As a kid, my sisters called me NLF, short for Nature Loving Freak. (I know, nice, right? It’s ok, it was the 90’s.) Some of my childhood memories that have the largest gravity to me are:
- Make a trap to catch turtles out of popsicle sticks and my parents explaining asking me to think through what would happen if I could them and whether it would be good for the turtles
- Canoeing with my dad in early mornings on the lake we grew up. This may have only happened one time, but I revisit it so often that it feels like it was a regular occurrence
- When he would take us father/daughter camping in an old smelly motorhome, but loving waking up to dewy, misty mornings
- Catching lightning bugs at night with my sister at our house
- Catching, and then eating sunnies (sunfish) with my grandpa, who was a true naturalist and knew the names of trees, birds, and mammals, along with their stories
Check out some of my various writings about nature over the years below!
Back to the Ack: My entrance letter to Grad School, the second time around
This letter was written by me, to Dr. Jonathan Hall, who accepted me into his graduate lab at WVU and changed my life for the better in a million different ways. I’ll share more about him and his work down the road, but for now, this is what was going on before I entered (and…
AltZoo: Was I onto Anything in 2012, or just a nerd?
This is some writing I did back in 2012, when I was working for the Staten Island Zoo in New York. It was a dream in some ways, but I had felt a constant tension between the vital role they play in offering access to nature for all people, and the ethical implications of keeping…
Exploring the Universe 