This blog is intended for the viewing of family and friends! However, in the event that someone who does not know me well finds this, which is perhaps not that unlikely due to the nature of the internet, I have included a brief history about my self in the following paragraphs as well as a disclaimer of sorts about my story telling methods.
If you do know me, please fell free to skip ahead to "Day 1" of this blog :)
A brief history of me, Ben Summerlin:
Picture credit: Steve Summerlin
As I sit here on my back porch, with the decision to make a blog still bouncing around inside my head I'm wondering where to begin my story, and as I attempt to portray my journey and adventures I hope that whoever is reading this can see past my at times, sub par grammatical skills or humble, single year of college education and see that this is just my personal story, nothing more or less. It is also my hope that you will let the parts that interest you, be just that, parts that interest you, as for the parts that don't interest you.. well I hope you can recognize them as the necessary connecting thoughts for me between experiences.
Shall we begin?
I found myself 5 weeks out from graduating high school, freshly 18, making multiple trips to the Marine Corps recruiting office. The reason I was there was simple, I felt I had no other options. And the one thing a Marine recruiter is good at (for those of you who don't know) is making you feel like you have options. Obviously I did not enlist in the Marine Corp, but I was quite close, at least I like to think I was, who knows what I would have done if my parents had not mandated that I try out a term of College before doing something like join the military. So off I went to Principia College, for that was the only place I had applied for, and I wasn't willing to put too much effort into indulging my parents this short 10 weeks of a speed bump in my plans to go out and experience the real world! Or so I thought.
As first term of freshmen year slugged on I talked with my dad and decided that WWOOF.com (World Wide Opportunity on Organic Farms) would be my new path, and that it made more sense than signing the next four years of my life away to the military. So with my heart set on traveling to a new place, essentially anywhere westward, I began to patrol WWOOF daily, searching for the farm for me.
8 weeks of this passed and first term came to and end, and seeing as I had enough sense to not drop out now and live at home with no job or any way to productively spend my time, I resigned myself to another term of school. This happened again after winter term, and then finally I got an email back from Tina around mid way spring term! It was one of the rare times in my life where I found myself involuntarily punching my fist in the hair in triumph, an action born out of shear joy and excitement, some other notable times were when my football team won districts back in high school, however this fist pumping occasion was much more subdued and silent than the districts occasion, because I was still on the phone with Tina trying to convey a calm, professional demeanor. Although I'm not sure how good of a job I did at masking my elation. :)
So there you have it, even if you didn't ask for it, you are now up to date on the decisions, choices and actions that lead me here, on my living room couch preparing to leave.
More current news:
I leave for the airport at 7:30am Thursday morning to fly to Tuscon, AZ where I will be starting a 3 month internship at Walking J Farm. I am very excited for the adventures coming my way, after having been part of the the Principia educational program for basically all of my conscious life (and even a littler earlier than that) I am most definitely ready for some change. This is not to say that my time in the Prin system hasn't taught me some valuable things, but for the most part, I will not miss it, at least I don't think I will. How can I really know though since this is my first time being away from it. I guess, as with most things in life, time will help shed some light on the situation.
I'm essentially all packed up and ready to go and have been mentally preparing my self by going on yet another Lord of the Rings marathon and eating copious amounts of rice and beans :) not really though, I am mentally prepared, I have been for quite some time. My recent Permaculture Design Certification experience did wonders to inspire me and get me super pumped up for this farm-boy adventure. It was such a blessing the way that class/experience came into my life. Permaculture focuses on holistic approaches for producing food in ways that is good for the earth, and the farmer by using a deliberate and well thought out pre-planning phase before developing an area for farming. It is truly wonderful.
I guess that's enough background information on my impending journey.
