(This is an essay I wrote a while back and edited with the help from friends. It's about something so many of us love. . . Adventure.
Who can deny the joy of being outside and, yes, "exploring.")
A Knack for Exploring
Picture this: I'm in Kindergarten. My Dad has picked me up from school on his red ten-speed, and pedaled us with me balanced on the high bar, here, to the sand-pit off Southeast Division Street in Portland. We've crawled under a fence and are slowly making our way down the side; I grasp for my father's hand while letting go a tree branch just above me.
I've always loved exploring. My Dad and I toured around lots of areas of Portland when I was growing up, and the memories have stayed with me. . . .
My recollections are of sunny days, like the time in late-summer, just before school started, when we went up the hill of Kelly Butte, past the high school kids sitting on the incline, looking at us wonderingly--up into the yellow-grass top, and finding arrowheads along with--of course--the geological markers.
I remember exploring the perimeter of this same butte one afternoon--trudging through the bushes, while my older sister stayed at home with Mom working on her third-grade science project: No, it was up to Dad and me to conquer the wilderness, face the unknown.
There are other times I've walked, snaking my way up the side of a hill. Who knows what I might encounter?--maybe a homeless person's camp, a beautiful garden, or a lookout with a majestic view of forest and homes.
Whether it's Eugene, Portland, or anywhere else I find myself, I listen for the call: "Get off the trail, get off the hard-shelled path, go somewhere you've never been before, see what you can, see what you can find." . . . Even now it's a part of the kid in me still, a hunger for wildness, adventure, excitement--a longing to never outgrow.
