To whom it may concern:
I remember my C-II Brian Lussier claiming Backcountry to be a magical place. He referred to it once as going to "Narnia". When I came to the Backcountry Orientation, I thought I was going to see a bunch of hippies, I guess I was thinking of a commune. I wasn’t sure if I was going to fit in, but I found out that everyone there was just as diverse as the places that we’re sent to, and that diversity is welcomed. On my application, I wrote that a community is a group of individuals who share resources, brought together (intentionally or not) by or for a commitment or cause. The community aspect of Backcountry is just as important as one’s work ethic. Everyone on your crew is essential to the experience, a unique dish for the potluck. One of the most interesting aspects of the community is how your peers become self-reflecting mirrors of your weaknesses.
The unknown, especially if you grew up in an urban setting, can be intimidating. Everyone should know that anyone is capable of completing a season, but what sets a Backcountry Corpsmember apart from everyone else is the choice, choosing to leave what you knew (or at least thought you knew) as the world, electronics, friends, family, and complexity behind. But it’s worth it. The mountains have and always will be neutral. As my supervisor David Villarino once told me,” the mountains do not judge us, and they are not out to get us, they are just simply unforgiving...” . For me, Kings Canyon National Park seemed like a type of purgatory, heaven was the beautiful scenery, hell for what you have to go through to see it, to be deemed worthy to witness the timeless surreality. It may be the closest some of us will ever come to experience what author Milan Kundera calls the “lightness of being”, a detachment from or absolute absence of the weight of our burdens. I believe the experience represents philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche’s idea of eternal recurrence.
When you leave backcountry, you may be transcended, or awakened from apathetic slumber, or at least more confident in every future action you take. And yet your family and friends will not fully understand what you have been through. But every Backcountry Corpsmember will. One of the things I like most about the Backcountry Trails Program is that no matter when you completed your season, whether it was 1979 or 2012, when 2 Backcountry Corpsmembers meet and shake hands, it is respect, and automatic trust, because both know and recognize that what was accomplished in their 5 and ½ month journey was extraordinary. It is as if 2 soldiers from different fronts, but fighting the same war, finally meet, although it was never a war, but a challenge of nature and self. These bonds can never be broken.
But there is something that the program does ask in return. When you leave the program, whether you return to your center, transfer, or decide to move on from the California Conservation Corps, teach. Go out and spread what you have learned.
There are no guarantees of what your experience will be like, but I guarantee this: No matter how your season is going, it will come to an end. In a blink of an eye it will be over. And everyone on your crew will go their separate ways. What you do with the friendships made, the skills learned, and ethics instilled is up to you.
Meet you at the top,
Jason Evans
2011 Americorps CCC Backcountry Trails Program - Kings Canyon National Park
2011 Operation Sunrise Legacy Volunteer Project (Greenwood Center) - Grand Canyon National Park
2012 Tahoe-Baikal Institute Summer Environmental Exchange Program
