To My Co-Leader

I really miss summer.

And no, it's not the frigid temperatures. Side note: do people think that the weather only applies to them? Yeah, I know, it's cold out. I don't need to see a photo of what your weather app says. It's January in New England, if it's 75 degrees THEN I'll be surprised. I miss summer because it was easy and hard at the same time. The work was hard but it was extremely rewarding at the end of the day. Life was easy because it was simple and filled with people I really enjoyed. One of the people I enjoyed most was my co-leader, Lumberjack. He recently wrote this piece about his life in the dogsledding world, and it made me miss him that much more (queue "AWWWWWW"). He is a pivotal piece in my great summer, because if he sucked then my summer would have REALLY sucked. I infamously had the absolute worst group members for projects in school (I mean, like, really really bad), and it made my life hell. I couldn't imagine how terrible it would be to live and work with someone I couldn't stand for three months straight. Lucky for me, he didn't suck. 

I was really nervous about having a crappy co-leader. All the other co-leaders rotated through leading together, so some people only lead together once. Since Lumby and I were an hour away we would be together the entire summer, no rotating. We lived in canvas tents (or backpacking tents) not 20 feet away from each other. We worked side by side every day. The first time we had a crew big enough to split into two project sites we both felt really weird to be leading without the other. There weren't many off days that we didn't hang out. 

I learned that the gruff, blunt, bearded man I met during training was really a softy at heart. Still, he had no tolerance for bullshit. 

Almost every single lunch break looked like this

And this (doing push-ups for swearing)

I quickly learned how much he loved to lounge, to sit and read a book, but also that he was one of the hardest workers I've ever met. I can't tell you how many times I found myself saying "okay, kids, why is Lumby the only one doing something right now?" Example:

Finishing touches on our worksite

I always had a blast playing little games when I got to know his work style better. I would be making crush, a favorite activity of mine, which involves finding rocks and smashing them into smaller rocks with a 8-10lb doublejack (sledgehammer). Those rocks are used to set and support other rocks or logs or whatever you're working with. Sometimes we would be working in an area that didn't have great "crush rocks". Ideally they should be "pancake" rocks with lots of striations, but sometimes you could only find round, dense, smooth rocks. Throughout the day we would send people off into the woods to collect crush rocks, and often kids would bring back rocks that were near impossible to break. Good crush rocks will smash with almost no force, bad ones will get a mere dent even after several full, strong hits. Anyway, if I was making crush and came across a "bad" crush rock I would tell the kids "watch this", then yell "Hey, Lumby, come here! I don't think this rock is going to break! You wanna try?". A little crowd would giggle as he came over, silently inspected the rock, then continuously smash it until it was obliterated. Without any other words he would turn back to me, hand me the tool, and say, "Hm. There you go, Bean.", and go back to what he was doing before. Could I have broken the rock eventually? Probably. But tell Lumby he can't do something and he will keep trying until he proves you wrong. 

Making crush

Our best times were probably when him and I had to do something we didn't want our participants doing, or had to get something done fast. It was usually something dangerous and borderline stupid to do, like:

Dig out mud/rocks from under a step stone that was nearly impossible to get back out of its mud-ridden hole while your trusted co-leader (me) sits on the rock bar propping it up and takes photos of you. Also, never ever do that. It's a terribly dangerous idea. We had a grand 'ol time dealing with dangerous and stupid situations. It was also a blast to do really great work FAST because we were so strong and in shape. We could work together seamlessly and without words.

Most of all, we really enjoyed each other and it gave us a strong bond that lasted the whole season. When I was out for my back injury I got a call from Lumby telling me he flipped his truck. Service was terrible, so I promptly jumped up and half sprinted half hobbled down the street without shoes on to try to get back on the phone. Thankfully he was okay, and I only looked mildly insane.

The story of my summer would have been immensely different if I didn't have a partner like Lumby. There are other things that make it great, but I can't help but recognize what a key role he was. It's amazing how quickly two people can come to work well together, trust each other, feel the need to look out for each other, and become friends. Three months isn't a long time... unless you live with that person day in and day out. I'll end this with a quote from the man himself - "They said I could choose my co-leader if I came back next summer. I said thanks, but in my head I said 'Yeah... but Bean won't be back next summer, sooo.....' "