Short Story

     A lovely little butterfly was flying swiftly from flower to flower, filling up on much needed nutrients. This butterfly looks the same as any other butterfly. However, behind this little butterfly is a story. The butterfly’s name is Blair. Blair has just recently morphed from a teeny caterpillar into this entirely new, foreign form. She is a Blue Morpho Butterfly. She resides in the lower parts of a tropical rainforest. The front of her wings are a brilliant, bright blue color, with the outer edges lined in black.

     Her day was just coming to a close. She had had a lively day, filled with a multitude of exciting activities. She had started off her day by allowing a slight breeze to ease her off of a still position. She used the light wind to her benefit, only having to flap her wings very few times in order to continue flying. The wind drastically slowed, and left her between some crammed branches of a tree. She traveled inward to the trunk of the tree to gather some sap. Once she had had enough, she continued on her way through the forest. Since she was fairly new to the vastness of her location, she decided to spend the day exploring.

     All she could see was a plethora of green scenery. Ginormous trees with ginormous leaves. The plants on the rainforest floor themselves still had very large leaves of green. She flew towards the top of the trees and the closer she grew to the top, the more of the sunlight she could see. She felt the warmth of the sun’s ray almost immediately as she had made it to the very top of a tree. After she experienced the direct sunlight, she moved on to explore some more. It took her a while, but eventually she had made it to a waterfall. She decided to fly to the top of where the water was falling. Once she arrived there, she took a moment before quickly plunging down along the water, just far enough above it to not get the slightest bit wet. It was quite an exhilarating moment for her. Right before hitting the water, she rapidly shifted her body upward into a straight forward positions, preventing her from nearly drowning. She stayed flying in this direction for a while, until deciding to take a right to venture back into the forest.

     In the distance, she saw a blurb a bright blue color against the all green forest. She rushed over to see what it was she was seeing, only to find a large group of Blue Morpho Butterflies, just the same as her. She set herself down on the massive leaf they were all sharing a spot on. She relaxed for a second, and felt a slight sense of belonging. She eventually decided it was time to move on yet again, and began on her own way. This time, as she was flying, she felt a light push down against her left wing. She didn’t think much of it until moments later, she felt another, heavier push. Before she knew it, she was caught in the middle of a rainstorm. She rushed to find shelter, but unfortunately, an immense raindrop fell upon her and forced her into a tightly interlaced branches, where she easily became stuck. While struggling to get out, she noticed a large spider heading her way. Aware that she was in even more danger, she began to try even harder to become unstuck, but she only became more and more uncomfortable with each struggle. She was almost within the spiders reach when she realized that she was much too tense to be able to easily make her way out of this predicament. She relaxed her wings and within a second, broke free from what could have been the end of her journey that had just nearly begun.

Today, we went canoeing in Bellbrook. We were placed two to a boat. My partner and I enjoyed ourselves. However, we did crash into the side of the river on multiple occasions. Also, we would get often become stuck in the shallowest parts of the water. Once, my partner even had to get out of the boat and into the water just simply to push us out since we were unable to move ourselves with the paddles. Steering was the thing we struggled most with, which we would explain why we crashed so many times. We thought we would get the hang of turning eventually, but we never really did. We were on the canoe for about 3 hours before coming back to the place we arrived at when we first came. Whilst canoeing, we witnessed loads of turtles, varying in size. We also stopped to take a break on a shore to the side in the middle of the way there. We hung out on the shore for a second and took a look into the shallow water. We saw about one hundred adolescent fish swimming close to the shore. Overall, it was a calming and fun experience. 

Into the Woods STEMmersion group photo.

Earlier in the day, prior to leaving the school, we were given a paper that gave instructions on how to make a recipe poem. Two examples of recipe poems were given on the front, a short one of only five lines and a longer one of 12 lines. Then, on the back there were templates so we could recreate our own rendition of each poem. This was mine:

To make a river it takes 500,000 gallons of water,

Millions of rocks, and fallen trees.

Also, loads of fish,

If turtles are few.

Today, we were led in a writing workshop by Kris. She presented us with a PowerPoint that explained what a vignette was and the five steps to writing one. A vignette is essentially a snapshot with words, never more than 800. We wrote a practice vignette based of off an image at the end of the PowerPoint. Mine is below.

River water rapidly flows across large boulders. An adult brown bear stands atop a boulder, patiently they are all still naturally created colors, meaning all these colors are slightly muted and deeper, than the bright shades waiting for the perfect opportunity to easily catch a fish. The clear, fresh water allows for an easy visual into the water, letting the bear know precisely when his dinner has arrived so he can dive in. the rapids entirely surrounded by beautiful plant life. Evergreen trees stand tall throughout the area, their needles a lovely, deep green color, proving the reasoning behind their name. The other trees present themselves in an array of autumn colors. Some tree leaves have turned red, some have turned yellow, and some have turned orange. They are all still naturally created, meaning all of these colors are slightly muted and deeper. Looking up from ground, apparent elevation is visible. Thousands of feet away, a line of mountains border each side of the narrow river. Even taller mountains than those are present at the very edge of all that can be seen. These mountains have tops that have been buried entirely in pure, white snow.

Then, we had to write a vignette based off of a photo of a creature we were required to take at Cox Arboretum.

My chosen creature, a Garter Snake.

A garter snake lies peacefully as a lightweight on some bushes. The snake is coiled up, not in motion. Its head is entirely black, but starting from its neck all the way down, three yellow stripes are visible. One stripe is directly along the top of the snake’s spine. The other two are split into one on each side of the snake. The length of its body was a minimum of two feet. Observing the creature calmly was key. The last thing anyone wants to happen is to startle or disturb it. Provoking it when it is being no threat is just unfair and potentially dangerous. So, the best thing is just to let it be.

Today, we took a visit to Eastwood Metro Park. We all separated into two groups. One group was to kayak first while the other group went hiking. After lunch, the group that hadn’t gone hiking went kayaking and vice versa. My group was the first to go kayaking. I found kayaking to be extremely fun, despite the cool weather we were having. Fortunately, no one in our group tipped over, but if so, life jackets were provided for us all. However, all of us got at least a bit damp. For me, my legs got especially wet due to the dripping of water off of the paddles and onto my legs when rowing. The rowing also very quickly tired out my arms, it was truly a workout for me.

On our hike, we witnessed many new plants. The most memorable one for me was the Winged Stem plant. It was a plant that stood about a foot and a half tall and had incredibly narrow leaves sticking out along the entire stem of the plant. We also listened for many bird calls. One of which was from a bird that imitated the songs of other birds, just the same as some humans can impeccably impersonate other humans. I also witnessed some work that had been done by nature’s engineers, better known as beavers. In the middle of our hike, one of my friends had pointed out a tree that had clearly been gnawed away at on the bottom of the tree. We also looked at some invasive plant species such as the Honeysuckle Bush. Over all, it was a good day and I enjoyed myself. 

Into the Woods students kayaking.  

The lake in which we kayaked.

Today, we completed an activity called Planning a Hike. We were paired up and each pair had to determine what precisely they would pack if they were to go on a very lengthy hiking trip for a prolonged amount of time. My partner and I decided we would hike half of the entire Buckeye Trail. We would take our hike during the fall. The hike would be 722 miles long and take us approximately 92 days. We had to total up the weight of all the items we planned to bring. Below is an image of the list my partner and I had composed, including the item name, the quantity of that item, and the weight it would be. 

`The total came to about 56-57 pounds. Each team had their totaled amount placed into a backpack and had to put the backpack on to experience how heavy the bag was. We were also encourage to walk out into the hall around a classroom with it on. This was a challenge for me since I found the backpack to be immensely heavy and surely burdening. I could not even imagine what an arduous, painstaking journey a hike of about 15 miles a day for 92 days straight would be like whilst having to carry so much weight upon your back. 

While creating the list, the hardest part for me was finding the quantity of items. I am definitely no professional survivalist, so I had no clue how much food we would need or how long we could last off of certain amounts of food. Also, another challenge I was presented with was separating what I knew what would be absolutely necessary from what was maybe less important. Despite some of these difficulties, I still found the activity to be pretty fun, interesting, and of course, educational. 

  

Contemplation Script

Image yourself in a serene environment. This environment takes place in the middle of a wooded area. Vast trees, fifty to one hundred feet tall, surround the entire area. Sunlight is barely visible, due to the shade provided by the mass of trees. However, a few rays of sun manage to peek through openings left between leaves. The location is not entirely darkened, yet is a quite dim. The dimness causes a sense of relaxation, as opposed to being much too bright which may provoke excitement.

When you look to the ground, you see there is not much grass. Instead, there is rich, dark brown soil all around. Various fallen branches and leaves add to the mix of the earth on which you stand atop. There is not much else due to the lack of major sunlight, leaving little able to grow on the ground. The beautiful trees, tall and proud, make up for the lack of other plant life. The trunks of these trees are large in circumference, and also are bare until about a third of the way up the tree. At that point, long branches covered in classic green leaves protrude outward, slightly tilting in varied directions. This area does not have much, but it doesn’t need it. For when it comes to nature, quality is over quantity.

On Friday, the 29^th, we took a visit to the Aullwood Audubon Center and Farm. I personally found the trip to be quite enjoyable and intriguing. I loved learning about the plants and insects I had not been aware of before. For example, the mass amount of larvae of all kind residing in the unnoticed areas of the ponds. Obviously I knew they existed, it’s just the thought of all that was lurking in the waters that I could not see from an average perspective had not often occurred to me. The instructor my group had, Ms. Pat, was very kind and well informative. I was fortunate enough to take a closer look at a couple of birds through the utilization of binoculars provided for us all, allowing me to get a better look at the florescent, brilliant colors of these birds. But, a creature I was able to get an even closer look at was a snake. In fact, I was able to hold this snake in my hands myself, which was such an amazing experience for me since I honestly find snakes so interesting. I would not have minded seeing a few more snakes that day. But it’s alright because I was able to hold another reptile almost as interesting. They were box turtles, and frankly, they were adorable. Viewing all the natural land I had that day was so lovely. There is so much beauty in nature that most tend to disregard. It’s always nice to get outside for a while and fully appreciate that beauty, and that is precisely what I had done during our trip. Eventually, we headed down to the farm to see the farm animals. The farm that I witnessed were goats, horses, pigs, chickens, rabbits, sheep, and turkeys. The goats in particular were incredibly friendly and easy to pet. All in all, it was a very good day and I would love to experience another day similar to it.

A rabbit from the Aullwood Farm

Today, we took a trip to Cox Arboretum. We went after we finished up a few things from the day before. These things included finishing up a Hersey Kiss activity where we were required to intricately describe a Hersey Kiss through all five senses and then put our description into a booklet shaped like the candy itself. It also included finishing up a blog post from the day prior to this one, since our yoga session had gone longer than expected and we had no time to start off our new post. Even if we had yet to finish up these tasks entirely, we all had to leave to Cox Arboretum. Once we arrived there, we all had freedom to walk around anywhere we would like. However, there was a scavenger hunt assigned to us prior to our arrival. The scavenger hunt included taking an image of five different trees and at least one creature (not a human being). We had to take a close up image of the bark, then a close up of the leaves, then the entire tree. We all met back up with the rest of our Into the Woods members around noon. Soon after meeting up, we grabbed our yoga mats and laid them atop the grass, preparing for another yoga session. After yoga, it was time to pack up and go back to the school. We utilized our remaining time we had at school by finishing up anything we had yet to finish, which included our post for today. 

A photograph taken during our yoga session at Cox Arboretum

Yesterday, on the 27th, we started off the day with a reading titled “Take a Closer Look” by Tom Brown Jr. Once we read it, we discussed it and along with it came an adapted from the reading. The activity we had to do was to literally take a closer look into a square foot spot of our choice in a natural setting. The activity was called “Small World”. Taking a closer look into our small world of nature included recording detailed observations from two different perspectives. One perspective was from a standing position and the other was from a kneeling position. We also were encouraged to lie all the way down on our stomachs and appreciate the area from that perspective, but recording an analysis was not required. What I had recorded of my small world from the standing perspective was a patch of land with the upper right corner bordered by two rocks. The patch of land consisted of grass, clovers, and a few white wild flowers strewn about the area. From a kneeling perspective I definitely could see a bit more details I had not noticed from a standing position. I noticed small pieces of broken off bark, some blades of dead, yellowed grass, and I noticed minuscule holes bitten into the leaves of some of the clovers. Where we had gone to make this observations was Delco Park, which we all had traveled to on foot. Below is a photograph taken by a few of my friends and myself enjoying our time at Delco Park on such a lovely day.

Today, we were further introduced to what our STEMmersion, Into the Woods, was going to entail. We started the class off with a discussion of a quote by Henry Thoreau, which was “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately.” We discussed what we felt the meaning of living deliberately was to us and shared with the class. After that, we all read an excerpt from “Looking Around” by Anne Lamott and once again discussed with the class any thoughts we had about the reading. In order to get to know each other better, we all traced our hand onto a piece of paper and on each finger wrote one thing about our self. We went around with our paper and introduced ourselves to one another, having each person we introduced ourselves to sign our paper. After that activity, each of us received a syllabus and briefly went over it, so we all knew what to expect in order to prepare for this STEMmersion. One thing we needed to prepare was our blogs we are required to update daily, so we all set up our blogs and were able to customize them a bit. We then split into two and completed a team activity where we were given four small, wooden boards. With these boards, we had to get our entire team from one point to another, stepping only on the boards. An image of this activity is provided below.

 Soon after, a guest speaker, Scott Geisel, came to speak with us about nature writing. He explained to us what nature writing was and the importance of making our writing detailed enough for the reader to be able to visualize, in their own minds, what we were describing. He also talked of the major parts of nature writing, which were observation, meaning, and delivery. After he was done speaking, we had a recess break outside followed by lunch. Once lunch was over, we went into the gym along with our yoga mats, in preparation to do yoga. Unfortunately, something came up for our yoga instructor and she was unable to come teach us. Instead, we came up with some rules and expectations to follow during the course of Into the Woods. To end the day, we just simply went back to the classroom we began in and started to write our blog post for the day.