Yellowstone like a Teenager
To Our Nephew Matt,
Teenagers are resilient. The Life of a teenager is not easy. Things are coming at you pretty fast as a teenager. Changes that appear to creep in slow and steady when perceived from a distance (the perception of an aunt and uncle who spend most of the year traveling the country for instance) are actually occurring with each rapid and raging new impression a teenager is exposed to, impressions that intrude their influence on the developing minds, bodies and worldviews of today’s teenagers (teenagers like you, our Nephew Matt, for instance), impressions that are creating our world’s future.
We know that may sound a bit heavy on the philosophical side of things, but we just spent a week with a teenager, and for a couple of non-parents, that experience is without a doubt, deep.
Matt you are a great kid, there is no question there. We had a fantastic vacation together.
For Randy’s brother Rob’s son’s 16th birthday we had him join us for a vacation, a vacation that provided us with an opportunity to explore the depths and insights of a modern day teenager while a modern day teenager explored the depths and sight of Yellowstone National Park.
Yellowstone National Park is resilient too.
Actually, there are numerous comparisons that could be utilized to describe both teenagers and Yellowstone. Life in both can be complicated for example.
Don’t get us wrong, sometimes complicated is a good thing, for both Yellowstone and Teenagers complicated leads directly to diversity, and diversity is definitely a good thing.
The country’s first National Park proudly exhibits its complicated combination of turbulent geothermal activity, the calm of its enormous lake, the nurture of nature on display in its plush river valleys, and the rugged solitude in its Rocky Mountain peaks as they work together to create the one of a kind environment some of this country’s most diverse wildlife call the perfect home.
As for teenagers, even those in the most perfect of homes could be described as a “wild life”, a life that is at times digesting and at other times rejecting its nurturing as nature leads the search for the rugged solitude that comes in the form of their own opinion. Sure, some moments in the life of a teenager compare to calm, but there is a lot of blowing off steam going on too. Like we said before, we are not parents, but we don’t think a comparison to a teenager involving the word turbulent is too much of a stretch.
After spending a week in Yellowstone with a teenager we are as confident that Old Faithful is going to put on an impressive display sometime in the next ninety-four minutes as we are confident that Matt is going to put on an impressive display in life.
We only hope that your experiences in Yellowstone learning about geothermal, tectonic, and volcanic activities, including the Mammoth Hot Springs, Norris Geyser Basin and its colorful extremophiles called thermophiles, fumaroles at Roaring Mountain and mudpots like those at the Fountain Paint Pots, can compete for the attention of your constantly developing and consistently evolving view of the world (and compete with X-BOX too).
We would like to think that a day of rafting below Electric Peak and through Yankee Jim Canyon would speak directly to the adventuresome heart of a teenager.
We hope the hours spent climbing Mount Washburn for views overlooking the entire park, the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone River, The Yellowstone Caldera and Yellowstone Lake from high in the Rocky Mountains will open up your mind to the idea that we live in a very big world and that the possibilities in life are endless if you continue to willfully put one powerful step in front of the other.
We wish on every crystal clear star that you could see in the darkness above Yellowstone at night that the visits to the Madison, Hayden and Lamar River Valleys for countless wildlife observations will open your heart to the diversity in our world, and we will keep our fingers crossed that some of our passion for exploring these amazing outdoor wonderlands will possibly be contagious and you will search out similar experiences as you continue to define the life you choose to live.
Just remember Matt, with each choice you will create a new set of consequences, and whether you find yourself in the calm of a Yellowstone Lake or in the turbulence of the Lower Falls in the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, you need never go alone into the rugged solitude because one consequence you can count on even more regularly than Old Faithful’s ninety-four minute cycle is the consequence of having a family that loves and appreciates you.
Thanks for a great vacation buddy.
See You Outside,
Aunt Sheri and Uncle Randy
For more on Yellowstone from Get Out More: 2009 Visit, Yellowstone Photos 2009 and Yellowstone Photos 2010
September 11th, 2010 at 6:13 pm
Hi Sheri and Randy!
We met briefly @ the BassPro in Portage, IN this year. We talked about you guys going to Yellowstone and roasting corn and using bacon to grease the bottom of a pot.
It was really good to see you got your nephew out to Yellowstone with you! They seem underwhelmed sometimes (trying to be cool) but my 17 yr. old daughter talks about our backcounry trip up the Lamar all the time.
Well done! Stay well.
DanO