It’s easy to be an armchair adventurer. How comforting to watch or read about other people’s close calls with polar bears, thunderstorms, class-five rapids and other hazards of nature, especially when we know they’ll survive.
But what about when we’re the ones coping with nature’s wilder sides? And what about exposing our kids to her wrath? Then it’s easy to do the cost/benefit analysis and conclude that we should have stayed in the armchair.
That would be a shame because it’s relatively easy being green when that means recycling, buying compact fluorescent lightbulbs, dialing down the heat and resisting the urge to drive to the corner Walgreens. Those environmentally-friendly acts are valuable, certainly. But they don’t bring you closer to the thing you are trying to protect. They’re like sending a check to an important charity–helpful, but cerebral, not visceral.
I think you have to get out of your comfort zone to truly respect nature.
That’s the basic premise of all our family vacations. Not an aversion to comfort, but a willingness to jeopardize it and see what happens.
When our daughter was a baby, my husband and I first grappled with how much to dial down our adventurousness. Everything about our culture urged caution and conservatism. But something in our bones demanded we take some risks. I’ll never forget the first time we took her camping. During the day, she happily bounced down the trails in her baby backpack, entertained by the variety of sights and sounds around her. At night, she slept between us in our tiny little expedition tent, her warm breath condensing in the cold air. We cooked over a single burner, created almost no garbage, and took pleasure in the temporary simplicity of our lives. It all felt so right, so natural.
But there were times in later years when thunderstorms raged and there was just a thin layer of nylon between us and the elements. At times like those, we marveled at how precarious our comfort was and appreciated it all the more. And there were times when we heard animals rustling around outside and felt unsafe. At times like those, we reminded ourselves that we had no special privilege and hoped for the best.
As our kids grew, we took more risks. They weren’t always pleasant in the moment, but they were consistently rewarding. One year, we were flooded into Point Reyes National Seashore. All roads were closed to traffic; we were the only people for miles around. So we took the kids for a six-mile hike. The trail was virtually a stream; our rain gear wasn’t completely up to the challenge. We trudged along through the surreal beauty of the deluge, our clothing soaked, our kids complaining the whole way. But here’s the rub: They think back on this hike with great pride. They remember the triumph of coping with the elements, not the lack of comfort, and they truly appreciate being dry and comfortable in a rainstorm.
Now we’re all into river and sea kayaking. Together we’ve faced the thrill and sometimes the fear of whitewater and big open water. When we paddle, we’re not conquering nature; we’re getting along with her. Kayaking has tuned us in to some of the threats to our local rivers and lakes as well as the efforts to keep them clean. It has added a dimension to our environmental awareness.
Of course, you don’t have to be get quite as wet or exposed as we’ve chosen to get in order to experience nature. You can sail on Lake Michigan instead of paddling, walk in a forest preserve instead of hiking in the rain, and have a picnic in the park instead of camping. Or you can get more exposed and uncomfortable, like polar explorers Eric Larsen and Lonnie Dupre, who trekked to the North Pole in the summer to call attention to global warming.
Either way, being out in nature is an important part of being green. Sure, we should all try to reduce our carbon footprints, but we should also make a point of connecting with our natural environment so we know, viscerally, why it’s so important to protect it.
