She had few female role models in either realm. With the encouragement of supportive teachers, she discovers her talents as a student and athlete, both of which serve as catalysts for her professional journey into the Ivory Tower and the great mountains ranges of the world. I am eternally grateful to have recently discovered this seminal work of outdoor adventure narratives.Blum’s book weaves together her experience as a young girl in suburban Chicago, trying to find her way and her place, with the challenges she meets as an adult trying to navigate the male-dominated worlds of academia and mountaineering in the 1960s and beyond. Looking back, I wonder how my life would be different if I had read Arlene Blum’s memoir, Breaking Trail, as a young woman. I felt a deep love for wild things, but my imagination of what the wilderness held was as limited as my experience. I exalted in whatever natural features I encountered, from the culvert behind the house that felt like a raging creek to the worn trails at city parks. “As a kid growing up in the clear cut flatlands of the Midwestern United States, large stands of trees were a luxury, and mountains were something from a world far beyond my own. Ellen Bayer’s Recommended Reading : Breaking Trail by Arlene Blum This week, Ellen Bayer and ? are sharing their meaningful reads. Everyone is invited to share a book with thoughts on why the book was meaningful to their career, studies, or life. Campus Meaningful Reads is a recommended book series celebrating faculty, staff, and students at the University of Washington Tacoma.
0 kommentar(er)
