a new novel: my lastest update

I thought it’s about time to catch you up on the latest in Mary’s life... the winding, lovely, yet sometimes stressful path of a wanderer…

Well, biggest news is that I’ll FINALLY be graduating this May! YAY! I decided in the end that it’s not worth the extra time to get the two Spanish classes I need to get a dual major, deciding that I’d just make International studies a third minor. So I’m proud to announce that I’ll be graduating with as a Service-Learning Scholar with a BS in Anthropology and three minors including Environmental Studies, International Studies, and Sociology. Now that’s a mouth-full. But I guess it took me long enough, I should have a lot to show for it☺

I finished up my restoration/vegetation internship with Everglades National Park (ENP) at the end of Feb and am now doing a 3-month temp job down in the lower Florida Keys as a “Exotic Strike Team Member” for a Habitat Restoration Team. As opposed to the SCA job in ENP that had a fair amount of office work, this position is all field-based, which is nice for a change for a while (As I do miss flexing my brain muscles on the job… writing, reading, researching a bit…) I have to confess that life in the keys is not too shabby! I’m loving it☺ (And I’m finally connected to the outside world now that I have internet at my house and my cell phone has reception!!!)

So now, a bit about how I got here…and my thoughts on life direction and such. When I started out here in FL, I was thinking that I wanted to do the Utah Conservation Corps, but as I thought about it and calculated how much I’d make (also realizing that with the SCA position behind my belt, I’d be qualified for GS-05 biological technician positions in the National Park Service and other gov agencies), I had second thoughts. I’ve now spent about 2 full years of my life working as an intern, Americorps volunteer, SCA, etc, working for a penance, all the while gaining a whole lot of GREAT and VALUABLE experience…that I don’t regret as it’s been personally enriching and helped me to clarify the type of career and education I’d like to pursue, but I’ve got enough experience to get a better paying job goddamit! Right?

I’m finally growing up! And it is bitter sweet. I’m not sure if you heard about my car catastrophe last fall (on my way to FL, it died for good in CO!), but that left me carless for several months. But I’m proud to announce I’m almost a full blown grown up as I’ve now got my desired car (with accompanying loan and insurance payments)…a 2002 subaru outback…and I’m in love with her! Can’t wait to get back out west really use her☺

Anyhow, I’ve really been feeling the pull to be in the mountains, so I’ve started looking for seasonal jobs out west in January, but turns out the federal hiring process is a nightmare and a very long one at that (not to mention the economy)…so stressed about not having anything lined up, this job in the keys fell in my lap. It’s a perfect in-betweener (and decent pay), but I’m still looking out west and have expanded my search to jobs outside of the government (and now feel I can be a bit pickier cause I’ve got more time). I’m really enjoying field-work, being outside, physical work, and gaining new kinds of knowledge and learning new skills. It’s refreshing.

At this point, I’m keeping my options pretty open and would be satisfied with a wide range of options (seasonal work, entry level positions for 1-2 years, funded Masters or PhD programs) Long term, my goal is still to blend social science with conservation and land/natural resource management, preferably internationally. I definitely want to pursue grad school at some point, but am not necessarily in a hurry to do so. I’m still weighing whether a biological science-based, social-science based, interdisciplinary, or natural resource degree is in my best interest (and at this point I’m unlikely to get into an unpaid position or program. Ideally, I’d like an assistantship or fellowship…so I’m keeping my eyes peeled for those). And of course, international travel is always in the back of my mind, but I’ve got to buckle down for a while…and make some money or get more education...or a combination of all of the above:)

We’ll see where the wind blows me…

One of my top choices at this point is a 5 month, well-paying conservation and land management internship (http://www.clminternship.org/ ). Would you be willing to write a letter of recommendation for me? I feel I’m a competitive candidate for one of the 100 or so they offer each year…

Another appealing option I an across through an announcement for PhD Fellowships on sustainability, conservation, and natural resources at University of Hawai‘i at Manoa. I’ve started a correspondence and am not qualified for the PhD program, but I’m looking into their Master’s program. The Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management (http://www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/nrem/students/grad-e_komo_mai.html#admit) seems like a really good fit (integrative and multi-disciplinary program that uses a systems approach to understand and manage tropical terrestrial ecosystems) …I think Hawaii could be a nice place to do grad school, eh? So a request for a letter of recommendation might come for that one sometime soon as well. Or maybe it’d be a better option next year…I’ll see how the correspondence goes☺

Personally, I can’t complain either. I’ve been meeting some great people, living in beautiful places, exploring within and outside of myself☺ Although, I seriously miss elevation and the anthro nerd crew from USU! Dani is graduating this May too! At this point, I’m not going to make it back to walk though. Not sure it’s worth the hassle…but I’m hoping my path brings me through Utah sooner than later!

the nEw LiFe plan... in letter form...

It has been too long. Just another testament to how horribly notorious I am for keeping in touch! I thought I’d say hello and catch you up…I may have a new few year plan, again! I doubt you are all that surprised, but a I have a feeling you are not going to be incredibly enthused about the idea. In fact, I have putting off writing this email for that reason.

But as you’ve become an influential person in my life, here it goes…please don’t hate meJ I’ve thought a lot about this and am trying to follow what I think will be most beneficial for me in the long run, with a bit of disregard for what ‘society’ would have me do.

I don’t know if you remember, but my plan was to finish up my online Spanish 2020 class by May and then take the last 3000-level Spanish course over the summer and be done with it, get my goddamn bachelors degree out of the way. That’s what we’ve been aiming for all along, right?

Well, I have to admit I am a bit disappointed in myself because I haven’t been on top of my online Spanish course and figured out about 2-3 weeks ago that there is no way that I could get it done in time to enroll in the online summer class. I’ve thought about this a lot and understand why it is so hard to motivate myself to do my Spanish coursework. It comes down to the fact that I despise Spanish courses and loathe the homework when I feel I am not really learning. I want to ACTUALLY learn the goddamn language..(…and I think I’ve finally acknowledged that language learning and acquisition is not a strength of mine, and that frustrates me too.)

So as I see it, I have two goals: 1)to finish my degree, and 2) to learn Spanish. I could jump through the hoops (which I hate to bow to the man) and just finish my degree by taking online classes, and be disappointed in myself because I’m sacrificing the goal of actually learning Spanish to achieve the degree. Am I ok with that? The answer I came to is: NO. I am not. I do not want to let the pressure of “what society thinks I should do” let me pass up doing something that I feel will be fulfilling and help me achieve both of my goals.

And so the scheming began… as it always does once I have an epiphany. Can you guess what it might be? I bet you have a good ideaJ I’ve been talking to Kay Forsyth about options to get 3000-level Spanish credits abroad. I do have an education award coming my way after all. But given that I am shit-ass broke and will not have the money right after this Americorps stint, I’ve identified and applied for several internships with the Student Conservation Association (SCA) that would allow me to work, get good experience, make a bit of money, and buy time until I go abroad either in January or March. Eh? Brilliant? I think so. Achieve both goals, get even more experience (in environmental/ conservation field), AND see another part of the country)

The SCA internships range from 3 to 6 months in duration starting in September, which would influence what study abroad program I’ll do. They include:
- Invasive Species/Restoration Intern at TNC-Albany Pine Bush Commission
- Resource Management Conservation Intern at Naval Support Facility Indian Head
- Restoration and Vegetation Intern at Everglades National Park
- Water Quality Monitor Intern at Cape Cod National Seashore

Eh? Don’t they all look like they’d be REALLY good for me? I think so too. So, what are your thoughts? If you are not going to swear me off, would you be willing to be a reference for my SCA application?

As far as life goes here in Aberdeen, my terribly unorganized boss continues to drive me up the wall, but I feel I am still gaining a lot, learning from the dysfunction and even setting an example of quality work and planning. I just got really good feedback from the college president on this huge project I’ve been leading, doing and Institutional Footprint Project for Grays Harbor College. Yay!
With all the budget cuts, the county contract that pays 57% of my bosses salary got cut, so she is scrambling. But we did end up getting some economic stimulus money to carry out a Summer Watershed Leadership Program with 24 high school kids (Ironically, they will make more money per hour than we do…goddamit!) oh well, life as a ‘volunteer.’ I chose it….

On a more personal note, I’m sad to be leaving my cute little studio apartment, but I’m super-excited to be moving to a little organic homestead farm and living in the ‘love-shack.’ I farm sat out there a few weekends back and LOVE it out there. Its only about 3 miles from where I live now, but nestled away in a charming little agricultural area. There are animals galore, I even got to take care of the day-old baby goat when I farm sat! (even though I thought I was gonna die when I got chased by what I thought was a lethal ram, electrocuted myself several times while frantic jumping of the fence, only to find out it was only the ram with horns that is dangerous!) Then, it is just about time to get the organic garden started. It’s a partial work-trade situation, so I’m saving a good amount of money on rent. It’s a win-win situation. And my foot is doing awesome. I’m a normal person again! WAHOOO!

Even though I may not really want to hear it or agree, I’d like your honest opinion.

Looking forward to your reply.

Emails like these make my blood BOIL!

With any slight amount of forethought, this would not be unreasonable to ask. But compounded by all the other abundant disfuntion and irresponsibility...my blood is boiling upon receipt of this email.

It is absolutely ridiculous. If this type of request was infrequent or I felt time was well managed, I would have not problem at helping out. But, really? "Oh, and i need them in the next 30 minuteS!!!" WOW.

I'm already busy and got shit to do, while you are off on your third vacation of the year so far. Sorry, I'm going to keep on working on the audit...

SHISH!

Direct copy and paste:


Hi Guys,
I need some success stories for:
1) working with hs kids on SCP
2) working with volunteers
3) working with kids in classroom/ activity
4) implementing recycling at area schools
5) any comments and or kudos you guys have received.

Oh, and i need them in the next 30 minuteS!!!

HELP!

Trail Extravaganza!

On Saturday I went out to lend my labor to building a trail at the Ocean Shores Interpretives center (a senior culminating project with our partner, PEI). I freakin loved it. It feels so good to actually get something accomplished as a team, work hard physically. Our society just doesn't provide enought of these types of activities! With probably a team of 15-20 people, it was pretty damn cool to see a trail carved out of the forest, along with all the kinds of tools, methods, cooperation with strangers.

I ended up working on starting one side of the trail on the side without too much forest, meaning we did hacking up of the dirt,roots, weeds, branches, shoveling out the dirt and creating an edge. 3 of us kept at this 25 ft of trail, learning as we went, that each root we pulled up, created about 3 more...figuring out what tool what best, using a combination of hoes, axe-like chopper (my favorite for agression release), shovels, rakes, loppers, an edger, wheelbarrow...after smoothing the path, we rolled a weed cover over the trail and started hauling and laying the gravel.

All the while, other groups have gone through with chainsaw, saw, loppers, rakes, clearing the a 3 foot path through the forest, hauling out wheelbarrows full of bush, weed, branch remnants. Oh, so freaking rewarding. A full forest with tags throughout was carved into and acutally looked pretty much like a trail by the time i took off. Hell yeah!

INSPIRED TO BLOG...borderline inappropriate...BEWARE conservative folk...

I feel pretty fucking cool right now. Today was my second session at good ol’ Americorps Serves with the fucking hilarious dude Brandon Rogers. I’m that girl that bursts out laughing at some of the most random of his comments that nobody else really thinks is funny, but strikes me as fucking hilarious. Although everybody is laughing at his jokes, I just to seem to gleem some extra kind of joy from his humor…I think its something about the fact it oozes sex, conceit, and alcohol into a discourse that keeps me rolling. I relate. But have not found my outlet… the ideas just float around inside my head.

Completely inappropriate, yet maintaining a professionality. I constantly find myself thinking highly inappropriate thoughts, amusing myself in my head. A difference between Brandon Rogers and I: I hold it in. He says it, in such a dry, sarcastic, fucking brilliant way and pulls it off, even while teaching Americorps sessions on grant writing or doing the writerly thing. I stand in awe.

His literary voice reminds me of how I’ve recently realized my inappropriate meter is broken. One of my favorites. At work one day, treated to pizza hut by our boss, my coworker spewed off the sins pepperoni, and how it is a concoction of all the nasty left overs…my response: “mmmmm. pig but hole in my mouth.” I couldn’t stop laughing for a good 5 minutes. Seriously. The others stopped laughing after about one. It came as quite the shocker, as I’m sure you can imagine. I couldn’t stop. I cracked myself up so much, resulting in one of those outrageous fits of laughter that I love so much, but have received A LOT of weird looks for.

Ah. I love making myself laugh. And here is sit, gloating inside because I found the blog he wouldn’t tell us the name of because it was too inappropriate. Wahahaha! I fucking rock. I am super sleuth, master of the websearch. I can find ANYTHING! Not that it was that difficult…but you will never convince me I’m not brilliant. My search strategy: google search: “brandon rogers, one child left behind” First Result: / thepenismightier \. How could it not be his? In the writing of his I’ve read so far, one of his reoccurring themes is very clever and strategic placement of penis size talk. Just one more reason I love him for so many reasons.

I am From...Poem

I am from...
Utah.

A land of wonder
enchantment, beauty,
snow, mountains, desert,
A landscape I miss so

But also a conservatism
that stifles, chokes, represses
creativity, questioning, exploration
of the depths of yourself,
the expanse of the world.

Rooted in the landscape and natural wonder of Utah
but turned way by the culture of repression
I long for a place of mountain peaks,
4 seasons, deep canyons of red rock, billowing rocky peeks

But I cannot live stifled

So I search...

by mary sundblom
written in session on service-learning in refugee communities

Unexpected Motivation and Delight...

Ok so, reflection time. I've been wanting to do this all weekend, but been runnin round like a chicken with my head cut off, even though i asked for it to be cut off...haha. ok, that translates to I did some pretty damn cool stuff this weekend, that thus prevented me from refelcting sooner. more on that to come...

SERVES... I wasn't looking forward to it, another conference with over 700 young people getting together for a whole bunch of workshops that vaguely relate to what we are actually doing. Afterall, things are crazy busy at work these days, with never enough time to get everything done...and to take off for 3 days, even if it is free hotel and food. But whatever, it was mandatory...we treked across the state to Yakima, WA.

After checking into our hotel, which was in the 'armpit' of Yakima, far far away from the convention center (IP's always get the shaft)...we headed to the conference to check in. With an hour till dinner, and the fact it was St. Patricks, we decided a green beer was neccesary to get this party started... that was where the fun began...part of it was the beer (incredibley green, enough to color our teeth) made me relax a bit, then the hotel lounge was sweet, and we sat in the corner "mafia" booth. Things had started out right.

Green teeth and all, we headed over to get dinner and sit through all the boring traditional welcomes and introductions. This is where they got me. They had a few volunteers or shall i say Ameriteers...reflect to the group on their expereince. The second speaker really peaked my interest by telling her story in a really creative and sarcastic way that totally resonated with me. It was a comedy routine on screwing up in life, realizing you hate what you studied, so thus hated teaching and hence created a classroom full of critical, negativity... What got me here is that, uh, doesn't that often times sound like me? I get so angry and frustrated at the system and all the bad going on in the world that sometimes I get so caught up in that, it's hard to keep positive. So basically making fun of herself, the whole time she reviewed "what not to do" in life and americorps.
Essentially reminding me of the power of empowering folks to do something about what they see as wrong in the world, instead of spreading the gospel of doom.

The AmeriPedia speech got us upto par on the all the Ameriwords created in honor of being Ameripoor....getting us all to think of creative Amerivocab. My favorite: Ameriscare: a pregnacy scare while serving as an Americorps member. Then Power of Hope got us up, moving and singing together...a beatiful round. on with a little motivational schpeel... "We are the Ones...we've been waiting for." Ah, precious...

Surprisingly, it got me pumped and excited, the engery was flowing and good vibes were abound. Being surrounded by people that are working to improve their communities, serving and sacrificing part of their lives for a cause, with so many ideas, passions, and plans to improve our world. I always forget how empowering being surrounded by those kind of people can be. and am reminded that I am also one of those people...even though I forget sometimes.

OH AND...Game night...LIFE happened and i convinced an attractive man that wasn't too enthused about the idea of playing life and we joked around the whole game, ending up inviting him and his friend to the 'festivities' (aka. drunk cranium in hotel room with over 20 people). that automatically means fun!