from burned forest to scrape against a tree...

  6-17-24 POBR Today reminds me of the hill I climb when I’m on my way to Cowiche so I can “give myself a challenge.” It's always a precursor to the severity of the journey ahead. The feeling of pure exhaustion, only to realize that the hill is a terrace. The fire kept their hands warm but I was warmed just by the idea that the fire hadn’t stopped. A kiss to the river and off on the road to another unknown location. It's not like that information wasn't fed to me over and over, I just simply love the idea of not knowing where I am and having trust that the path is guided. After we met our gracious hosts, they taught us how to build beaver dams. Jeanette Burkhardt and Gerard Foley were our lead beavers choppin' and chewin' through the day like it was a soft cottonwood. Nothing was soft about the trees we had to haul though. Come to find out, the logs were extra dense and extra thin. The rocks real scarce and the foliage a pain, were tough to pack in the dams to diver...

  6-16-24 POBR blog I think I just got stung by a mosquito on my forehead. And my feet are cold from sitting in the river. But my heart feels full from sitting next to these people in such a beautiful place. While driving out here I was surrounded by what seemed to be melting ice fairies, smacking up against our window in defense of their mother cloud. This was truly the only moment I remember from our drive. When we arrived at our hook-up spot, the fire was still crackling. A sort of unease fell upon us when we realized someone was just here, but we very quickly reclaimed it as our own space. Sandy and Virginia rekindled the fire, making me feel like an inexperienced fawn following its mother deer with disorganized legs. I followed chaotic chatter til my eyes met the vocal cords of the forest, our campground creek.  (Graphite drawing of River of rocks and logs)