Have more life in your years than years in your life. . .

. . . is my new life motto!
      Okay, so I've been away a while. Make that a really long while, a whole summer's worth, and boy does life look different from the other side.

It looks. . . higher. . .

       This summer undeniably was a life-changer. Working on the grizzly bear research project is one of the hardest things I've ever done, and yet so valuable. I know what I want my life to be about now. And that's getting the hell out there and just LIVING it. For instance, skydiving is something I always dreamed about and said I'd do growing up, but never thought I'd actually do it.

Walk of triumph

The summer was certainly an experience. I got lost in the woods for hours, every inch of me beaten, bug bitten and bruised from hiking through the underbrush. I shivered at night in my tent, got soaking wet all day long in the springtime, and sweated buckets in the hazy heat of midsummer. I hiked hundreds of miles of beautiful trail, and bushwhacked through territory no human would ever want to go. I went on road trips with people I'd just met, partied with crewmembers, and floated the Clark Fork for the first time.

         It was the first time in my life I've been truly living on my own. And I loved it.
        How can I be afraid of anything in life now, when I've been hurtled out of a plane at 9,000 feet in the air?

       One day you will. . . and I'm beginning to be able to say that I am.