Legacy Magazine

By Kirk Carter Mona

As winter drew to a close I took an “active seniors” group on a snowshoe hike. It was the last snowshoe program of the year. We took off our snowshoes, stowed them away for the season, and came into the warmth of the building. We’d had a wonderful time exploring and learning. I finished off the program inside by answering just one more question and telling just one more story. Maybe it was because I was working with an adult group after working so much with kids, but I was on a roll sharing information. There is something cathartic about being able to expound on almost any topic on a deep level without worrying about going over the heads of the audience. I had already taught enough programs involving felt boards and monosyllabic words for the season. As I finished my program, we all walked upstairs and a woman asked in amazement how I knew so much.

I’d spent the last two hours chatting with the group as we strolled though the hilly terrain of our wooded property. I told them about snowshoes, owls, trees, forestry, ecological succession, black cherry burls, lichens, tornadoes, straight line winds, glaciers, ancient river valleys, groundwater movement, lake levels, animal hibernation, torpor, quinzee construction, winter camping, tracking, and probably a dozen other topics. She was clearly amazed by the varied string of knowledge I had at my fingertips. She asked very directly where I learned all this. It should not be an odd question, but it caught me off guard.

I stumbled and started to give the answer that part of my degree in college was in environmental studies, but that sounded silly as soon as it came out of my mouth. That’s the answer I gave fresh out of college trying to impress audiences that I really am a college graduate and, yes, this is really my job. I’ve been out of college for over a decade now and while I can’t be certain, I would guess nothing I learned in those four years made it into the actual information I gave out on that hike. So where do I learn then? How do I know what I know?

As in interpreter, I am constantly amazed by the resource I interpret. I explained in an interview with a journalist recently that the more I learn about the forest, the shorter distance I make it into the woods. I love to go on long, meandering hikes but sometimes it seems I only make it a few feet into the forest. There are simply so many interesting things to see that I’m constantly stopping to take it all in. There are trees, shrubs, herbs, fungi, lichens, insects, birds, mammals, rocks, soil, weather, and the signs of interactions between them all. I stop to look at and study each of these things but I use the other senses, too. There are things to hear and touch and smell and even taste in the world around me. All science begins with observation and there is much scientific learning to be had by simply observing. The best answer to give the woman when she asked me where I learned about the woods should have been “in the woods.”

I have learned to interpret the place where I work because I spend time studying and living with the everyday experience of the place. Learning is more than personal observation though. I can never see it all. To learn it all, or at least as much as we can, we have to share what we learn. I learn from my coworkers, I learn from professional journals and books, I learn from the experts I seek out, I learn from direct experimentation. For example, when the snow finally melted off the grass in the spring, it revealed a web-like frost on the ground. I wasn’t satisfied until I had touched it and studied it and checked references to learn what it was. It was a snow mold, and I’m glad I took the opportunity to study it, as the web-like mycelium had dried and nearly vanished a few days later.

Being an effective interpreter means you are constantly learning. You can’t help but constantly learn about a resource that continues to fascinate and compel you. “Where did I learn all this?” I learned all this working and living it in the field of interpretation.

Kirk Mona is the outreach coordinator for the Lee and Rose Warner Nature Center in Marine on St. Croix, Minnesota. He has been an NAI member since 1996. Kirk welcomes your comments at kmona@smm.org.