The Voice of a Region

“A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find that after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us.”  John Steinbeck

Tomorrow, an adventure, a journey begins for me.  I was selected to participate in the institute "John Steinbeck, the Voice of a Region, a Voice for America”, sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities (http://www.steinbeckinstitute.org/index.html).

Most people would consider my expedition to Antarctica in 1999 or the immersion into Ukrainian culture in 2012 as true adventure and I will certainly not deny that both journeys push my boundaries. Participating in a program not directly related to science is no less of an adventure and in many ways, a riskier undertaking for me.  Since I read The Red Pony at the age of 10 and secretly read The Grapes of Wrath as an 8^th grader (there is a story here, saved for another day), John Steinbeck has been my favorite author.  I read most of Steinbeck’s novels while a college student.  Unfortunately, his works were never part of the courses I took for credit or the many literature classes I audited (my early version of a book club).  This institute will afford me the opportunity to study Steinbeck with other like-minded individuals.  Yes, this puts me in a risky position far outside what is familiar and comfortable to me.  In science, the analysis of empirical data is customary to explain natural phenomena. Writing as description without numbers is much less familiar, thus this institute’s status as ‘adventure’ in my eyes.

Photo courtesy of The Steinbeck Institute

Tomorrow I journey to Monterey California, Steinbeck country.  The participants in the institute will visit Salinas Valley and Cannery Row, we will engage in discussion with scholars who have devoted their studies to the works of John Steinbeck, we will experience tidal pools and plankton tows and whales (I hope), we will participate in a variety of pedagogical practices and develop lessons for our classrooms.  We will see John Steinbeck as a “significant cultural voice--as novelist, dramatist, visionary ecologist and enduring commentator on twentieth-century American values and ideals.” (The Steinbeck Institute).

The opening quote suggests “…we do not take a trip; a trip takes us”.  I wonder where this trip will take me.