My earliest memory of my love for the outdoors happened on a trip to Kings Canyon when I was 7-years old. My parents packed the van with their six kids and drove the winding road up to the National Park. Along each curve, one kid after the other grew car sick and dropped like a fly. This car-sickness was not uncommon for our bunch, but I was proud to have made it to the top without losing my lunch. At least, until that night when the sudden urge awoke me. I left our family-sized tent, did my business outside, and went back to bed. When I woke the following day, my left eye had swelled shut from a mysterious insect bite. After a quick check-up with the park ranger, my parents handed me a pair of sunglasses and marched all six of us (ranging in age from ten years old to one year old) on an 18-mile hike up the Roaring River. The memories from this trip that stayed with me through my youth and young adulthood were not so much the car sickness and the allergic reaction. They were the smell of the pine forests, the cool crisp air in my lungs, campfire smoke, massive pine cones, and the sound, force, and mist from the whitewater river.
A year after this trip, my family moved to Maineville, Ohio, for my Dad's job. Maineville, at the time, was a small township located in the countryside outside of the suburbs of Cincinnati. We moved to a bigger house on 8-acres of flat and forested land. Surrounding us were fields of corn and soybeans, ash forests, and mossy creeks flowing to the polluted Little Miami River. The first year we lived in Ohio was the first memory I recall struggling with my mental health. I had moved from a cul-de-sac surrounded by my best friends with no limits of outdoor space to explore and play to feeling alone in a hot and humid place that I had very little interest in. Don't get me wrong; I was highly privileged. I was fortunate to grow up in a big family with loving parents. I went from being homeschooled to going to private catholic school starting in the 5th grade, and I got to play team sports such as basketball, volleyball, and eventually field hockey. Despite this privilege and frustratingly so, I still found myself struggling to belong and to have the desire or focus on imagining, let alone pursuing any goals. Life seemed pretty clear at that age. Go to school, get a degree, get a job, find a husband, have some kids, and maybe continue to work. I couldn't say I was too excited about what I perceived as my only option, and as a result, I started to look for thrills in alternative ways.
When I was a freshman in high school, I was suspended from school for leaving a mixer (a co-ed dance) to drink beer between the field hockey field and the nunnery with some new friends. Having learned what we had done, the vice principal prescribed an in-school suspension where I was to sit in silence and do my homework in a 100 square foot office with one of the schools' nuns throughout each school day for one week. The office had clear windows facing the school hallway, so my punishment was on display for the entire school to see. I was also required to see a psychologist as part of the discipline by the school to ensure I did not have any addictions. I was grounded from seeing friends for a month. I recall hearing about the whispers of my behavior from the community at my parent's church. I felt their judgment as I approached to take communion on Sundays. From this moment, I was labeled the trouble-maker in my class, even though this was the most severe altercation I had while at school. If a backpack wound up missing at school, I was called to the vice principal's office to see if I had stolen it (I had not).
This label lived with me throughout high school, and I took it on as my identity. By doing so, I had resolved that that was who I was. Someone who wasn't cut out for school, who partied hard, had promiscuous sex and wasn't afraid to try most drugs I was offered. My idea of what my future could hold had merged from a degree, job, husband, and kids to early pregnancy, jail, or worse. It makes me sad to think about how little I cared for myself during this time in my life, but I am also so grateful that I found a way to turn things around by finding what I loved to do outdoors.
When I graduated from high school, I could no longer lean on field hockey to help me stay in shape. I knew I liked to exercise, but I had always resented the pain, discomfort, and monotony of running. My Dad had been a runner his entire life, having completed over 20 marathons throughout our childhood. His knees, however, eventually stopped serving him, and so he found a new activity. He had chosen cycling just a couple of years before I graduated from high school, and my Mom had picked it up a bit too. So, one day I rode my Mom's Lemond road bike on a road ride with my Dad. I loved how low impact cycling was on my body, how I could see new places, and how it was a great excuse to ride to ice cream with my Dad. For a hardened high schooler, it seems so innocent looking back.
Eventually, I started venturing out on my own to new places, and it was then where I found places that sparked my childhood memories for my love of the outdoors. I found pine forests, rushing rivers, campfire smoke, and pine cones within two hours of my home in Ohio. Once I saw these places, I kept going back. Then, I would go a little further: in Ohio, Indiana, West Virginia, and Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina.
Over these years, my love for cycling coincided with my realization that I love to work with bicycles as well. I worked a part-time job at the Loveland Bike and Skate Rental since I was 12-years old for 8-years. I decided to work at bike shops and eventually managed those shops. I started becoming more focused and driven to graduate from school and did so with honors (for the first time in my life) and a bachelor's degree in history. When I graduated from college, I decided to follow what I knew I loved to do and opened my bike shop, Swallow Bicycle Works. After five years of operating SBW, I signed my first contract with Specialized Bicycles and rode my bicycle across the country on dirt roads following the Trans America Trail (TAT). The rest, at least for this story at this time, is history.
I share this story because I want to illustrate how finding what I love to do outdoors literally changed my trajectory in life and why I am choosing to fundraise $5,000 for The Cairn Project to increase accessible outdoor opportunities for young girls. If I had been able to learn that the outdoors was a place that could provide me the sense of purpose, inspiration, freedom, and adventure I had been seeking as a youth, I probably could have saved myself, my parents, and teachers a whole lot of trouble. I am fundraising for The Cairn Project because I believe they make a difference in the worlds of young girls who are less privileged than I was, where opportunities and chances to be outdoors are few. If you can, please support this goal by donating to The Cairn Project. $5,000 will fund an entire grant to an outdoor organization that helps get more girls outdoors. To donate, click here. Thank you!