Some years ago my adult children and I had a vigorous argument. What’s the best approach to change the world? Is it small acts of beauty, kindness and teaching, or great storms of justice?
I argued for great storms and they for small acts.
As I approach the far bookend of my shelf life, I’ve reconsidered. In the not-yet-final analysis (I’m only 72, for goodness sake!), even seismic movements are the result of innumerable small acts, just as each massive drift is the accumulation of many trillions of snowflakes. I’ve also learned that grandparenting is one of the few life experiences where the reality is even better than the hype.
I’ve chased risk, physical challenges and adventure for many decades — training with Olympians, testing my limits in ultra-length races, immersing myself in wilderness and knowing the power of self-reliance in conditions most sensible people avoid. Such things have provided me with deep satisfaction, exposed me to ineffable beauty and ripened a profound obligation to cherish and preserve the Earth.
I want that for my grandchildren — for their own sake, of course, but also that they feel so connected to the Earth that they will save it. I hope they will hang upside down in trees. I want them to know the experience of hearing their own hearts pound when standing alone on a peak in the Rockies or pausing on a Vermont ridge in a howling blizzard. I wish them to feel the invulnerability of running 20 miles in sub-zero cold, when weather reports warn to stay indoors, but you smile as you take off your hat and catch snowflakes on your steaming tongue. I want them to go to places where nature makes them cry.
So we start small.
Quinn was probably 7 when we skated on our Vermont pond on New Years Eve, alone under a canopy of stars that glittered on the ice like sequins. The sky was our private disco ball. It was so cold that the ice groaned and crackled under our blades.
We spent countless hours in her early childhood pushing (me) and riding (Quinn) a Scandinavian kick sled (we called it the “rocket sled”) along miles of Vermont snow machine trails, flying recklessly down hills and crashing, giggling, into deep mounds of pristine powder. One crisp morning the blue sky was so thick we could have stirred it with a spoon.
Climate change is already making these experiences less likely. Three Christmases ago, neighbor folks swam in the pond. I couldn’t do it, as I found no joy, just desperation, in the aberration.
I take no primary pride in presenting this world to Quinn. Her parents introduced her to mountain climbing, backpacking in hammocks, canoe camping and aimless hours in trees near their rural Vermont home. And then she grew up. In college now, she cycles everywhere, climbs 5.13s (very hard rock climbing!) and cares for her body and her planet. But we don’t rocket sled anymore.
It is thus my great good fortune to have a next generation of grandchildren on whom to ply my outdoor trade. Maddie is 8. Jack is just 4, so our adventures are age-appropriately modest — things like swinging higher at the park than his grandmother appreciates or sledding down what counts as a hill in a Colorado high desert community.
Maddie learned to confidently ride her bike several months before her eighth birthday. Just months later my son and I cajoled her into joining us on the local single-track trails. He bought her a used mountain bike and we headed to the hills. In the context of wild adventures, these trails are very modest, populated by families as well as experienced riders who go for big air on the Black Line. To Maddie it may as well have been a downhill racing course at Killington.
On the first visit she complained on the uphill — we did too, as it was 95 degrees — but she navigated the green pump track with caution. My son rode in front, Maddie in the middle, and I behind, watching her learn to lean through banks and relax over the rolling bumps. Her grin at the bottom was radiant. “Again!” she proudly demanded. And so we did.
Just a few weeks later, after two runs of the Green Line, my son said, “Maddie, let’s try the Blue Line.” She balked. The Blue Line had mythical status in her 8-year-old mind’s eye. Only big kids and professionals can ride the Blue Line. “You can do it! You’re really good, Maddie!”
We started tentatively, same ride order, and I watched her approach the first banked curve, tensing up slightly (both of us), but wobbling through successfully. She whooped slightly at the first set of small jumps, rolling over them with near aplomb. At the bottom she once more demanded, “Again!” and I knew she was hooked. She even called the uphill “easy peasy.” On the second run, she dared more speed and her back wheel lifted at least two inches on the series of sharp rises and drops. She screamed, “I got air!”
On the ride home, Maddie was bursting with pride as we pedaled toward the distant and distinct profile of Longs Peak. “I never thought I could do the Blue Line. It was my goal for next year and I already did it! Maybe the Black Line next week.”
She turned around and watched a few teenagers soaring off the bottom jump. “Well … maybe next year.”
I can wait.
Steve Nelson lives in Boulder, Colo., and Sharon. He can be reached at stevehutnelson@gmail.com.