Our Place in Nature
Written by Emma H during the Fall 2020 Gap Semester
When I began my somewhat unexpected gap year, I genuinely had no idea what to expect. With all of the COVID-19 craziness, my decision to take this year off was incredibly impulsive, but I’m grateful and glad that Glen Brook is where I ended up. I’ve always had a positive relationship with nature, but I wasn’t expecting a lot of what this program has offered me, especially this past week as we all learned to orienteer in Pisgah State Park.
To say that I was dropped in the woods with a map and compass to guide my way might seem a bit dramatic, but that was exactly what happened to my gap group and I for four days. I’ll preface my orienteering experience by stating that I am a true geek for the woods, but even this experience was new to me. My entire life I’ve operated solely by trails and paths. I’ve never enjoyed uncertainty, and being flicked in the face by random off-trail branches never appealed to me. Alas, those two factors became the epitome of my experience this past week, and, surprisingly, I had the time of my life.
We began our week by practicing our map and compass skills around the Glen Brook property. On Tuesday, Wednesday, we were dropped off in various parking lots around Pisgah in groups of three and were expected to find our way (primarily off-trail) to two marked locations in about four or five hours. We were armed with a walkie-talkie and one phone for emergencies, but other than that, we were left to our own devices.
Besides overshooting my first location by a half a mile on Tuesday, my experience went quite well overall! I spent the day with people I loved doing the thing I love doing most - romping around the woods. On Thursday we even had the option to do a solo expedition. We planned our own routes and were expected to create a challenge that was appropriate for our personal confidence and comfort levels. I planned my route on Wednesday night and spent the next day traversing over a mountain to find myself at a beautiful pond. Luckily, the route I chose wasn’t too draining and I was able to spend around four hours sitting by the water in awe at the scenery surrounding me.
As I took that time to think, I realized a lot about my relationship with the world around me and how we as humans treat nature as a whole. Being forced to interact with the world in a purer form than man-made trails created the realization that I, and many others, have always seen the woods as something to conquer and something to feel comfortable in. Wandering off-trail is a great reminder that the natural world does not and has never worked for humanity. If anything, we should always be respectfully working around it - to embrace uncertainty in nature is to understand where our place is within it.
My time here so far has truly made me a better person, to say the least, and has taught me a lot about my values. I’ve always loved the woods, but my weeks of canoeing, backpacking, and orienteering have brought me closer to nature in a way I’ve never imagined. I am finding a community that values my input, understands my goals, and challenges me to try new things and think in a different way. I am so grateful for my time at Glen Brook, and I’m especially excited to see where our final three weeks take me.