Making Breakthroughs and Breaking the Color Barriers in the Great Outdoors

The Breakthrough.

I�m busy, busy, busy like a bee. I have been busy writing. Writing is a necessary part of science. I know my dissertation meter has moved in a while. It doesn�t mean I haven�t been writing. It�s just that I am reluctant to count a word until I feel that what I have written is perfect. Perfectly worded and perfectly placed.

But I�ve been feeling like I need to claim my words, all of them � even the imperfectly worded and placed ones. So my word meter reflects those words. I expect that I will lose many of those words � to revisions, and re-drafts. I also think that my final dissertation word count might actually be less than 40,000 words (10,000 words per chapter).
I now claim 28, 981 words!

I feel gravid � productive, full of promise and excitement.


Breaking the Color Barrier in the Great American Outdoors
My spirits have been quite high lately. I�ve made new online friends and discovered new websites and blogs. I feel excited to be apart of a community, a movement of people who care about increasing diversity in outdoor experiences.



Not long ago I learned about a fantastic upcoming conference - Breaking the Color Barrier in the Great Outdoors. It meets next week - September 23-26 in Atlanta, Georgia, and will feature a host of great speakers including some people I am big fan of: Majora Carter
Dudley Edmundson
Dr. Carolyn Finney

It's a conference of educators, environmental activists, outdoor recreationists, and nature enthusiasts that focuses on how members of diverse communities (people of color) participate in these activities and examines reasons/strategies for getting more people of color outdoors enjoying nature. Isn�t that right up my alley? See the CNN interview with conference organizer, Audrey Peterman: Aiming to add more diversity under America's blue skies - CNN.com

I've met some people online who are also involved in this barrier breaking, too.
Wayne Hubbard, host and producer of Urban American Outdoors (Kansas City, Kansas)
Kellen Marshall-Gillespie, fellow Ecology Ph.D. Student at the University of Illinois-Chicago and owner of Roots and Shoots Organic Gardening
Rue Mapp, founder of Outdoor Afro (Albany, California)

Even though I won�t be attending the conference (and I am so tempted to just go anyway), I really need to stay close to home and finish writing. I�ll catch up with all of those great people sooner or later.

In the meantime, I�ll be sporting my swag (thanks Rue, cause I sport the the Afro outdoors all of the time. hahaha) and breaking down color barriers in the great outdoors my own way�.By trying to win this contest to Antarctica!!! So, please continue to support me. Please vote and pelase spread the word.