“Democracy is not something you believe in or a place to hang your hat,
but it’s something you do. You participate. If you stop doing it, democracy crumbles.”
– Activist, writer and speaker Abbie Hoffman

This is the toughest blog for me to write. In fact, I devoted 2023 to blogging and writing about my life story. This was the blog I knew it was vital for me to write, but I dreaded writing this blog. For the past 23 years, I have not felt that environmentalists, climate advocates, progressives and Democratic leaning voters were smart about electing Presidential, state level, and local candidates who would protect our environment, planet, and our democracy.

This is going to be a very painful blog to write, but I feel like I have no choice to share but to share my story. Hopefully, someone can learn from my disappointment and letdown I felt from environmental and climate Democratic voters who allowed awful candidates for President and other elected offices win.

This was such a tough blog to write. I had so much to say that I broke up it into many parts:
Part 1, My 1980s childhood in Missouri to witnessing 2000 Presidential Election in Florida
Part 2, My story as a park ranger and rediscovering Al Gore 2001 to 2007
Part 3, Loss of a friend, Leaving Everglades, and finding my passion for climate action 2007-08
Part 4, Healing from grief and Taking Climate Action in Oregon and Missouri 2009-2016
Part 5: My frustration and heartbreak with the 2016 Presidential Election
Part 6: Donald Trump’s Disgraceful Presidency and my climate action 2017-2020

Part 7: Working as a U.S. Census Enumerator and living through Presidential Election of 2020

My job as a U.S. Census Enumerator in 2020 during the COVID 19 Pandemic

On March 10, 2020, Oregon Governor Kate Brown signed strong executive orders for the state of Oregon to tackle climate change. She did this in response to the Republican walking outs to prevent passage of Renew Oregon’s cap and invest bills in 2019 and at the end of February 2020. I was one of the dozens of climate organizers, including many school age children who were invited, to be inside the Governor’s office to witness her signing those executive orders.

Two weeks later, March 23, 2020, Citizens’ Climate Lobby (CCL) published a blog I wrote about this event, “Oregon Governor Kate Brown signs strong climate executive order.” That always feels like a big accomplishment for me to get an opinion editorial published in a newspaper or a blog published, such as the CCL website. After the release of that blog, I felt like I did not have anything to look forward, including no traveling, no lobbying, no public speaking, no way to meet with friends, no events to organize, etc. I was lucky to have my wife Tanya, and we still went hiking locally together. I just felt so lethargic and no motivation to do anything.

Oddly, Tanya got laid off from her job for about nine weeks because of the pandemic and economic downturn. Financially, we were fine. She threw herself into studying full time for a degree in data management. I was just adrift. I did not feel like reading any books or writing any blogs. My wife is half Danish and I started taking daily Danish lessons from her. In May, I started doing the Duolingo Language Learning App on my phone full time.

In January 2020, a friend encouraged me to apply for the U.S. Census Bureau to help them complete their Census count. I turned in my application that winter. I would hear from the Census Bureau periodically that they wanted to hire me to be an enumerator to help compile data for the 2020 Census. I was so tired of sitting at home. Yet, 2020 highly recommended people to stay home with the very contagious COVID 19 raging at the time.

The U.S. Census Bureau finally hired me and the other Census enumerators in the last week of July 2020. I had to complete a series of trainings at home before I drove to a temporary Census office on July 28th in Damacus, Oregon.

The next week, I started traveling to different houses in Portland to interview residents who did not fill out their Census form. I thought this was the most patriotic job I could do at that moment. The Census dates back the U.S. Constitution enacted in 1789. Article I, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution empowers Congress to carry out the census in, “Within every subsequent Term of ten Years, such manner as they shall by Law direct.”

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, “The Founders of our fledgling nation had a bold and ambitious plan to empower the people over their new government. The plan was to count every person living in the newly created United States of America, and to use that count to determine representation in the Congress.

Enshrining this invention in our Constitution marked a turning point in world history. Previously censuses had been used mainly to tax or confiscate property or to conscript youth into military service. The genius of the Founders was taking a tool of government and making it a tool of political empowerment for the governed over their government.”

I helped to count American citizens so they could have full representation in our democratic government. During our training, it was emphasized that U.S. Census population statistics determined not just Congressional, state level, or local representation. “The results of the census help determine how hundreds of billions of dollars in federal funding, including grants and support to states, counties and communities are spent every year for the next decade. It helps communities get its fair share for schools, hospitals, roads, and public works.”

I knocked on the doors of Americans in my nearby community of those who did not fill out their U.S. Census forms to make sure they were fully seen, represented, and were awarded the government services available to them. These services included access to schools, police, fire departments, roads, hospitals, etc. In addition, Oregon expected to gain a 6th Congressional seat from the 2020 U.S. Census count. Oregon barely missed gaining a congressional seat in the 2010 Census. Population studies from that time suggested it was a near lock.

Thus, by working for the U.S. Census and counting people in my community, I could help Oregon gain representation in Congress. Even more, my own neighborhood and the neighborhoods that surround me are some of the most diverse communities of Portland and possibly for all of Oregon. Thus, I was helping my community to be seen and fully represented.

Sadly, President Donald Trump attempted to order the U.S. Census Bureau to exclude undocumented immigrants from key census count. He wanted to shut out undocumented immigrants from having fair representative in Congress and for government services. He demanded a citizenship question added the 2020 U.S. Census, but the Supreme Court blocked it. Trump then threatened to defy a Supreme Court ruling that blocked it, but then decided against it.

Trump hoped a citizenship question or even the rumor of a citizenship question would discourage communities of color and undocumented immigrants from participating in the 2020 U.S. Census. In fact, President Trump and his Administration went to the Supreme Court to attempt to stop the U.S. Census Count in September 2020. Civil rights groups argued minorities and others in hard-to-count communities would be missed if the counting ended in September instead of October. Reading and hearing about this situation in the news motivated me further to count as many people as I could in the Census, especially people of color.

I enjoyed working in this job where I got to be outside engaging with people to try to conduct the most accurate Census count possible. I met some very kind and helpful people. On the other hand, I encountered incredibly rude people did not want to be helpful. They yelled at me for coming to their door. Some even threatened me with a gun.

Part of me was fine if belligerent white conservative folks did not want to be counted in the U.S. Census. Plenty of them were already counted in the Census. It was disheartening when I encountered African Americans, Latino, Hispanic, Asian and other people of color who refused to talk with me. Sometimes I wondered if the U.S. Census Bureau would have had more success if a person of color approached them instead.

Because some people could be so mean, rude, nasty, bitter, and refusing to help me, it made it hard to go to work some days. I had days when I could not wait for this temporary job to be over. I often came home totally deflated worried about America’s future if so many people did not want to participate in the Census, our democracy, and spurned my attempts to chat with them. I consider myself a friendly guy who loves people and wants the best for everyone. I felt depressed when some people acted negatively to me when I was just doing my job. I cared enough about them that I wanted them to be counted on the Census, but they did not care.

This was the flip side to when I worked as a park ranger at Crater Lake and Everglades National Parks for 25 years. I encountered so many park visitors who seemed to love me. They were enamored with the ranger uniform. They wanted their pictures with me. I was as popular as Mickey Mouse at Disney World. I knew it was because these park visitors were excited to be on vacation in a national park and they loved seeing park rangers. It was not me that they loved, it was the uniform. Still, my park ranger years were a very heady experience.

When I was a park ranger, it was a fun part of my job to go to work each day to experience complete strangers that were so thrilled to see me. This U.S. Census Enumerator job felt like the opposite of that. Some of these same individuals who hated seeing me come to their door would have been so excited to encounter me as a ranger in a national park.

As the old saying goes attributed to Mark Twain and Shakespeare, “Clothes make the man.”

I wrote about my U.S. Census Enumerator experience on Facebook on October 13, 2020. Friends gave me many supportive and positive comments. They encouraged me to publish what I wrote. Thus, I wrote an essay for Medium, “Thoughts from a recent 2020 U.S. Census worker.”

The Census Enumerator was a temporary job, so I had to figure out what I was going to do next. Up until the Presidential election on November 3, 2020, I spent that autumn supporting Oregon Democratic candidates. One thing I learned over the previous 20 years is that we can’t pass climate polices on the national, state or local level without electing Democrats.

Helping elect OR Democratic 2020 candidates while threats emerged about Donald Trump not accepting election results.

On September 10th, while I still worked for the U.S. Census Bureau but on my spare time, I organized a Zoom House Party for my friend Chris Gorsek who ran for the Oregon Senate for District 25. In addition, I volunteered for phone bank shifts to urge voters in his Gresham District to support him. I was eager to knock on doors to canvas for Chris, but he and other Democratic candidates were not allowing that due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

On October 25th, I co-organized a house party for Shemia Fagan, who was the Democratic candidate running for Secretary of State. I knew Shemia well since she served as my Oregon Senator at that time. She was very helpful with all my climate organizing. It was important for me that she won the election because in 2021 she would potentially have the final say over redistricting efforts after the 2020 Census statistics were released for Oregon.

It was very exciting on November 3rd that Chris Gorsek and Shemia Fagan won their elections. It felt great to have played a small role in that.

As I volunteered at home to support Oregon Democratic candidates due to the pandemic, articles popped up that Donald Trump may not accept the November 3rd election results. One of the first articles I noticed was “THE ELECTION THAT COULD BREAK AMERICA” by Barton Gellman in The Atlantic on September 23, 2020. The sub headline was “If the vote is close, Donald Trump could easily throw the election into chaos and subvert the result. Who will stop him?”

Two days later, “‘Everyone sees the train wreck coming’: Trump reveals his November endgame” by David Siders and Holly Otterbein in Politico on September 25, 2020. The sub headline: “After more than four years of nonstop voter fraud claims and insinuations that he might not accept the election results, the president isn’t keeping his intent a secret.”

I found these articles to be very alarming and sobering. Yet, they were not surprising because Donald Trump had said for years that he would only accept the election results if he won.

I spoke out on social media after I read these articles. Responding to the Politico piece, I wrote on Facebook on September 25th, “Former Vice-President Al Gore said it best years ago: ‘In order to fix the #ClimateCrisis, we must first fix the democracy crisis (in America).’ Looks like Trump is going to use every despicable tactic possible to stay in power. Therefore, we must be ready to respond. We must vote early if possible and demand that our votes are counted. We must do all we can to ensure this is a free and election, every vote is counted, the results are legitimate, and the losing candidate concedes. Now is the time for fortitude and steel determination, not pessimism, cynicism, nihilism, or feeling defeated. That is what the other side is counting on you to do: give up and not fight back.”

After The Atlantic article, I posted two days later: “Very important article to read and share with the upcoming November U.S. election. The survival of American democracy is under threat. It’s time to face a reality that America has a President struggling with mental issues. He has never been held accountable or learned how to suffer defeat in his life and he is unable to fathom this now. Rather than face a possible loss of power and prestige, he is willing to destroy American democracy just to stay in power. In November, we must steel ourselves to vote, vote in large numbers, and fight to make sure that every vote is counted and the true will of the people is respected.”

Celebrating November 3, 2020 election while concerned with Donald Trump’s reaction

The Presidential election results looked hopeful for Joe Biden on the evening of Tuesday, November 3rd. However, it was very frightening late at night when President Trump announced to his supporters at the White House, “This is a fraud on the American public. This is an embarrassment to our country. We were going to win this election. Frankly, we did win this election.”

Trump’s response was unhinged and troublesome, to say the least. I never heard a President or major Presidential candidate speak like that before in my life or in American history. It seemed like the U.S. was in uncharted territory for a President not to accept the results of an election. I was hopeful. Yet, I had a bad feeling it was going to be a rocky transition since Trump did not want to give up on the reins of power. He was going to do all he could to declare the election illegitimate to try to remain as President. Not good.

The next day, November 4, 2020, Barton Gellman, The Atlantic writer who sounded the alarm for months that Trump would not give up the Presidency, was interviewed on NPR’s Fresh Air prorgam by host Terry Gross. The interview was titled, “’Atlantic’ Writer Says Current Election Is A ‘Stress Test’ Of American Democracy.”

It was a huge relief for Tanya and me, as well as millions of other Americans, when the news media declared that Joe Biden won the Presidency on Saturday, November 7th. Pennsylvania was the “Keystone State” that helped Biden cross the threshold of 270 Electoral College votes. We were so excited with the results that Pennsylvania tipped the election in Biden’s favor.

To celebrate Biden’s victory, we drove to a local Portland food cart to order Philly cheese steak sandwiches. We ate them for a late lunch that day. Unfortunately, they tasted terrible. Maybe they taste better in Philadelphia. However, these sandwiches felt like a rock in our stomachs. We did not feel fine for the rest of the day. If Pennsylvania plays a crucial role in a future U.S. election win, we know next time to buy Philly cheesecakes, not Philly cheesesteaks!

It felt rather odd that former Republican President George W. Bush was one of the first calls that President-elect Joe Biden received congratulating him on his victory. That was a lovely gesture. Sadly, President Donald Trump refused to accept election results, said it’s ‘far from over.’

My November 2020 appearance on the TV show Comedy Central’s Tosh.o

On a lighter note, as we waited to see if Donald Trump would concede, Comedy Central’s Tosh.o TV show invited me to return to the show for another taping. They wanted to quickly put together an episode to get my comments and other past guests on the recent Presidential election. Unlike the previous episode, they were going to film me over Zoom. With the pandemic, they were not going to fly me to Los Angeles like they did in 2016.

In August, Comedy Central announced it would end its run with November 24, 2020 as the series finale for Tosh.o. ViacomCBS-owned cable network stated Tosh.o would wrap its run with its 12th and final season in the fall of 2020. The last 10 episodes would air starting on September 15th. Thus, I had a chance to return to the show for one last time on one of the last remaining episodes to be aired on Comedy Central.

This TV comedy show could be a great platform to discuss climate change. I wanted to slip in a message to urge for climate action if possible. With the pandemic, I had not given a climate change presentation in months, and I felt very rusty. Thus, I emailed climate scientist Dr. Michael E. Mann of University of Pennsylvania for his advice for climate change messaging for this TV appearance, and this was his response:

“Hi Brian…
Sounds like a great opportunity indeed. These days, my messaging is focused on just two words: urgency and agency.

Yes, bad things are happening, we can see them playing out in real time now. But we can prevent the worst from happening. Assuming the election goes our way, there will be leader ship once again in Washington DC. And we have ready climate plans on the table from both Congressional Democrats and the Biden campaign. We need to hit the ground running, and in his perspective first hundred days, Biden and a hopefully Democratic Congress need to pass a climate plan that put a price on carbon, incentivizes clean energy, enforces regulations, and blocks support for new fossil fuel infrastructure.
That’s sort of my elevator pitch!“

Sadly, this 2020 Tosh.o segment was not as good as the original episode where I was a guest in 2016. I was disappointed that I was unable to squeeze in a message about climate change for my second appearance. My first guest appearance on Daniel Tosh’s show focused exclusively on my climate change messaging and my attempts to use comedy. This time, climate change was hardly mentioned. Still, it was fun to participate on this TV show again. The segment was called, “DANDERSON COOPER 361.”

2020 was a depressing year for me with the COVID 19 pandemic. This Tosh.o appearance was a welcome comic relief for me. When I posted about it on Facebook, my friends and family seemed to enjoy watching me again on TV. As far as my climate organizing, I made good connections with Oregon Legislators in 2019 and 2020 when I lobbied for the cap and invest bills. This led to new climate organizing effort in 2021. I will cover this in the next blog as well as my thoughts on the serious threat to American democracy.

Stay tuned for Part 8, the aftermath of the 2020 Presidential Election: U.S. democracy under attack 2021-2023.

“Remember that your political adversaries want you to feel demoralized, cynical, and hopeless about taking political action. NEVER GIVE THEM THAT SATISFACTION.”
– Brian Ettling

This is the toughest blog for me to write. In fact, I devoted all of 2023 to writing and blogging about my life story. I knew it was vital for me to write this blog, but I dreaded writing it. For the past 23 years, I have felt that environmentalists, climate advocates, progressives and Democratic leaning voters were not smart about electing Presidential, state level, and local candidates who would protect our environment, planet, and our democracy.

This is a very painful blog to write, but I feel like I must share but to share my story. Hopefully, someone can learn from my disappointment and letdown I felt from environmental and climate Democratic voters who allowed awful candidates for President and other elected offices win.

This was such a tough blog to write. I had so much to say that I broke up it into many parts:

Part 1, My 1980s childhood in Missouri to witnessing 2000 Presidential Election in Florida
Part 2, my story from 2001 to 2007
Part 3, 2007-08, Loss of a friend, Leaving Everglades, and finding my passion for climate action
Part 4, Healing from grief and Taking Climate Action in Oregon and Missouri 2009-2016
Part 5: My frustration and heartbreak with the 2016 Presidential Election

Part 6: Donald Trump’s Disgraceful Presidency and my focus on climate action 2017-2020

Taking Climate actions in St. Louis in January 2017

In January 2017, as Donald Trump prepared to become President, I was busy taking climate action. On January 4th, I gave a speech at St. Louis South County Toastmasters, where I was a member. My talk advocated for joining Toastmasters as one of the best ways I know to engage climate change doubters. A video of this speech is on YouTube. My fellow Toastmasters voted for me as “Best Speaker” for this speech. This was my 20th speech for Toastmasters during the previous 6 years. Most of my speeches were about climate change. As a result of this speech, I achieved the Advanced Communicator Bronze Award from Toastmasters International.

On Sunday morning, January 8th, I was the first speaker for the “Climate Change and You” series at Second Presbyterian Church in St. Louis. I led a webinar for Citizens’ Climate Lobby (CCL) volunteers on January 12th, “National Parks and Climate Change.” I talked about how my work experience as a park ranger and our love of national parks helped me achieve common ground in meetings with Congressional staff when I lobby them as a private citizen on climate change.

On January 24th, friends informed me on Facebook that they spotted me on TV when my August 2016 episode on Comedy Central’s Tosh.o aired on television again. One of my favorite stories that happened when this episode aired was shared my friend, Lucia Whalen, who is a professional comedian. I know Lucia as a fellow Climate Reality Leader. She was hanging with friends and watching television. She was trying to convince them to attend the upcoming 2017 Climate Reality Training in Denver, Colorado and my episode came on TV.

On January 29th, I organized a St. Louis Climate Reality Meet Up (now called Climate Meetup-St. Louis) event at Schlafly’s Bottleworks. I invited Philadelphia area businessman and CCL volunteer Congressional Liaison Jay Butera as a guest speaker via Zoom. I asked Jay to share his recent lobby stories to successfully shift some GOP members of Congress to act on climate change. Just one month before, the National Geographic TV series, Years of Living Dangerously, featured Jay on an episode, called “Safe Passage.” Jay asked me to play this video segment at this event before I introduced him to speak. Over 80 people attended this January event at Schlafly’s, which packed their large meeting room.

This was my last event I organized for this group. Just days before this event, my wife Tanya, accepted a job in Portland, Oregon. We moved there in the second week of February 2017.

The start of Donald Trump’s Presidency in 2017 was a disgrace and a disaster.

As Tanya and I transitioned to living in Portland, the U.S.A. was transitioning to life under the Presidency of Donald Trump. His Presidency did not start well. He was unhappy with the news media reporting of the small crowd size at his Inauguration. Two days later, his Inauguration was overshadowed by the Women’s March, the largest peaceful protest in U.S history, according to political scientists. It was prompted by Trump’s policy positions and rhetoric, which were considered misogynistic and represented a threat to women’s rights. Trump tried to impose a ban on Muslim immigrants to the U.S. which sparked big nationwide protests at airports.

Trump’s leadership was an ongoing disaster. The abrupt firing of FBI Director James Comey in May 2017. His continual lying because he did not want to acknowledge the Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump refused to accept Russian mingling in the 2016 election, although it was obvious they played a role in promoting misinformation on social media and hacking Hillary Clinton’s emails. Trump campaign had numerous meetings with the Russians in 2016 and shared campaign data with them.

In June 2017, I felt dismayed, as a climate organizer when Trump withdrew from the 2015 international Paris Climate Agreement. He promised he would do this when he ran for President. Thus, his action was no surprise, but it looked foolish with the rising threat of climate change.

On August 12, 2017, it felt like American racism and bigotry had fully bubbled up to the surface with the “Unite the Right Rally” in Charlottesville, Virginia. White nationalists and neo-Nazis showed up the evening before to protest the planned removal of the prominent statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. They repeated racist chants, such as “Jews will not replace us!” which needed to be condemned in the strongest possible terms. It seems like the election of Donald Trump allowed some Americans to think that it was ok to say openly racist things and boldly gather with like-minded people to openly express hatred.

When counter-protestors showed up in Charlottesville to stand up to the alt-right protesters, violence broke out among them. The violence peaked when a car plowed through a group of counter-protesters killing one protester, Heather Heyer, and injuring more than 19 others.

The worse part was that Donald Trump struggled to find the right words to condemn the bigotry, hatred, and violence. He tried to rebuke the neo-Nazis and alt Right. However, he then made the erroneous statement, “you also had people that were very fine people on both sides.”

Oddly, two of my Facebook friends defended maintaining the Confederate statues in the U.S, such as the Robert E. Lee statue in Charlottesville, VA. From my perspective, America was going backwards under Donald Trump. Elections have consequences. The Democratic leaning voters in 2016 who chose not to vote or voted for third party candidates helped elect Donald Trump.

Donald Trump’s awful first year showed Hillary Clinton should have been elected President.

In September 2017, Hillary Clinton wrote a book that was published and released that month called, What Happened, where she attempted to grapple with the outcome of the 2016 election. The book received mixed reviews as she shared her perspective. Some critics thought she was still “out of touch” with Americans, “not newsy.” On the other hand, I agreed with her from what she wrote in the book that Bernie’s “attacks caused lasting damage, making it harder to unify progressives in the general election and paving the way for Trump’s ‘Crooked Hillary’ campaign.”

I saw this with some of my progressive friends in November 2016 who reluctantly voted for Hillary Clinton or voted for third party candidates such as Jill Stein of the Green Party. Did Bernie Sanders play a role in handing the 2016 Presidential election to Donald Trump? Most news sources I read from November 2016 and afterwards did not think that. However, I found one source, “Bernie Sanders Voters Helped Trump Win and Here’s Proof” from Newsweek, August 23, 2017.

In that 2017 book, Hillary Clinton pointed to many factors that led to her defeat, including the Russian misinformation campaign on the internet, FBI Director James Comey re-opening the email investigation against her, the media obsession over her emails, many people distrusted her especially as the first woman running for President, Republican voter suppression efforts in states like Wisconsin, and ultimately the decisions she made as the candidate. She aimed to be as candid as she could be and let her ‘guard down’ by writing this book.

When I read What Happened in October 2017 and re-read it in November 2023, I came away thinking that Hillary Clinton would have made an effective President. She had well thought out plans for a jobs and infrastructure package, comprehensive immigration reform with a path to citizenship, bipartisan criminal justice reform, bringing down prescription drug prices, and a public option to get us closer to affordable, universal healthcare.

As she prepared to run for President in 2015, Hillary sought out the advice of Senator Elizabeth Warren on tackling issues such as student debt and financial reform. After Hillary won the Democratic nomination, she collaborated with her former Democratic opponent in the race, Senator Bernie Sanders, on plans to make college more affordable and “to write the most progressive Democratic platform in memory.”

She noted that her collaboration with Bernie on college affordability, “That kind of compromise is essential in politics if you want to get anything done.”

Even more, she had a chapter in the book on her philosophy how one makes real change in America: “Step by step, year by year, sometimes even door by door. You need to stir up public opinion and put pressure on political leaders. You have to shift policies and resources. And you need to win elections. You need to change hearts and change laws.”

She learned from her battle for health care reform in the early nineties, “Reluctance to compromise can bring defeat…If you want to get something done, you have to find a way to get to yes.”

She advises that “Progress comes from rolling up your sleeves and getting to work.”

A final tip I wanted to share from her: “I’ve always thought about policy in a very practical way. It’s how we solve problems and make life better for people. I try to learn as much as I can about the challenges people face and they work with the smartest experts I can find to come up with solutions that are achievable, affordable, and will actually make a measurable difference.”

Like Al Gore sixteen years earlier, Hillary Clinton was a very thoughtful highly qualified candidate for President who lost, I believe, because not enough Democratic leaning voters showed up to support and vote for her. In her book What Happened, I did not get the impression that Hillary wrote it to rehash the past. Rather, it felt more like a catharsis to heal from that bitter defeat and a lesson for us and future historians to understand her perspective on her 2016 election loss. At the same time, Hillary made it clear that she was moving forward with her life and doing what she could continuing to make a difference for the U.S. In the months after her defeat and Trump’s inauguration in 2017, her mantra was, “Resist, insist, persist, enlist.”

My climate change public speaking in 2017 and 2018 after moving to Portland Oregon

Like Hillary, I was not giving up after Donald Trump became President in 2017. After Tanya and I moved to Portland, Oregon in February 2017, my climate organizing was very busy that year. In early March, I was a breakout speaker at the Day of Action after the final day of the Climate Reality Training in Denver, Colorado in early March 2017. On March 13th, a Portland 6th grade teacher invited me to be a speaker at the Climate Conference that she hosted.

At the end of March 2017, I traveled back to Missouri for a week to give climate change talks to over 100 people in Jefferson City and over 60 people Truman State University in Kirksville. I worked at Crater Lake National Park as a park ranger from early May to the end of September 2017. However, I took off the month of June to attend the Citizens’ Climate Lobby (CCL) Conference in Washington D.C, where I was a breakout speaker and moderated a panel discussion. At the end of June, I attended the Climate Reality Training in Bellevue, Washington, where I was a co-breakout speaker for the conference giving a presentation on “Reaching Your Audience: Tips and Techniques from Experienced Climate Reality Leaders.”

At the end of October and beginning of November 2017, I lead a climate change CCL speaking tour across eastern, central, and southern Oregon. It was called The Oregon Stewardship Tour. For a recap, I had:

• 9 public outreach events
• 2 lobby meetings with district offices of Rep. Greg Walden
• 2 newspaper editorial board meetings
• 2 live radio interviews
• 4 published articles in Oregon newspapers featuring the tour.

After I completed that tour, the Portland Climate Reality Chapter wanted me to give a presentation about that tour for their December 2017 meeting. In that same month while visiting my parents and Tanya’s parents in St. Louis, MO, KMOX 1120 AM radio station, the most dominating radio station in the St. Louis area, invited me to the station to record a one-hour radio interview about my climate organizing.

In January 2018, I was invited to give a short climate change talk at the coastal town of Newport, Oregon. February 2018, I was a guest speaker at the Florida CCL Regional Conference in Tampa, Florida. My topic was the power of Storytelling for communicating climate change. In March 2018, the coordinator for the Greater Pacific Northwest CCL Regional Conference invited me to give two talks at this conference in Boise, Idaho. I gave a summary of my October CCL tour across eastern, central, and southern Oregon. My other talk was on the importance of storytelling for effective climate action. Both of those Boise, Idaho talks were recorded for YouTube.

From February to June 2018, I worked for Tesla Energy. My job was to engage customers at local Home Depots in Portland to schedule them to meet with Tesla solar advisors at their home to install solar panels. This was my first sales job. I became good at making sales for home solar installations. Unfortunately, Tesla laid off my supervisor and the middle management at Tesla Energy in mid-June 2018. My job was transferred to Tesla Motors. I went from a job where I set my own hours and worked near home to transferred to a new Tesla job where I had a long commute and worked long hours. The new job was not a good fit for me, so I quit in early July 2018 to focus on my climate organizing.

Discovering statistics that “Environmentalists are disproportionately awful voters.”

In early June 2018, I attended the CCL Conference and Lobby Day in Washington D.C. The first speaker at their conference and for the June monthly call was Nathanial Stinnett, Executive Director of the Environmental Voter Project.

His presentation was earth shattering for me. Stinnett showed a graph (pictured below) which clearly explained why members of Congress have made climate action a very low priority up to now. When American likely voters are polled about their top concerns, climate change and the environment appeared at the bottom of the list compared to top concerns such as national security & terrorism, economy & jobs, immigration, health care, crime & public safety, etc.

According to Stinnett: “It is really important to understand is that when so few voters prioritize climate change. It impacts policy making on all sides of the political spectrum. Democrats or Republicans are not going to pay attention to an issue that voters don’t care about.”

Looking at the graph, he pointed out that the loudest voices are those of voters because “politicians go where the votes are, or they don’t get to be politicians anymore.”

Stinnett then boiled it down to good news and bad news. As of 2018, the good news was that 20.1 million Americans are registered to vote identify climate change or other environmental issues as one of their top two priorities. These are “super-environmentalists,” as the Environmental Voter Project calls them.

The bad news? “Environmentalists are disproportionately awful voters,” Nathaniel says. Using public voting and polling data, the Environmental Voter Project breaks down the numbers of environmentalists who vote.

In the United States, we have about 200 million registered voters. In the 2014 primaries, 83 million people voted, and of those 83 million, only 4.2 million were super-environmentalists.

In the 2016 presidential election, 137 million of the 200 million possible voters showed up to the polls. Of those 137 million, only 10.1 million were super-environmentalists. That leaves 10 million super-environmentalists who were already registered to vote, but who simply didn’t find the motivation to get to the polls in an election that was decided by 77,000 votes.

The Environmental Voter Project then had volunteers who contacts those voters by phone (registered voters are public information). The volunteers tries to develop rapport with them to become regular voters who vote in every election.

After I saw Nathanial Stinnett’s information on the June CCL monthly call, I included his information in my climate change presentations on the importance of voting.

His presentation was a motivating factor for me to go door-to-door canvassing in Vancouver, Washington in September, October, and early November 2018 to urge voters to support the Washington’s 1631 ballot measure for a statewide carbon tax.

In the summer of 2018, I became involved with Renew Oregon’s efforts to urge Oregon Legislators to pass a cap and invest bill for Oregon, known then as the Clean Energy Jobs Bill. In the fall, Renew Oregon asked volunteers like me to go door to door canvassing in the Portland area to urge voters to elect Democratic incumbent Kate Brown for Governor and Democratic legislators so we could pass this bill in 2018.

My only time I did not canvass was when I took a 12-day trip to Missouri in mid-October 2018 with my wife Tanya. This was a climate change speaking tour where I gave talks at my alma mater William Jewell College, the University of Missouri in Columbia MO, St. Louis University, St. Louis Community College, and Oakville High School, where I graduated in 1987.

Overall, the Democratic Party did well in the 2018 election flipping the U.S. House of Representatives and electing a strong majority of Democrats to the Oregon Legislature as well as electing Kate Brown to a full term as Governor. The bad news was that the Washington ballot measure 1631 failed to pass. The 2018 election showed that many voters in the U.S. and Oregon were not happy with Donald Trump and the Trumpism movement. I was glad to have actively participated in that election with door-to-door canvassing in Oregon and Washington state.

Organizing for Oregon’s Cap and Invest Bill in 2019 & 2020, then came COVID 19 pandemic

After the 2018 midterm election, Oregon voters seemed to give Governor Kate Brown and the Democratic controlled Legislature a mandate to pass Renew Oregon’s Clean Energy Jobs Bill to tackle climate change on the state level. In the remaining weeks of 2018, all of 2019, and in the first two months of 2020, I organized hard with Renew Oregon to encourage Legislators to pass the Clean Energy Jobs Bill. I regularly met and wrote letters to my state legislators, I attended town halls for my legislators and other nearby Oregon legislators, attended hearings before Joint Legislative Carbon Reduction committee that held hearings on the bill and testified numerous times before the committee, and I participated in Renew Oregon’s Lobby Days and rallies at the Oregon state Capitol.

All of this was not enough because a Republican Senate walkout prevented the Clean Energy Jobs bill from passing in June 2019. After all my efforts, that loss felt like a severe blow, similar to the Presidential election losses of 2000 and 2016. After several weeks feeling depressed and laying on the couch in July 2019, I picked myself back up and started organizing with Renew Oregon again. I organized two large community events attended by over 100 people in September 2019 and January 2020. For the short Oregon Legislative session of 2020, I repeated all the same actions I mentioned in the previous paragraph of regularly writing and meeting with my legislators, attending legislative town halls, attending legislative hearings and testifying, and participating in Renew Oregon’s Lobby Days and at the Oregon State Capitol in Salem.

The same result happened at the end of February 2020, the House and Senate Republican legislators walked out to prevent the Democratic legislators from passing the bills. This was another emotional letdown for me. Whenever I faced a defeat, disappointment, or setback in the climate movement, I always found a way to dust myself off and jump on a new horse. I would just focus on a new climate organizing project. However, in March 2020, the COVID pandemic arrived, and all my climate organizing came to a standstill.

I literally did not know what to do with myself. Suddenly, I had no climate meetings scheduled, no lobby meetings or legislative hearings to attend in Salem, no public presentations to give, no meetings or events to organize, etc. Nothing. All I could do was to sit at home. Thankfully, my wife had a good paying job, so financially we were better off that many people during the 2020 COVID 19 pandemic. However, with the bitter defeat of Oregon’s cap and invest bills and no climate activities to devote my attention, I fell into a severe depression.

Making the pandemic worse for me was the leadership of President Donald Trump. I craved for a leader like Winston Churchill who would rally us to say, ‘This will take a couple of years. It will require great sacrifice for all of us, but we will get through this and prevail.’ Instead, we had a President who downplayed the virus, thought it would magically disappear by late spring or summer, did not want to test the American public, and advised people to ingest bleach to defeat the disease. It was such a heavy and bleak time to be alive.

Stay tuned for Part 7 of this blog series, Working as a U.S. Census Enumerator and the Presidential Election of 2020.

“It’s not enough to be angry when it comes to politics and the world.
We must channel our energy into action and link with others who are acting effectively.”
– Brian Ettling

This is the toughest blog for me to write. In fact, I devoted the last year to writing about my life story and blogging for years before that. I knew it was vital for me to write this blog, but I dreaded writing it. For the past 23 years, I have felt that environmentalists, climate advocates, progressives and Democratic leaning voters were not smart about electing Presidential, state level, and local candidates who would protect our environment, planet, and our democracy.

This is a very painful blog to write, but I feel like I must share but to share my story. Hopefully, someone can learn from my disappointment and letdown I felt from environmental and climate Democratic voters who allowed awful candidates for President and other elected offices win.

This was such a tough blog to write. I had so much to say that I broke up it into many parts:

Part 1, My 1980s childhood in Missouri to witnessing 2000 Presidential Election in Florida.
Part 2, my story from 2001 to 2007.
Part 3, 2007-08, Loss of a friend, Leaving the Everglades, and finding my passion for climate action.
Part 4, Healing from grief and Taking Climate Action in Oregon and Missouri 2009-2016

Part 5: My frustration and heartbreak with the 2016 Presidential Election

Initial impression and skepticism about Senator Bernie Sanders running for President

On April 30, 2015, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont announced that he was running for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States. I never heard of him. I found him to be intriguing because he has never been a registered member of the Democratic party and calls himself a “democratic socialist.”

I leaned towards supporting Hillary Clinton for President because of her experience as a former First Lady, U.S. Senator, and Secretary of State. I found her to be extremely intelligent and insightful in TV and radio interviews. I thought she would make an excellent President. At the same time, I welcomed a vigorous debate for the Democratic nomination. I had concerns that many Republicans, independent voters, and even Democratic voters strongly disliked her. Personally, I liked U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren and wanted her to run for President. If Elizabeth Warren was not running, I saw Hillary Clinton as the best Democratic candidate for President.

The first time I commented about Bernie Sanders on social media, primarily Facebook, was July 25, 2015. I found an informal online survey determining how my views matched up with Bernie Sanders vs. Hillary Clinton. For that post, I wrote, “Vote for the candidate based on issues and NOT party. Use https://www.isidewith.com/ to see who you agree with most on many of the top issues we are all discussing. I am with Bernie Sanders.”

During the summer of 2015, I worked as a park ranger at Crater Lake National Park, Oregon. After one of my ranger talks, I chatted with a couple in their 30s who were from New Hampshire. I commented that it must be interesting living there having the first Presidential primary in an election year. They responded that they had met many Presidential candidates over the years. Most recently, they shared that they met Bernie Sanders. I asked them how that went.

They replied that he had many great ideas on healthcare and other issues. However, they seemed skeptical that his ideas would pass through Congress if he was President. They asked him, ‘You have bold ideas, but how are you going to pass that through Congress?’

His response: ‘We need a revolution to elect members of Congress to get those items passed.’

They were unimpressed with his answer, and they decided not support him for President. Their response left a big impression on me that Bernie Sanders did not seem like a good candidate. After that conversation, I did not focus much on Bernie Sanders. I worked at Crater Lake until October 7th. I then drove across country from Oregon to St. Louis, Missouri. After I arrived home on October 16th, Tanya and I had to prepare for our November 1st Wedding.

Getting married in November 2015 and seeing floods in St. Louis in December 2015

Tanya and I had a fantastic wedding with over 100 people in attendance. My mother-in-law is originally from Denmark, so we had nine relatives from Denmark come to the wedding. With their visit, we had festivities happening for days afterwards.

Two weeks later, I taught a climate change 101 continuing adult education class at St. Louis Community College. November 15th to November 19th, I traveled to Washington D.C. to attend the Citizens’ Climate Lobby conference and to lobby with them for climate action at the Congressional Offices on Capitol Hill.

The only downside was that I got a frozen shoulder from handling a suitcase that was too heavy from this trip. It was very painful to move my right arm and shoulder in the remaining weeks of 2015 and beginning of 2016. Fortunately, I was able to go to a doctor who prescribed physical therapy for me. By April 2016, thankfully my shoulder healed, and I felt back to normal.

In December 2015, I was productive with my climate writing. I wrote two blogs about how I taught my climate change 101 continuing adult education classes. Plus, I wrote a blog about the toast my mother-in-law gave at Tanya and my wedding supporting my climate change work. In addition, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch published my opinion editorial, “A GOP market friendly alternative to Obama’s Clean Power Plan.” This was my third op-ed published in Post-Dispatch the past two years. Plus, I had 10 opinion commentaries published in Oregon newspapers in 2013. Thus, at the end of 2015, I felt like I was becoming a pretty good at getting op-eds for climate action published in newspapers.

As 2016 approached, I focused on blogging and writing for climate action. We had heavy rains in St. Louis starting the day after Christmas and continued for a couple of days after that. This led to severe flooding with standing water that overflowed the Mississippi, Missouri, and Meramec Rivers, causing gridlock of traffic in the St. Louis metro area.

On December 30th, my wife and in-laws drove several hours from their house in West St. Louis County to my parents’ home in South County. That drive normally takes around 30 minutes. We received our wedding photos a couple days earlier. We were excited to see the photos, but the weather, enhanced by climate change, dampened the occasion. After that experience, I wrote the blog two weeks later, “Experiencing a taste of climate change is no ‘walk in the park.’”

Receiving angry responses from friends because I was not ‘Feeling the Bern’

As I began writing my next blog, I noticed the Presidential campaign was heating up between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. On January 18, 2016, I read an article by Laura Akers, Contributor to the Huff Post, “To Those of You Who Feel the Bern.” Akers wrote,

“To my progressive and liberal friends who support Bernie Sanders: I’m starting to get a little worried. You see, I see some of you spending a lot of time talking about Hillary Clinton as though she is the enemy. And I get why you’re concerned about her in the primary. I really do…

So please, support your candidate. Sing his praises to the sky. Talk about his track record and his vision and what he could do for this country. But remember that the primary is not the whole game.

In fact, remember that this is not a game.

That this is not about your guy winning or taking your ball and going home. This is about making our country — all of it, in a lot of different arenas — a better place. And that either of them will be far better for the majority of this country than the alternative.”

The intense passion of Bernie Sanders supporters was impressive. However, I noticed rumblings among them that if he was not the Democratic nominee, they would not vote Hillary Clinton for President in November 2016. As a Florida voter in 2000 who had to contend with Ralph Nader voters, hearing these statements from Sanders supporters deeply troubled me.

When I posted this article, I received over 30 comments, many from my ranger colleague from Crater Lake, Mike Frederick. He said if Bernie was not the nominee and it was Hillary Clinton, he was not going to vote in November. He would just stay home. Other friends and I tried to discourage him from taking a strident stand, but Mike refused to listen. Mike and a few others who commented had me very troubled about the upcoming 2016 election.

On January 25, 2016, Paul Starr wrote a piece for Politico that I concurred, “I Get Sanders’ Appeal. But He’s Not a Credible President.” The subhead was, “Democrats have a choice between a symbolic candidacy and a real one. They should choose the real one.”

He added, “(Sanders’) campaign has been waging is a symbolic one. For example, the proposals he has made for free college tuition and free, single-payer health care suggest what might be done if the United States underwent radical change. Those ideas would be excellent grist for a seminar. But they are not the proposals of a candidate who is serious about getting things done as president—or one who is serious about getting elected in the country we actually live in.”

Like the New Hampshire voters I chatted with the previous summer, I was skeptical Bernie Sanders could implement his grand ideas. After I posted this article, I received nearly 100 comments on Facebook. Many of the comments were from strong Bernie supporters angry with me that I was not supporting him.

This was the response I wrote to them, “If you think Bernie can win the Presidency, well I am from Missouri. ‘Show Me’ that he can. Instead arguing with me on Facebook, I need to see you taking action: working his phone banks, knocking on doors, getting your friends & family to the polls during the primaries, helping to raise money, putting the signs on your lawn, etc. doing whatever you can to make it happen. Don’t just quote me poll numbers and tell me he’s the better candidate. Show me how you are going to make it happen. I need to see action from you.

Again, I am going to support whatever Democratic nominee that emerges. I like Bernie and Hillary. Thus, I am not your opposition. Show me that you can form a coalition stronger than the Republicans that will help get all of Bernie’s ideas passed.

Show me that you have a strong enough network when the GOP decides they will obstruct everything Pres. Sanders want to do, just like they did with Obama starting in 2009.

Show me that you will have enough strength, numbers and energy to overcome the Tea Party, Koch Bros, NRA, ALEC, etc in the 2018 mid-terms. Again, I am not your opposition. They are.

We cannot let a GOP President come into office in 2017 and take a giant step backwards on climate action, the EPA clean power plan, a woman’s right to choose, gun control, clean water for Flint & all of us, overextending ourselves with a war on ISIS in the Middle East, etc. We must find ways to continue to work together otherwise, otherwise the GOP will win.

Again, I need to see results from you in the primaries. Now get to work, show me results, and I will then be happy to join your bandwagon.”

Reading those Facebook exchanges on my wall in 2016, I was struck by the amount of time that hardcore Bernie supporters who were Facebook friends wanted to debate me. As I wrote above, I wanted to see that they were actively supporting Bernie by phone banking, knocking on doors, organizing events, etc. One Facebook friend, Videns Veritatis responded, “Should I send you my receipts and itinerary? Maybe after Iowa and NH you’ll be more convinced.”

Cathy Cowen Becker replied, “Happy to! I am phone banking and attending Bernie meetings weekly.” Yes, if one looked on Cathy’s Facebook page, they saw she was active in Bernie’s campaign. At the same time, Videns and Cathy would write very long comments on my wall defending Bernie and attacking Hillary. I found them to be very passionate, but not very persuasive.

This discussion turned into an endless rabbit hole of Bernie vs. Hillary debate. I started receiving hateful and derogatory comments because I expressed skepticism about Bernie on my Facebook wall. I deleted over 10 Facebook friends pelting me with nasty comments because I preferred Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders. I tried to explain numerous times to my Bernie friends that I was very alarmed by all the strong Bernie supporters or ‘Bernie Bros’ saying that they would not vote if he was not the candidate in November. I shared my story about Florida in 2000 and not wanting to relive that again.

The nastiness of the Bernie vs. Hillary debate caused me to try to post a more subtle but positive message on social media. I posted photos of me with my earthball with quotes I created such as, “Don’t tear other people down. Instead, aspire to bring love and hope into the world.”

“We are all angry at the gov’t, Wall Street, and the 1%. Let’s link together and channel that energy into effective peaceful action.”

“Those who scream the loudest are not always correct. Make sure you are also listening to the people who are calm, thoughtful and reasonable.”

By February 2016, I was burned out of the Bernie vs. Hillary debate. No, I did not ‘Feel the Bern.’ As I joked back then, I felt ‘Berned Out.’ I re-focused my energy on how I could be effective for climate action. I called numerous friends in the climate movement to attend the February 2016 St. Louis Chapter of Citizens’ Climate Lobby and 16 people showed up for this meeting.

Why I supported Hillary Clinton for President in 2016 over Bernie Sanders

In March 2016, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch endorsed Hillary Clinton for President on March 6th, just one week before the Missouri Presidential primary on March 15th. I voted for her in the primary. I posted on Facebook about the Post-Dispatch endorsement and that I voted for Hillary, which created more scorn from Bernie supporters following me. They had a strong visceral dislike of her. When I tried to explain her positions on trade, fracking, campaign contributions, climate change, etc, they did not want to hear it. I always stated I would support Bernie if he was the Democratic nominee, but he was not my preferred choice in the primary election.

The negativity and hostility of the Bernie supporters scared me in the spring of 2016. I did not see how this was going to settle down for the 2016 election if Hillary became the nominee. After voting for Hillary in the primary, I focused on giving climate change speeches for South County Toastmasters three weeks in a row from March 23rd to April 6th.

In April 2016, the New York Times published an article, “The Right Baits the Left to Turn Against Hillary Clinton.” MSNBC then reported on that article, “When the right goes after Clinton from the left.” The subhead stated, “A variety of far-right groups, including Karl Rove’s, are pushing a bizarre new attack: Hillary Clinton isn’t liberal enough.” This created more angry comments when I posted those articles on my Facebook wall. I responded to one acrimonious comment with the example of climate and environmental writer Bill McKibben. In that New York Times article, it was noted that McKibben grabbed an attack of Hillary from a right-wing blog without realizing source that grabbed. Thus, again, it is important for respected activists like McKibben, double check their sources for tweeting and posting.

Several of my climate friends were swooning over Bernie Sanders because he wanted to ban fracking, he claimed to not take campaign money from fossil fuel corporations, he intended to phase out of nuclear power, and he supported a carbon tax. However, climate and energy writer David Roberts was unimpressed with both candidates, but especially Bernie Sanders. After watching them in a Presidential Debate, he wrote a Vox article, “The Clinton-Sanders exchange on climate change was a dumpster fire.”

Like me, Roberts felt that “Sanders rejects the notion that there might be trade-offs in climate policy, but the next president is likely to face many.” Sanders sounded great on paper, but I did not think he is realistic in effectively implementing his policies.

The longer the campaign wore on, but the less I liked Bernie Sanders. He seemed more like fingernails on a chalkboard. I could not wait for the primary campaign to be over. Bernie Sanders and his supporters with rightwing help painted Clinton as corrupt, ineffective, and not a progressive. As one person commented on my Facebook feed, “Clinton is so far to the right she could have just as well run as a Republican.”

I was not having it. I pushed back, “I don’t buy that for a second. Hillary is strongly pro-choice, favors equal pay, campaign finance reform, strong action on clean energy and climate change, increasing the minimum wage, LBGT rights, affordable college education, continuing the EPA Clean Power Plan, ending voter I.D. laws and restrictions, immigration reform, etc. None of the Republican candidates are in favor of these things. Anyone who says that there is no difference between Clinton and the Republicans is either confused or is kidding themselves. There is too much at stake in this election to think otherwise.

Even more, I heard the same thing as a Florida voter about George W. Bush vs. Al Gore in the 2000 election: ‘Tweedle-dee vs. Tweedledumb.’ Eight years of George W. Bush was a huge setback for climate policy, foreign policy, women’s rights, etc. I think you really need to sit down and think through what you are saying.”

As I exchanged messages with the Bernie supporters, one even called me the ‘Democratic establishment.’ I found that to be odd because I had never attended a meeting for the Democratic Party and I was not that involved in politics at that point, except for lobbying the offices of my U.S. Representative and Senators to act on climate. My impression of Bernie supporters was that if you were not 100% behind Bernie, there was something wrong with you. Then you received their full wrath, anger, and insults.

One person wrote to me, “I like you, Brian, but sometimes in your wonderful pursuit of the ideal I think you may sometimes lose grasp of the real.”

Or lecturing me with, “We’re running out of time. ‘Pragmatic incremental change’ just doesn’t cut it.” Not realizing that the President Barak Obama in 2016 was a pragmatist. He got what he could accomplished having a hostile Republican Congress for most of his Presidency. I remember reading he would direct his staff in negotiating with Congress, ‘a half a loaf is good.’ In other words, he was happy to get what he could making deals with Congress and the GOP.

In 2016, I was unimpressed by the methods of persuasion by Bernie supporters. As I remarked to one of his most loyal supporters in February,

“If Bernie followers want to truly succeed, they must build a winning coalition. They must build a strong majority. The Bernie-or-bust mentality and extremely hostile tone I have seen when I and others express doubt Bernie or support for Hillary is very disconcerting. I am becoming more convinced that Bernie is going to lose the nomination because his supporters could not effectively reach out to moderate and Hillary leaning voters. It will be close and tight but the lack of civility I have seen is going to come back to bite Bernie supporters in the long run. In the summer of 2015, I was leaning towards Bernie but I got turned off by the Bernie-or-bust over the winter. This is something that should give you pause. I like Bernie Sanders. I think he is a great guy. However, I got turned-off by Bernie’s followers. I do want to wish you and Bernie all the success for the primaries. Let’s do all we can to come together for the general.”

My concern was the progressive critics of Hillary had made up their minds in the spring of 2016. With all this bitterness, I did not see how they would vote for her in the general election. Fortunately, Hillary Clinton secured the Democratic nomination for President on June 7, 2016. I happily posted about it, and friends that disliked her responded with the typical snide comments.

Yes, I was probably on a fool’s errand. However, I wanted to talk friends off the ledge that if Bernie was not their candidate they would not vote in November 2016. I thought it was too risky to take a stand like that when the Republican candidate was Donald Trump who looked like he could do a lot of damage to our country and democracy if he won the Presidency.

To me, it did not feel like Ralph Nader voters in 2000 and Bernie Sanders voters in 2016 understood coalition building. It’s one of the weaknesses of the U.S. style of democracy for voting separately for a President and members of Congress. In a parliamentary system of democracy, such as Canada, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, Latvia, the Netherlands, and New Zealand, a voter votes for the member of Parliament and the party that they are affiliated. The party that has a majority in parliament then selects a Prime Minister and forms a government. If that party does not have a majority, they form a coalition with political parties in the parliament who have somewhat similar agendas and then select a Prime Minister and a cabinet.

My personal opinion is that it too many Americans feel like if they just vote a Presidential candidate they like, their work is finished. They fail to understand that they need vote for the same political party in Congress as the President to increase the likelihood that the Congress will then pass the President’s agenda. If a Green Party candidate like Ralph Nader is elected President or a Democratic socialist like Bernie Sanders is elected President, but then the American voters select a Congress with Republican majorities in the House and Senate, I am skeptical a President Nader or Sanders would be able to accomplish much. That was my opinion in 2000 and 2016. I still feel that way today.

Bit of Climate Change Comedy among the heaviness of the 2016 Presidential Campaign

In spite the friction I had with friends who were Bernie supporter in 2016, I had a very productive spring and summer as a climate organizer. On April 6th, I was voted “Best Speaker” by my fellow South County Toastmasters for my speech, “Hey U.S.A! Let’s Win the Clean Energy Race!” The St. Louis Post-Dispatch published my op-ed that I submitted to them for April 22, 2016, “Earth Day and our national parks calls for GOP climate action.”

Then in mid- April 2016, something unexpected and magical happened. I was starting packing up my belongings for the summer when the phone rang at my parents’ house. My mom informed me that ‘someone from Los Angeles wants to chat with you.’

I picked up the phone and the person identified himself as a staff member of Comedy Central’s Tosh.o. We had a friendly conversation where he asked me about my background such as “The Climate Change Comedian,” and making the YouTube videos with my parents and Tanya. He then got to the point: “We would like to fly you out to Los Angeles to appear on a taping Comedy Central’s Tosh.o next week to be interviewed by our host Daniel Tosh. Would you be interested?’

“Yes!” as I serendipitously jumped at this opportunity. The show wanted my mom, Fran Ettling, to also appear on the taping. Thus, I asked her if she was interested, and she was. The producers of the show felt bad that when they found out that Tanya and I planned a honeymoon trip to Augusta, Missouri that week in April. They offered to fly her to Los Angeles and she accepted.

The three of us had a blast flying out to Los Angeles over a 24-hour period for this trip. The host Daniel Tosh turned out to be very gracious to my mom, Tanya and me. The taping of the show with Daniel Tosh was a lot of fun. After we flew back to St. Louis, we could casually mention it to family and friends. However, we did not have permission to announce on social media about it until they informed me when it would air. The show finally aired on the Comedy Channel on August 2, 2016, Climate Change Comedian – Web Redemption Tosh.o.

Appearing on Comedy Central’s Tosh.o is a highlight of my life. It was a dream come true for me to talk about climate change using humor on national TV to be seen by millions of people.

The menacing and odious atmosphere of the Presidential Campaign in the fall of 2016

Through the spring, summer, and fall, the 2016 Presidential campaign between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump became more unsettling for me. As a Presidential candidate since June 2015, Donald Trump made endless bizarre statements, such as calling Senator John McCain, who was a prisoner of war in Vietnam for almost 5 years, “not a war hero.” He responded with insults to the Kahn Gold Star family who spoke at the Democratic convention who lost their son in Iraq while serving in the military.

When Trump mocked New York Times reporter with a disability, he looked like an insane person that belonged nowhere near the White House. That should have ended Trump’s chances to get elected as President then, but it only got worse. The Russians hacked Hillary Clinton’s emails and released them before the Democratic convention. Bernie Sanders supporters were still upset he was not the Democratic nominee. They protested inside and outside the convention.

In October 2016, it was shocking to read “At least 24 women accused the Republican presidential nominee, Donald Trump, of inappropriate sexual behavior in multiple incidents spanning the last 30 years.” Then came the infamous Access Hollywood tapes where Trump made lewd and inappropriate comments about kissing women and grabbing them by the genitals.

For me, that was not even the lowest part of the campaign. The most disgusting part of the 2016 Presidential campaign was when Trump invited Bill Clinton’s accusers of sexual abuse to sit in the family area close to the center of Presidential debate. The four women — Juanita Broaddrick, Paula Jones, Kathleen Willey and Kathy Shelton — sat in the audience alongside other ticketed members. It stunk as an obvious stunt to try to throw Hillary Clinton off their game and to deflect from Donald Trump’s glaring issues.

It is possible Bill Clinton may have been inappropriate with these women. If so, he should be held accountable. To me, it felt like Donald Trump used and abused them again as pawns and objects. He did not care about them. Even more, I was very disappointed with those four women. I would have had more respect for them if they would have held a press conference before the debate laying out their cases against Bill Clinton. Then they should have stated that Donald Trump invited them to the debate, but they refused to participate in his game. In their thirst for revenge against what they saw as a sexual predator (Clinton), these women ended up helping another sexual predator (Trump) with zero interests in securing more rights for women.

Trump’s mentor was attorney Roy Cohn. He was an American lawyer who became well known for as Senator Joseph McCarthy’s chief counsel during the Army–McCarthy hearings in 1954. In 1973, Trump hired Cohn to defend him and his father, Fred Trump, Sr. Donald and Fred were sued by the federal government for discriminating against black renters looking for apartments in their buildings in New York City. Cohn taught Trump when someone punches you, punch back 100 times harder, to be a counter puncher. Cohn advised Trump to “never settle” to never admit when he was wrong or made a mistake. These were deranged attributes that were very dangerous for a man to be power craven to want to be President of the United States.

The warning signs should have been clear to a large majority of Americans that Donald Trump was not fit to be President. Yet, he remained within striking distance in the polls. In October and into November, I kept watching the aggregate polls from fivethirtyeight.com hoping for reassurance that Donald Trump would lose. Their final poll had Hillary Clinton with over a 70% chance of winning the White House, with Donald Trump less than a 30% chance.

Other news media were even more bullish on Hillary Clinton’s chances. Days before the election, the Independent had the headline, “Survey finds Hillary Clinton has ‘more than 99% chance’ of winning election over Donald Trump.” On election day, the New York Times reported, “Clinton has an 85% chance to win.” Reuters forecasted, “Clinton has 90 percent chance of winning.”

I took solace reading these articles about polling in the weeks leading up to the election. Yet, the 2000 election, plus the negative interactions I had with Bernie supporters in 2016, had a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach that Hillary Clinton might not win. I felt especially nervous on October 28th when FBI Director James Comey announced to Congress that his agency found Hillary Clinton’s emails in a probe into former Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., then-husband to Clinton aide Huma Abedin. Those emails Comey wrote to Congress appeared “pertinent” to the investigation into Clinton’s personal email server. He said the FBI was reviewing them.

I remember hearing this news on the radio and reading it on the internet at my in-laws’ house. My wife, her parents, and I did not know what to say. We all felt deeply troubled this could cost Hillary Clinton in a close election. To this day, many Clinton staffers and even Hillary Clinton felt it was a crucial blow that doomed her campaign in the days leading up to the election.

Still, because I thought she was the strongest candidate for climate action. Even more, people I deeply admire such as climate writer David Roberts and former Vice President Al Gore thought she was the best candidate in the November 2016 general election. Thus, I proudly voted for Hillary Clinton for President on November 8, 2016.

Responding the horrendous news that Donald Trump won the 2016 Presidential election

My wife and I watched the election results at her parents’ house on November 8, 2016. I was in a state of disbelief for days. I did not sleep for a couple of nights. Late that night, I wrote on Facebook, ‘There goes many years of my climate organizing down the drain.’

I felt like electing Donald Trump was a huge step backwards for U.S. climate policy. I could not decide if 2000 or 2016 felt worse.

The good news is that my friends on social media encouraging me to continue forward with my climate organizing. Yes, I intended to move past the election results. I planned to fly to Washington D.C. in a week to attend the November Citizens’ Climate Lobby (CCL) conference and lobby Congressional offices on November 15th, just one week after the election.

In the hours after the November 8th election, I exchanged messages with Cathy Orlando, the Director of Citizens’ Climate Lobby Canada. In September, I made plans to attend the CCL Canada conference happening at the end of November in Ottawa, Canada. I had friend who attended the previous Canadian CCL conferences and lobby days on Parliament Hill. They shared with me afterwards how they loved attending and lobbying in Canada. Plus, I really admired Cathy, so I was determined to attend. Somehow, Cathy and I exchanged messages about my April 2016 Toastmasters speech, “Hey U.S.A! Let’s Win the Clean Energy Race.”

Cathy then asked me if I could modify this speech and give it for the CCL Canada Conference. I was thrilled and honored that she invited me to be a guest speaker for this conference. Tanya then let me know that she wanted to attend the conference with me. This was peak experience for Tanya and me to travel to Canada for me to speak at this international conference and lobby Canadian members of Parliament to prioritize climate policies.

My presentation for this CCL Canada conference went great. I modified my April 2016 Toastmasters speech for this conference to be called “Hey North America! Let’s Win the Clean Energy Race!” Thankfully, the organizers of this conference live streamed and video taped all the presentations. Thus, later on, I uploaded this presentation to YouTube.

I recently heard Jane Fonda quote Greta Thunberg on a Climate One podcast released on September 29, 2016. Jane Fonda remarked, “Greta Thunberg said, ‘don’t go looking for hope. Look for action and hope will come.’ And she’s right.”

I overcame the bitter loss of the 2016 Presidential election by lobbying, public speaking, and taking action. My friend, former Crater Lake Park Ranger, and climate journalist Brian Kahn wrote an article featuring me for ClimateCentral.org, one of my favorite websites. The story, “National Parks Are At the Front Lines of Climate Communication” was published on November 14, 2016. It focused on how a greater number of park rangers are talking with park visitors about climate change. Brian reported on how I talk about climate change as a seasonal park ranger at Crater Lake National Park. Brian quoted me saying,

“The reality of climate change is facing us in national parks. You can’t deny it or go around it so it’s important to engage visitors no matter what.”

On December 6, 2016, I was live on St. Louis radio show Earthworms at FM KDHX 88.1. Host Jean Ponzi interviewed me about my climate change advocacy, especially my recent lobbying in Washington D.C. and Ottawa Canada for Citizens’ Climate Lobby.

The November 2016 Presidential election was a huge setback for climate action. However, as the Donald Trump Presidency approached in 2017, I did not let it stop me. I was determined to do more organizing, public speaking, and writing to reduce the threat of climate change.

Stay tuned for Part 6: The disaster of Donald Trump’s Presidency and my climate action during the Trump Presidency, 2017-2020.

“Yes, we do need hope…But the one thing we need more than hope is action.
Once we start to act, hope is everywhere. So instead of looking for hope, look for action.
Then, and only then, hope will come.”
– Climate Activist Greta Thunberg at her 2018 TED Talk

This is the toughest blog for me to write. In fact, I devoted the last year to writing about my life story and blogging for years before that. I knew it was vital for me to write this blog, but I dreaded writing it. For the past 23 years, I have felt that environmentalists, climate advocates, progressives and Democratic leaning voters were not smart about electing Presidential, state level, and local candidates who would protect our environment, planet, and our democracy.

This is a very painful blog to write, but I feel like I must share but to share my story. Hopefully, someone can learn from my disappointment and letdown I felt from environmental and climate Democratic voters who allowed awful candidates for President and other elected offices win.

The first post in this blog series, My 1980s childhood in Missouri to witnessing 2000 Presidential Election in Florida. Part 2, my story from 2001 to 2007. For Part 3, my life in 2007, Loss of a friend, Leaving the Everglades, and finding my passion for climate action.

Part 4: Healing from grief and Taking Climate Action in Oregon and Missouri 2009-2016

Finding Healing from Grief on Hawaii’s Big Island in October and early November 2008

In late May of 2008, I returned to work at Crater Lake National Park for the summer. Soon after I arrived in the park, I mentioned to my superiors that I wanted to give a ranger program about climate change. My Crater Lake supervisor, Eric Anderson, and the lead interpretive ranger, David Grimes, supported and encouraged my idea. I just did not feel like I knew enough or was brave enough to do such a program. It would take me three more years before I felt courageous and had enough knowledge to give my climate change evening program at Crater Lake.

During summer of 2008, I focused on my ranger programs, including adding a sunset guided ranger hike up Watchman’s Peak. I was still in a fog and feeling raw from losing my mentor Steve Robinson the previous October. In autumn 2008, Eric Anderson persuaded me to give ranger programs to the school groups visiting Crater Lake during the Fall Classroom at Crater Lake program. The school groups ranged from 5th grade to high school.

I quickly discovered giving ranger talks to school groups was not my thing. The students were frequently rambunctious since they were outside of their school for the day. I could relate because I was a boisterous brat when I was a kid, especially on school field trips. Many of the teachers were either overly demanding or aloof. At the same time, I saw fantastic teachers in action the way they successfully guided their students. I marveled at the great teachers and I doubted I had the adept skills to manage a classroom like them. The adult chaperones were often annoying. I would ask the students a question and the adults would jump in to answer.

Crater Lake is so beautiful, and we had a lot of gorgeous weather that fall. However, I could not wait for my commitment for Classroom at Crater Lake to be over. I still grieved over the loss of my friend and mentor Steve Robinson. I needed to go somewhere to do some healing. Fortunately, my friends John and Jeanette Broward invited me to come visit them on the Big Island of Hawaii. They were close friends of Steve and could relate the emptiness I felt at that time.

I visited the Big Island of Hawaii for 8 days around the end of October and the beginning of November 2008. During the trip, Jeanette told me that Native Hawaiians believed that each of the islands has a theme. They thought the theme of the Big Island was a place of healing. The Big Island had tranquil Pacific Ocean beaches, imposing volcanic mountains that destroyed yet created more land, and towering waterfalls on the Hilo side. If one was open to it, the Big Island was a place that can provide renewal for one’s heart, mind and soul.

That warmed my heart to hear that. John and Jeanette lived in Volcano, which is right next to Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. John was a law enforcement ranger at the national park. On his day off, John took me hiking inside the national park for the day. During our hike, he told me that he had a recent dream where he had a conversation with Steve. In the dream, Steve was smiling and laughing. He told John that he was happy and doing great.

I really made the most of this trip. John and Jeanette took me to go snorkeling at a coral reef not far from their house. I tried parasailing and surfing near Kailua-Kona. I was terrible at surfing. It felt like a huge life victory when I was able to successfully stand up one time on the surfboard and ride a small wave. I visited all the national park sites on the island that were sacred heritage sites for the Native Hawaiians.

John and Jeanette arranged for me to go birdwatching with Jay Robinson, one of the top birding experts working at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. He showed me endemic native colorful Hawaiian bird species such as the ‘I‘iwi, ‘Apapene, ‘Amakihi, ‘Oma’o, ‘Elepaio, Nēnē (Hawaiian goose), and other birds.

In my own exploring, I drove to the southernmost point of the Big Island, South Point Park. This is the southernmost point of the U.S. It’s one of the windiest places in the U.S. Thus, it was great to go there feel the winds, the big jagged cliffs overlooking the ocean and see the multiple wind turbines providing a portion of the electricity to the island.

I journeyed to the far northern part of the Big Island to see the Pololū Valley Lookout. I hiked down the tall sloping ridge to the beach and nearly had the whole area to myself as I walked. I made the most of this vacation and exploration around the Big Island. In my state of traveling bliss and soaking up the healing spirit of the Big Island, my friend John asked me a question that reminded me that I had a role to play as a responsible citizen.

When I hiked with John at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, he inquired, “Did you vote by mail in the upcoming Presidential election?”

With the loss of Steve and my bitterness I still felt over the outcomes of the 2000 and 2004 elections, I admitted to John that I had not voted. John was flabbergasted and was disappointed with me that I had not voted. There was a lot of excitement across the U.S. that Barack Obama could win and become America’s first Black President. I shared with John that after what I experienced in the previous Presidential elections, I just could not get my hopes up. I was rooting for Barack Obama. I liked his message of ‘Hope and Change.’ I just felt hopeless at that point.

The Big Island provided the healing and renewal I needed. John’s question tugged at me that I needed to return my involvement in politics to take care of our natural environment and planet.

My long seasonal job at Crater Lake in 2009 with lots of traveling in between

For that winter of 2008-09, I returned to my hometown of St. Louis, Missouri to visit my parents, sisters, and their families. I got a seasonal job working at REI in mid November helping customers in the store shopping for holiday gifts and outdoor items for winter vacations. Sadly, the Great Recession dominated the economy in January 2009. The seasonal employees that were hired for the Christmas shopping season, such as me, were the first employees laid off.

I needed another job. The Spring Classroom at Crater Lake started in mid-March, and they needed rangers to guide the school programs. The manager of the Classroom at Crater Lake Program, Linda Hilligoss, was happy to have me return to Classroom at Crater Lake.

During the drive from St. Louis, MO to Crater Lake National Park in Oregon, I visited friends. I stayed with my college friend Brent Isaacs and his parents in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I met with Tess, a former Crater Lake boat captain, in Phoenix, Arizona. I then drove west I-10 and camped for a couple of nights in Joshua Tree National Park, California. It was a fun park to hike and explore. The Joshua trees were shorter and more stubby looking desert palm trees, not much taller than me. They still had a charming and majestic quality that was fun to take photos of them.

I then spent several nights visiting my friend Cherie Barth at Sequoia National Park. I knew Cherie from when we both worked in Flamingo in Everglades National Park years ago. It was magical to spend a couple of days hiking among the huge sequoia trees with their bright orange bark and their massive girth that seemed to extend to the heavens.

I arrived at Crater Lake on March 20th. I had a great spring working at Classroom at Crater Lake. I enjoyed leading the snowshoe hikes for the school groups. The snowshoe hikes were much more fun than the fall programs. I told the adult chaperones that if they jumped in to answer the students’ questions that they would be pelted with snowballs from the students. A couple of times when the adults jumped in to answer, the students grabbed their snowballs. They were getting ready to cock their arms to just pummel the adult with the snowballs. I then stepped in to save the adult’s life and they got the point to be quiet to let the kids answer the questions.

During the snowshoe hikes, I found a big snowy hill for the students to slide down. I always went first to show the students how to slide down the snow. Several occasions, the teachers and adults could not help themselves and slid down the snow. At the end the of program, I would line up the students at the top of a tall snowy embankment. I took off my snowshoes and was about 20 yards away from them. I stood on the paved road at Rim Village and dared them to hit me with a snowball. It was a fabulous workout to dodge the snowballs. The students were hilarious trying to hit me. One time a kid yelled at me, “Today is your funeral, mister!”

Because I planned to work a long season at Crater Lake from mid-March to the end of September, Crater Lake National Park had to lay me off for two weeks at the last week of May and the first week of June. This prevented the park from exceeding the number of hours and weeks I could work as a seasonal employee for the federal government during a fiscal year. For this two-week vacation, I decided to visit the national parks in Washington State.

For those two weeks, I camped and visited Olympic, North Cascades, and Mt. Rainier National Parks. I basically had sunny and warm weather the whole time. It was perfect weather for sightseeing, photography, hiking, and admiring the natural beauty of those places. Plus, on the drive up to Washington State, I stayed with my friends Gary and Melissa Martin and their daughter Shelby in Salem, Oregon. We visited Silver Falls State Park, which is less than an hour drive east of Salem. We spent the day hiking on the Trail of the Ten Falls. This is a loop trail over 7 miles long, with four water falls one can hike behind. The waterfalls are stunning, ranging from 27 to 178 feet. This was a state park that was so beautiful that it should be a national park.

In the second week of June, I returned to Crater Lake National Park to give my ranger programs for the summer. During that summer, I became lifelong friends with fellow seasonal park rangers Graham Hetland and Aubrey Shaw. They lived permanently in Ashland, Oregon where they attended Southern Oregon University. Graham’s mother lived in Ashland. They needed someone to housesit for his mom, Barbara, for the winter. Barbara planned to go on a cross country road trip in a RV. Thus, they wanted someone to watch her home and her friendly cat, Poppy. I planned to return to St. Louis, but they persuaded me to housesit for their mom.

Grabbing “Climate Change Comedian” Title while living in Ashland, Oregon in the fall 2009

I moved from Crater Lake to Ashland, Oregon in October 2009. Ashland is a beautiful small city in southern Oregon nestled right against the Siskiyou Mountains. The leaves turned brilliant autumn colors while I was there. The weather had ideal Indian summer days while slowly getting cooler as the calendar immersed into fall. It was fun to walk around Ashland for exercise and take pictures of Ashland experiencing autumn. At the same time, I found myself restless. I wanted to pursue my climate change calling, but not knowing what to do about it.

I decided to go to Southern Oregon University (SOU) and meet with Dr. Greg Jones, an SOU professor and climatologist. He specializes in the study of climate structure and suitability for viticulture. Specifically, he studies how climate variability and climate change influence grapevine growth, wine production, and quality. At that time, I was interested in attending grad school to learn more about climate change. I was eager to see if he had any advice for me. Even more, I was curious to see if maybe I could get my master’s degree studying under him at SOU.

My meeting with Dr. Jones did not go well. I shared my background of seeing climate change in the Everglades, plus watching the documentary about Al Gore, An Inconvenient Truth. He immediately let me know that he did not like Al Gore. He did not think Gore was a good spokesperson to explain to the public about climate change. That did not sit well with me because it was Al Gore and his advocacy that brought me to meet with him in his office. I left this awkward meeting I not knowing what my next step would be to pursue my climate change vision.

A few days later, I visited my friend Naomi Eklund who lived in Ashland for advice. She pressed me on what exactly did I want to do with my life. She kept pushing me harder. Finally, I snapped, “Fine! If I could do anything, I would like to be ‘The Climate Change Comedian!”

Naomi was a tough audience, but she nearly fell out of her fell out of her chair laughing. She responded: ‘That’s perfect! I want you to go home and grab that website domain name now, www.climatechangecomedian.com.’

I went home and did that. Barbara soon sent news that she did not like RVing across country. She decided to return to her home where I was housesitting in Ashland in mid November. When she moved back home, it felt awkward living in her house. Around Thanksgiving, Barbara announced that she did not want to share her home with me. My parents just moved into a new home in St. Louis. They wanted me to return home to spend the winter with them.

On December 10, 2009, I left Ashland, Oregon for a cross country drive back to St. Louis, Missouri. Like my previous road trips that year, I made the most of this trip. I visited a friend in downtown San Francisco and explored the city for a day. I then stopped by the beach in Monterey, California. Next I achieved a life goal seeing the picturesque Bixby Creek Bridge, just a few miles south of Monterey. Driving down the coast on Hwy 101, I spent the night in San Simeon, CA. The next day I achieved another dream to see Hearst Castle. From there, I drove across California to visit a friend in Death Valley National Park. From Death Valley, I traveled to Las Vegas to spend the night and walk around the city for the evening.

My next stop on this cross country trip was to visit my friends Steve and Melissa in Flagstaff, Arizona. Steve worked as a back country law enforcement ranger at Grand Canyon National Park. While chatting with Steve during a hike of a box canyon just south of Sedona, he asked me if I would be interested in hiking to the bottom of the Grand Canyon during this trip. I am always up for an adventure, so I said, “Yes!” The next thing I know, we were at the store buying groceries for this hike and Steve lent me his backpack and other gear. I hiked from Canyon Village on the south rim to the bottom of the Grand Canyon on December 20th. Steve arranged for me to spend that night at the Phantom Ranch Ranger Station at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.

I hiked back up from bottom of the Grand Canyon on December 21st. On December 22nd, I started the long drive to St. Louis. I faced winter weather snowing conditions driving up I-44 in Missouri on the afternoon of Christmas Eve. However, I arrived at my parents’ new house in St. Louis that evening to celebrate Christmas with my family just in time. After I settled into their home for the winter, I had to figure my next step with this “Climate Change Comedian” title.

During that winter in St. Louis, Naomi advised me to fully develop my website and create my own climate change PowerPoint that I would use for my presentations. Early in 2010, I developed my first climate change PowerPoint, “Let’s Have Fun Getting Serious about Climate Change.” I showed that PowerPoint to friends and family in the St. Louis. A family friend helped me launch my climatechangecomedian.com website that is still active to this day.

Finding my groove as a climate change speaker

During the early months of 2010, my sisters in St. Louis wanted me to speak at my nieces’ and nephews’ schools. My younger sister first booked me to speak at my nephew Sam’s second grade class in St. Charles, Missouri on February 5, 2010. This was my first presentation outside of working as a ranger in the national parks.

For this presentation, I brought my inflatable Earth Ball, which is my symbol for caring and appreciating our planet. I used an Earth Ball for years in my Everglades and Crater Lake ranger talks. The symbol of me holding an Earth Ball is the image I use for my website and all the social media platforms I use (Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn). The young students liked seeing the inflatable Earth during my talk.

Exactly one month later, March 5, 2010, I spoke at oldest niece and goddaughter Rachel’s seventh grade class in St. Louis. This talk was a breakthrough for me because this was the first time that I spoke about climate change in a public talk. I showed the average annual snowpack had gone down over the last several decades at Crater Lake. I defined global warming as humans trapping more carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. As a result, the average temperature of the planet has increased since the Industrial Revolution started in 1880.

I then talked about how climate change could cause problems with less snowpack, greater heat waves, and sea level rise. I then urged them to reduce the threat of climate change by recycling, unplugging voltage vampire appliances in their homes, and turning down the heat by putting on a sweater or snuggle blanket. Hopefully, this message on climate change somehow planted a seed in the minds with these students. I will always be grateful that my older sister, my oldest niece, her classmates, and her school gave me this opportunity to talk about climate change for the first time in a public talk.

At Crater Lake National Park that summer, I gave my climate change PowerPoint informally to some of my ranger friends one evening and I shared it with a few other ranger friends. During my cross-country drive from Crater Lake National Park, Oregon to St. Louis, Missouri in November 2010, I showed this PowerPoint twice. I shared it to some ranger friends in Page, Arizona and to my college friend Brent in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. These friends gave me some helpful tips and feedback to improve my talk.

In 2011, things started happening for me as a climate change advocate. After I returned to St. Louis for the winter of 2010-11, I wanted to improve my skills as a public speaker and climate change communicator. I joined a local Toastmasters group, South County Toastmasters, in January 2011. Over the next five years, I gave 20 climate change speeches to this local Toastmasters Club. My fellow Toastmasters voted for me as “The Best Speaker” for 8 of these speeches.

In March 2011, I had the fortuitous luck to be offered a job to work at the St. Louis Science Center’s temporary Climate Change exhibit. This was one of the few climate change museum exhibits in the United States at that time. While working there, I met St. Louis businessman Larry Lazar. We decided to co-found the St. Louis Climate Reality Meet Up in December 2011 (now known as Climate Meetup-St. Louis).

This Meet Up group is where I met Tanya Couture. She attended our events beginning in January 2012. We started dating in February 2013. We got married on November 1, 2015. As I joke in my climate talks, ‘Join the climate movement, you might meet the person of your dreams!’

In August 2011, I gave my first climate change ranger evening program at Crater Lake National Park, called The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. I performed this ranger talk at Crater Lake for the next five summers, up until 2017. Over the past 13 years, I ended up giving over 200 climate change talks in 12 U.S. states, Washington D.C, and Ottawa, Canada.

One of those speeches was at the Shrine of the Ages Auditorium at Grand Canyon National Park to an audience of over 200 park visitors and park staff in May 2013. Due to my ranger connections of working in the national parks for 25 years, my friend Pete invited me to give this talk.

Finding success and fulfillment as a climate change organizer

Besides speaking and hiking to the bottom of the Grand Canyon, I had many other adventures and exciting moments as a climate change organizer. In 2012, I attended a Climate Reality Project Training led by former Vice President Al Gore to become a Climate Reality Leader. I loved attending that training and was honored to be a mentor for 8 addition trainings to guide others become effective Climate Reality leaders. At the May 2015 Cedar Rapids Training in front of the group of my fellow mentors, I personally asked Al Gore how to best respond to his critics.

After I became The Climate Change Comedian, I created some YouTube videos with my wife Tanya, my mom Fran Ettling and my dad LeRoy Ettling. Comedy Central’s Tosh.o noticed these videos. This TV show flew my mom and I to Los Angeles in April 2016 to appear on their episode airing on August 2, 2016. I never dreamed that when I gave myself that title that it would be on a TV show seen by millions of people. My 2016 guest appearance met the satisfaction of Tosh.o because they invited me back for a second time for their November 10, 2020 episode.

In April 2012, Carol Braford, the St. Louis Chapter Leader for Citizens’ Climate Lobby (CCL) recruited me to volunteer for CCL. I immediately became deeply committed to CCL. While working as a park ranger at Crater Lake National Park during the summer of 2012, I reached out to various climate and environmental advocates in the Ashland, Oregon area. As a result of these interactions, I co-founded the Southern Oregon CCL chapter in 2013 that still regularly meets in Ashland. In 2013, CCL inspired me to write 10 published editorial opinions, two in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and eight in newspapers throughout Oregon.

CCL inspired me to attend 8 of their Washington D.C. conferences from 2015-19 to lobby Congressional offices on Capitol Hill. I loved attending lobby meetings with fellow CCL volunteers to urge Congressional offices to support federal climate legislation. As a climate change organizer, public speaker, and writer, it felt like 2011 to 2019 were very productive years for me. My lowest point though was the Presidential election of 2016. It was an extremely painful time for me. I felt like I was reliving the election of 2000 all over again.

Part 5 of this blog will focus on my painful experience of the election of 2016.

“When any great moral challenge is ultimately resolved into a binary choice between what is right and what is wrong, the outcome is foreordained because of who we are as human beings.”
– Former Vice President Al Gore
From his 2017 book An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power.

This is the toughest blog for me to write. In fact, I have devoted the last year to blogging and writing about my life story and blogging for years before that. This was the blog I knew it was vital for me to write, but I dreaded writing this blog. For the past 23 years, I have not felt that environmentalists, climate advocates, progressives and Democratic leaning voters were smart about electing Presidential, state level, and local candidates who would protect our environment, planet, and our democracy.

This is going to be a very painful blog to write, but I feel like I have no choice to share but to share my story. Hopefully, someone can learn from my disappointment and letdown I felt from environmental and climate Democratic voters who allowed awful candidates for President and other elected offices win.

The first post in this blog series, focused on My 1980s childhood in Missouri to witnessing 2000 Presidential Election in Florida. Part 2, focused on my story from 2001 to 2007.

For Part 3, this post is about my life in 2007. I was not focused on politics or Presidential elections. Instead, I achieved the peak life experience of skydiving twice and enjoyed my park ranger interpretation job at Crater Lake while I lost a close friend from that same year.

Part 3: Loss of a friend, Leaving the Everglades, and finding my passion for climate action

My peak experience of skydiving and enjoying a new summer ranger job at Crater Lake

In the summer of 2006, I transferred an entrance station ranger to an interpretative ranger at Crater Lake National Park. After many years of working other jobs there, I felt triumphant leading a lodge talk about the park founder William Gladstone Steel, giving a geology talk, and narrating the boat tours. In late August, I debuted a junior ranger program and an evening campfire program when other rangers left for the season to return to their teaching jobs.

I really stretched my boundaries in 2007 by going tandem skydiving twice. The first time I did it was in the south Florida in April 2007, at a small airport near Everglades National Park. This was a life goal that I have been itching to do for a few years. The Everglades is extremely flat with no hills or mountains. This would be my opportunity to finally get a bird’s eye view of south Florida.

My friend and fellow Everglades ranger, Jackie Dostourian, joined me for moral support that day. She decided that day that she was not going to skydive, and I was fine with that. I was determined to do it. It was great having her at the facility as I was very nervous before this experience, and she immediately saw me after I completed my jump.

This would be a tandem skydive, attached to a professional who does this for a living. After I paid the hefty fee, the other customers and I watched a 20-minute video to prepare for our tandem sky dive. The narrator on the video explained how he designed the tandem skydiving equipment for maximum safety. Oddly, he had a very long hair and beard. His piercing eyes spoke right into the camera and right into you. He was wearing a suit and tie. His hair and beard were so long that they covered up his shirt and suit collars, as well as his tie knot.

The narrator looked like a cult leader, not a businessman selling people on skydiving. I was very nervous to complete this life goal. My mind was committed, but my body thought it was a terrible idea to want to jump out of a perfectly good airplane. Thus, I was scared this narrator was going to say towards the end of this video, ‘And if you find that you enjoyed your skydive, I hope you will join us to live in our community forever.’

My body was waiting for a message like this on this video so we could go screaming out of there. After watching the video with the others committing themselves to skydiving that day, I met the person I would be attached to for this tandem skydive. He was a friendly guy in a profession where everyone needs to be super chill to relax nervous folks like me. Yet, he was confident and very detail oriented to help relax and calm down nervous folks like me.

For me, getting ready to go skydiving felt the same feeling as going to the dentist. My mind was totally set to do this, but my body wanted no part of it!

The weather was a typical Florida partly cloudy day. There were enough clouds rolling in that the professional skydivers had to wait until the last minute to decide if it was safe to jump out of the plane. They made this decision after the plane took off and we were 10,000 feet above the ground. The person making the decision was the lead skydiver, who was attached to me. The door was open on the side of the plane to make the decision. Each time he leaned of the plane to make the final call, I was leaning out of the plane with him. It was freaky looking out 10,000 feet below me with nothing between me and the ground. It’s not natural to be looking down on clouds thousands of feet below me. This was one scariest parts was when he leaned over the side several times to make his final call.

To the joy of my mind and the horror of my body, he determined it was safe for all of us to jump out of the airplane. Before we knew it, I was outside of a perfectly good airplane falling 110 miles per hour. It sounded so damn loud, like driving your car at 110 mph with the windows down. The Everglades looked huge and flat from high up in the sky, not much different than the ground. We just needed to aim for the landing zone, which was right next to Everglades National Park. I did not want to end up in the Everglades with all the alligators, venomous snakes, etc.

The experience was over in just a few minutes. I was thrilled that I accomplished it. It was great that Jackie was there to greet me when it was over to share this experience with her. I called up my parents and sisters that evening to let them know I skydived that day. None of them seemed impressed. My dad remarked, “Don’t ever do that again!”

I always had a rebellious streak in me. After my dad said that, I was determined to do it again.
I decided to do it again in Oregon when I returned to work at Crater Lake for the summer. I found co-workers at Crater Lake who were interested in joining me. We made our reservation to skydive in early August.

For this second time, I wanted to skydive to see the mountains of Oregon from 10,000 feet. This time, I decided to pay extra to have a video made of this skydive and pictures taken to remember this experience. Later on, I uploaded the video to YouTube.

In 2007, along with the skydiving experience, I had a terrific summer as an interpretative ranger at Crater Lake. I worked hard the previous summer to create all my ranger programs. Thus, I could enjoy my free time more in early July knowing that my ranger talks were ready from the previous summer. I just had to review my notes for all these programs. I felt like I improved each time I gave these ranger programs. It was a fabulous summer, but then tragedy struck.

The tragedy of losing my Everglades and Crater Lake mentor, Steve Robinson

In August 2007, we received news that fellow Crater Lake ranger Steve Robinson had pancreatic cancer. It was stage 4 and incurable. I knew Steve since I attended his ranger evening program in Flamingo in Everglades National Park in February 1993. When I returned to Crater Lake National Park for the summer, he narrated the boat tour I traveled on as a passenger in July 1993. I discovered that Steve and his wife Amelia Bruno were seasonal park rangers like me that spent their winters in Flamingo and their summers at Crater Lake.

In the years that followed, I stuck up a friendship with Steve and Amelia. He became a mentor to me how to be a good ranger, human being, and a man. When I worked in Flamingo and Crater Lake, I came to Steve and Amelia’s house to spend hours with Steve to learn his wisdom.

I learned a lot from Steve trying to absorb his wisdom. At that time, I wrote down inspiration quotes from to pin on my bedroom bulletin board. Steve was an optimist who would respond to cynicism, “Just because it has not happened yet does not mean it can never happen.”

Steve was a fourth generation Floridian who had a deep love for the Everglades and natural world. For 25 years, he worked as a seasonal park ranger in Everglades National Park. Steve had the good fortunate to meet the ‘Mother of the Everglades’ Marjory Stoneman Douglas one time when he worked as a ranger. He happened to see her at one of the scenic overlooks in the park and struck up a brief conversation with her when they were both admiring a scenery. Steve loved to quote Marjory and share her stories.

Steve had the gift of connecting with park visitors and people caught up in momentary short term, knee jerk, superficial thinking. One time, Steve told me, “My goal in life is to remove the rocks that other people’s paths.”

One of the pearls of wisdom that Steve gave to me was, “Every single person makes the world every single day.”

Steve and I saw eye to eye that the best way to protect our environment and planet is by speaking out every day. Even more, it was vital to vote in elections for Democratic candidates such as Al Gore who made those issues a top priority. Steve, his wife Amelia, and I were big fans of Al Gore. We watched the election results together and we all had a difficult time processing what happened in Florida.

In August 2007, I assumed I had years to absorb Steve’s knowledge. It shocked me when I learned he had stage 4 pancreatic cancer, one of the deadliest and aggressive forms of cancer. I visited Steve often in the hospital as his health deteriorated. During my hospital visits, he was too weak and on too many medications to talk. Sadly, Steve passed away on October 1, 2007.

I was in a daze for a year after Steve’s death. His mortality made me re-exam my own life.

Steve’s quick passing at the age of 57 years old showed me that tomorrow and a long life is not guaranteed. Steve made the most of his life as a park ranger, musician, husband, father, friend to many, someone who loved all people, and a mentor to me. He loved life and lived everyday like it was a gift to be alive. After Steve’s death, I felt lost no longer having my mentor around. I needed to do something different with my life to overcome the loss and to make the most of my life. I wanted somehow to be beneficial to the world as Steve was when he was alive.

Transitioning away from spending my winters in Everglades National Park 2007-08

In early September, around the same time that my mentor Steve was tragically losing his battle to pancreatic cancer, I received an email from my Everglades City District Supervisor Sue Reece. She told me that she would be happy for me to return to Everglades City for the winter. However, she had an opening for a winter seasonal ranger in the Shark Valley area in Everglades National Park. She thought I could be a good fit to work there. The Supervisor Ranger at Shark Valley at that time, Maria Thomson told Sue,

‘I want a good seasonal interpretative ranger to work at Shark Valley this winter. Someone who cares about the Everglades and can relay that to visitors. Someone like Brian Ettling.’

With Steve’s prospects of recovering from pancreatic cancer looking dim in September 2007, I needed some good news. It was heartwarming to hear that I was needed in Shark Valley. Therefore, I decided to work at that location in Everglades National Park for the winter. I would be narrating the tram tours, giving a short ranger talk, leading bicycle tours, and possibly providing a guided bird walk. This looked like a good opportunity to try a new location in the Everglades. Maria hoped I would work there. I had an opportunity to make a difference there.

When I arrived in Shark Valley in November 2007, it did not feel like a good fit for me. I had a housemate with a very surly personality. I missed my friends in Everglades City and other parts of the park. I felt like I was living in the middle of nowhere off Hwy 41, the Tamaimi Trail. The park housing was just a few miles west of Shark Valley, but it felt very isolating there. I could not sleep at night, and I fell into a very bad depression. I wanted to leave the Everglades, but I did not know where I wanted to go.

In my sleeplessness, depression, and restlessness, I found my life’s purpose. I wanted to carry forth my mentor Steve’s message of protecting our Earth and environment since he could no longer share that vision with others.

I recalled 1998 when I started giving ranger talks in Everglades National Park. Visitors then asked me about this global warming thing. Visitors hate when park rangers tell you, “I don’t know.” Visitors expect park rangers to know everything. Don’t you?

Soon afterwards, I rushed to the nearest Miami bookstore and to the park library to read all I the scientific books I could find on climate change.

The information I learned really scared me, specifically sea level rise along our mangrove coastline in Everglades National Park. Sea level rose 8 inches in the 20th century, four times more than it had risen in previous centuries for the past three thousand years. Because of climate change, sea level is now expected to rise at least three feet in Everglades National Park by the end of the 21st century. The sea would swallow up most of the park and nearby Miami since the highest point of the park road is three feet above sea level.

It shocked me that crocodiles, alligators, and Flamingos I enjoyed seeing in the Everglades could all lose this ideal coastal habitat because of sea level rinse enhanced by climate change.

By the winter of 2007-08, I read several books on climate change. Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth and his companion book, as well as the HBO documentary Too Hot Not to Handle, dominated my thoughts. I knew I needed to do something on climate change, but I did not know what. I was very clear though that I would not find the answer by continuing to work winters in the Everglades. It was time for me to move on with my life. By the winter of 2007-08, I was burned out of the south Florida climate, the very flat terrain, and the long cross-country drive to spend the winter in the Everglades. Even worse, as a single man, it seemed like I would not find a wife there.

I said goodbye to the Everglades at the end of April 2008. I decided I would spend my winters in my hometown of St. Louis Missouri to organize for climate action. I had no idea how I was going to do that, but I was excited I found my life’s purpose.

End of Part 3 of For Climate Action, let’s protect our democracy

In part 4, of this blog series, I will cover Healing from Grief and Taking climate action in Oregon and Missouri 2009-2016. Stay tuned!

“We have everything we need to begin solving the climate crisis – save, perhaps political will.
But in America, political will is a renewable resource.”

– Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore from his 2006 book, An Inconvenient Truth

This is the toughest blog for me to write. In fact, I have devoted the last year to blogging and writing about my life story and blogging for years before that. This was the blog I knew it was vital for me to write, but I dreaded writing this blog. For the past 23 years, I have not felt that environmentalists, climate advocates, progressives and Democratic leaning voters were smart about electing Presidential, state level, and local candidates who would protect our environment, planet, and our democracy.

This was a very painful blog to write, but I felt like I have no choice to share but to share my story. In the process of writing this blog, I discovered that I wrote so many pages that I am breaking this into an 8-part blog story. Hopefully, someone can learn from my disappointment and letdown I felt from environmental and climate Democratic voters who allowed awful candidates for President and other elected offices win.

The first post in this blog series, focused on my 1980s childhood in Missouri to witnessing 2000 Presidential Election in Florida. This blog, Part 2, focuses on my story from 2001 to 2007.

Part 2: My disgust with President George W. Bush and my thrill with the return of Al Gore

My disillusion with politics after George W. Bush became President over Al Gore in 2001

I know that in the year 2000 no one could foresee what Al Gore would end up doing after the election, as President or as a private citizen. At the same time, we all saw how the George W. Bush Presidency was a total disaster. During his Presidential campaign, he supported putting mandatory limits on carbon-dioxide emissions. Then he flip-flopped soon after he became President. On March 13, 2001, Bush announced he would not regulate carbon dioxide, stated he did not believe in the science of global warming, and affirmed his opposition to the Kyoto protocol, the only international procedure attempting to reduce the threat of global warming.

The climate disinformation efforts by the Bush Administration became a central tenant of the Bush era – and perhaps causing the most long-term damage. Even more, they went out of their way to censor, doctor, and suppress government scientific reports on climate change that hamstrung government action and misled the public. The list is long how the George W. Bush Administration set back climate policy.

Just as outrageous to me was the case that the Bush Administration seemed asleep at the wheel when the 9-11 terrorist attacks happened. A month before the attack, Bush received an intelligence briefing paper called paper titled: “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.”

What was Bush’s answer to Americans how to respond to 9-11? “Go shopping” and “Get down Disney World in Florida.”

Led by President George W. Bush, experts drew the conclusion that “After 9/11, the U.S. Got Almost Everything Wrong.”

For years afterward, I felt guilty after every time I put gas in my car wondering if my money went to Saudi Arabia and then to finance terrorism there. There were zero attempts by the Bush Administration to try to switch the U.S. to clean energy to deprive oil money flowing to Middle East, which funds terrorism.

Knowing all that I have read about Al Gore and even meeting him, I have a hard time believing that Gore would have responded as awful as George W. Bush did to 9-11. Even more, George W. Bush and Bush administration ignored clear warnings that led to the 2008 housing crash and resulting Great Recession.

As I mentioned in the first post of this blog series, I grew up as a fiscal conservative Republican. George W. Bush was a total failure with exploding annual federal deficits and increasing the federal debt by 57%.

Bush inherited a federal budget that had surpluses for three straight fiscal years (after running deficits for nearly 30 years in a row) and was on course for a surplus in fiscal year 2001. In fact, according the Center on Budget and Policies, “both President Bush’s Office of Management and Budget and the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projected that if the policies in place when President Bush took office remained unchanged, the budget would generate surpluses that would total $5.6 trillion over the next ten years — more than enough to pay off the entire outstanding federal debt held by the public.”

So why did large federal deficits and huge increases in the federal debt occur under President George W. Bush?

“The biggest factors were very large tax cuts and increases in security-related programs (primarily for two wars that were not paid for). The tax cuts and security spending increases cost nearly $3.4 trillion over those eight years and accounted for more than four-fifths of the fiscal deterioration that policy changes caused during that period.”

Oh, in case we forgot, Al Gore received over a half million more votes nationwide for President than George W. Bush, which should have made him the winner of the 2000 Presidential election. Instead, because of Florida tipping the Electoral College for Bush, he got to pick two Supreme Court Justices, John Roberts and Samuel Alito. Along with Donald Trump’s three Conservative Supreme Court picks, this current Supreme Court now tilts far right. As a result, in recent years, they overturned legalized abortion, favored loosening gun protection laws, allows for discrimination against LGBTQ+ individuals, etc.

I sure wish that the 2000 election Nader voters gave that more thought instead of hiding behind excuses that ‘Gore ran a weak campaign’ or getting easily duped when Nader referred to George W. Bush and Al Gore as “Tweedledum and Tweedledee.”

Not voting and squandering votes on 3rd party candidates in the 2000 election does have consequences that reverberate to this day. This still hurts for me to talk about 23 years later. The 2000 election deeply crushed my spirit.

With my job narrating the boat tours at Flamingo, I found some of the passengers from other states to be downright cruel. Some of them mocked me, ‘Can’t your state vote correctly.’ Or, I heard juvenile jokes about hanging chads. I responded that the same thing could have had in their state if their election results had been extremely close. Even more, it bothered me that we should be counting ballots to make sure that every ballot counts when we have extremely close elections. However, these visitors did not really care about this point I tried to make to them.

Even more, George W. Bush and his campaign were not interested at all in voter recounts to accurately determine who won Florida and the 2000 Presidential election. According to a 2023 CNN article,

“Amid ballot recounts in various challenged counties, the Florida secretary of state certified a 537-vote margin on November 26 for Bush, from 6 million votes cast. Bush strove to stop the recounts as Gore continued to challenge the state’s tallies.”

George W. Bush and his supporters wanted to win at all costs. For the sake of American democracy, they were not interested in holding off declaring victory until there was a completion of recounts to get a more accurate picture of who really won the election. I thought this started a dangerous precedent for American politics to try to win at all costs that Donald Trump and his supporters tried to do in the 2020 election.

After the election of 2000, I lost a lot of faith in the U.S politics, the American people, and American democracy. With thousands of Floridian environmentalists voting for Ralph Nader, the snarky comments I heard from Everglades visitors about the chaos counting the votes in Florida, and how Americans felt indifferent that a man who won the popular vote nationwide, plus possibility that Gore might have won the votes in Florida, left me feeling disgusted with the U.S. I felt very little sense of patriotism after that election.

I spent every day on the boat tours talking about ecology and trying to plant seeds in visitors minds to commit themselves to save the Everglades and our planet. The Florida Nader voters left me feeling less motivated to do this. There were probably many others who felt disheartened like me. Was that really the intention of those Florida Nader voters? Did they really think through the long-term implications of their actions?

President George W. Bush came to Everglades National Park on June 4, 2001. The National Park Service asked me for help to volunteer for this event. I initially said yes. I loved working in the Everglades, and this was a big deal to have the President come to the Everglades. However, the more I thought about it, the more I could not participate. I did not believe Bush won the 2000 election fair and square. I believe he tried to stop the recounts to determine who really won. I did not consider him to be an honorable and trustworthy man. I still don’t to this day. Thus, I choose to protest with a good friend and fellow park employees with many others at a designated free speech area at the park entrance.

Focusing on my seasonal park ranger jobs and my disappointment with the 2004 election

A year later, I gave up my year-round naturalist guide job in the Everglades where I had full time benefits. I needed a break from trying to inspire visitors to save the Everglades during my boat tour narrations. In addition, in 2001 and early 2002, I volunteered giving ranger talks at the Royal Palm Visitor Center and the Flamingo Visitor Center on the water ecology of the Everglades. Like my boat tour narrations, I hoped to educate and influence them to protect the Everglades, our natural world, and our planet.

In May 2002, I drove away from Flamingo and Everglades National Park unsure if I would return. My friend Amelia Bruno hired me to return to my old summer job entrance station ranger job at Crater Lake National Park. I planned to enjoy the summer there and do lots of hiking. I was unsure what I would do next. It turned out that I was not finished with the Everglades.

In 2002, I had a wonderful summer at Crater Lake. It was a superb summer for me to return because the park was celebrating its centennial. Congress passed a bill establishing the national park and President Theodore Roosevelt signed it into law on May 22, 1902. It was great to make new friends working in the park since I was gone for four years. It was a joy to rediscover all the trails in the park that I enjoyed hiking.

The stressful part was I did not have plans for the winter of 2002-03. I applied to work for the National Park Service in the Everglades that winter at the Flamingo Campground Kiosk, but I did not hear back from the park. I ended up going back to St. Louis to stay with my parents.

I returned to the entrance station ranger job for the summer of 2003. In June, I had a new housemate at Crater Lake, David Grimes. He worked seasonally in other national parks such as Congaree Swamp in South Carolina and Zion in Utah. We became friends. We both applied to work as seasonal interpretation rangers in Everglades National Park for the winter 2003-04.

In late November, I received a phone call from Candice Tinkler, the District Supervisor Ranger at the Everglades City Visitor Center. Someone she hired for the winter declined to work there. She needed to hire a new ranger fast. She saw my name on the list of eligible candidates. Grimes highly recommended me, so she called to offer me an interpretative ranger position for the winter. She needed me to come down fast, within a week if possible. I started throwing my ranger uniforms and other belongs in the car to drive from St. Louis to Everglades City, Florida. I left shortly after Thanksgiving and arrived during the first week in December 2003.

This was my first National Park Service interpretative ranger job. After my four years as a naturalist guide in Flamingo, this new ranger position was an ideal fit for me. I enjoyed narrating the boat tours in Everglades City, leading the canoe trips, and giving ranger talks on the water drainage issues and the Everglades Restoration plan. I liked spending the winter in Everglades City and I ended up spending three more winters there from 2004 to 2007.

In subsequent winters working in Everglades City, I expanded to do additional ranger programs, such as guided bike tours and an evening program on the birds of the Everglades. I enjoyed my year-round work of summers working as an entrance station ranger at Crater Lake and the winters working as an interpretive ranger in Everglades City.

With Al Gore’s 2000 campaign where he was extremely close to winning the Presidency, I eagerly wondered in 2001 and 2002 if he would run for President. If he ran for President again, I would be tempted to give up my ranger jobs to volunteer or to even see if I could somehow work on his campaign. Leading up to his decision for 2004, I still thought Al Gore was the best potential Presidential candidate for the environment. I really wanted him to run again.

On December 15, 2002, I received the crushing news that Al Gore decided he would not run for President in 2004. Furthermore, he disclosed that he did not expect ever to run for president. I felt deflated by that news. I was in St. Louis living with my parents. I had to go for a very long neighborhood walk to try to process the news and attempt to somehow lift my spirits. I still considered him to be the leading voice in the U.S. for protecting the environment and reducing the threat of global warming. I hoped he would continue to use his voice and platform to make a difference and to influence citizens like me.

As the 2004 Presidential campaign heated up, I was happy that Al Gore endorsed Howard Dean for President. Like Gore, I was impressed with Dean’s ability to appeal to the nation’s “grassroots” elements and his fundraising. After his poor finishes in the New Hampshire primary and the Iowa Caucus, I lost interest in Howard Dean. After John Kerry became the Democratic nominee for President, I supported him for President hoping he could defeat George W. Bush.

On Wednesday, November 4, 2004, I heard on the radio that George W. Bush had officially won the election. I was inside my car, and I could not stop crying. I thought it was a fluke of the electoral college that Bush won the first time in 2000. It shocked me that a majority Americans re-elected him in 2004. With that election, it did not seem like Americans cared about the environment or any long-term damage humans were causing the planet. The election left me feeling numb and so disappointed with the U.S. The election of 2000 still felt like a recent open wound that crushed my spirit further when I heard the outcome of the 2004 election.

I needed some good news that Americans really cared about the environment and the health of our planet. During that time, I focused on my summer ranger entrance station job at Crater Lake and my winter interpretative ranger job in Everglades City.

My excitement seeing Al Gore back in the public spotlight promoting climate action

In May 2006, I saw that maybe America was getting a tad bit more serious about the environment and climate change. I had wrapped up my winter season in Everglades City. I embarked on a cross country drive to my summer job at Crater Lake. Along the way, I decided to visit friends in North Carolina. My friend Dana Ostfeld was getting ready to graduate from Duke University with a master’s degree in environmental management. My friend Sheryl Shultz lived that time not far away in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. I had a good visit with these friends. I then went to see the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC. I got a motel room to spend the night not far from Asheville. The next day, I had plans to visit and hike in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

When I turned on the TV for a few minutes that morning to start my day, a documentary on HBO grabbed my attention. It was called Too Hot Not to Handle. The film had video interview clips with climate scientists throughout the program. The message of this documentary was that “Global Warming is the most urgent threat facing humanity today.” I found the film to be mesmerizing. It laid out a stark warning from scientists the threat of climate change and what they think we need to do to solve it. Soon afterwards, I bought my own DVD copy of it online from the HBO store to watch multiple times.

On a random news stand while I traveled across country, I noticed the May 2006 edition Wired magazine with Al Gore on the cover staring right at me. The headline of the magazine news proclaimed, “CLIMATE CRISIS: The Pro-growth, Pro-tech Fight to stop Global Warming.” In the lower right corner of the magazine had a sub-headline, “AL GORE and the Rise of the Neo-Greens.”

In the article, “The Resurrection of Al Gore,” I read something that jumped out at me,

“Al Gore is traveling the globe, delivering a slide show that, by his own estimate, he’s given more than a thousand times over the years. His one-man campaign is chronicled in a new documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, which made Gore the unlikely darling of the Sundance Film Festival earlier year and will be released on May 26th by Paramount Classics. He has also written a forthcoming companion volume of the same name, his first book on the subject since the 1992 campaign tome Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit.”

This was suddenly my “must see” movie and book to read for the summer. When I returned to Crater Lake in June 2006, I watched the internet periodically to see when the film would be shown at a theatre in southern Oregon. Finally, An Inconvenient Truth had a showing at a movie theater in Ashland, Oregon in July 2006. I saw the documentary with my girlfriend at the time, Marie Malo. We were speechless afterwards how fantastic the film was. Al Gore was very compelling to watch and even displayed a great sense of humor as the film showed him giving his climate change presentation. The film was sobering about the serious danger of climate change.

As we watched the credits, our hearts were further touched by the Melissa Etheridge theme song. “I Need to Wake Up.”

Like many others who saw An Inconvenient Truth, I wanted to do something, but I was not sure what to do. I did not know of any individuals or organizations working on climate change at that time. The film did give great advice as the credits rolled, such as “Vote for leaders who pledge to solve this crisis. Write to Congress. If they don’t listen, run for Congress.” To further reinforce what I saw and learned in the documentary, I purchased the companion book. Laurie David, the Executive Producer of the HBO documentary Too Hot Not to Handle, was a producer of this film.

When the film came out on DVD that winter, I bought it as soon as it was available. At that time, I was working my winter seasonal ranger job in Everglades City. I never shop at Wal Mart. I despised their business practices how they displaced so many small independent businesses. However, I had so much fun that day walking into Wal Mart to buy this film. I wanted to vote with my dollars that this was a good product that they for sale that day.

An Inconvenient Truth turned out to be a profitable movie for Hollywood. It costs about $1 million to make and made over $50 million during its showing in movie theaters worldwide. That was an unheard of a box office success at that time for a documentary. It turned out that this film was one of the “must see” films for the summer of 2006, not just for me. Years later, I had friends tell me that they got involved in the climate movement after seeing An Inconvenient Truth. In fact, Marshall Saunders, founder of Citizens’ Climate Lobby (CCL) – one of the first climate groups I joined back in 2012 and became a volunteer, was motivated to start CCL after seeing the film and attending one of Al Gore’s Climate Reality Trainings in 2007.

I was elated over the buzz An Inconvenient Truth created in 2006 and 2007. On January 25, 2007, the film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary (Feature). On Sunday, February 25, 2007, the Everglades City rangers had an Oscar watch TV party. I was ecstatic when An Inconvenient Truth won the Oscar for Best Documentary feature. Al Gore came on the stage with the Director Davis Guggenheim and producers Lawrence Bender and Laurie David to accept the award. Guggenheim even allowed time for Al Gore to give a short speech,

“My fellow Americans, people all over the world, we need to solve the climate crisis. It’s not a political issue, it’s a moral issue. We have everything we need to get started with the possible exception of the will to act. That’s a renewable resource. Let’s renew it.”

Later at that same Academy Award ceremony, rock musician Melissa Etheridge won the Oscar for Best Original Song for “I need to Wake Up.” Just like Gore, it was great to see her urge the audience of top Hollywood celebrities and a global TV audience of over a billion people to take climate action. She said,

“I have to thank Al Gore for inspiring us, inspiring me, showing that caring about the earth is not Democratic or Republican, it is not red or blue, we are all green.”

The accolades continued later that year when the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Al Gore. Their motivation to give the Prize to the IPCC and Al Gore was due to “their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change.”

“According to the Nobel Committee, Gore is probably the single individual who has done most to rouse the public and the governments that action had to be taken to meet the climate challenge. ‘He is,’ in the words of the Committee, ‘the great communicator’.”

With an Oscar winning documentary feature about climate change, An Inconvenient Truth, plus a Nobel Peace Prize. I was happy for him and how he was elevating the issue. At the same time, it was bittersweet because he because he should have elected President in 2000.

At the same time Al Gore made a comeback from his devastating 2000 Presidential loss with the Nobel Peace Prize and an Oscar winning documentary about him in 2007, I experienced a bad depression and my own heart-breaking loss.

End of Part 2 of For Climate Action, let’s protect our democracy

In part 3 of this blog series, I will cover The Loss of a friend, Leaving the Everglades, and Finding my Life’s Mission for Climate Action. Stay tuned!

‘In order to fix the climate crisis, we need to fix the democracy crisis.’
– Former Vice President Al Gore

This is the toughest blog for me to write. In fact, I have devoted the last year to blogging and writing about my life story and blogging for years before that. This was the blog I knew it was vital for me to write, but I dreaded writing this blog. For the past 23 years, I have not felt that environmentalists, climate advocates, progressives and Democratic leaning voters were smart about electing Presidential, state level, and local candidates who would protect our environment, planet, and our democracy.

This is a very painful blog to write, but I feel like I have no choice to share but to share my story. In the process of writing this blog, I discovered that I wrote so many pages that I am breaking this into an 8-part blog story. Hopefully, someone can learn from my disappointment and letdown I felt from environmental and climate Democratic voters who allowed awful candidates for President and other elected offices win.

Part 1: My 1980s childhood in Missouri to witnessing 2000 Presidential Election in Florida

Growing up in Missouri with the American Dream in the 1970s and 1980s

I grew up in Oakville, Missouri, a suburb in the south part of the St. Louis metropolitan area. My childhood and teen years where in the 1970s into the 1980s. I am old enough to remember the Iranian hostage crisis of 1979-1981, when inflation and stagflation was high, and the malaise of the late 1970s. I was a kid in the late 70s and 1980 just happy to ride my bike, play with my Star Wars toys, and enjoy touch football with neighborhood friends. Yet, I remember my parents and other adults feeling somber with the inflation, hostage crisis, the 1980 boycott of the summer Olympics, and the direction of the country.

I was a 12-year-old kid fascinated with the nightly news anchored by Walter Cronkite and the humorous monologues of the Johnny Carson commenting on the times. At the time, it seemed like a positive shift in the country when Ronald Reagan became President. He projected confidence with his sunny disposition and a conservative simplistic governing philosophy that I could understand at that age, ‘government bad, private sector good.’ Reagan was President from when I was in 6th grade until I started college in 1988. Growing up on Reagan, he seemed someone like a grandpa figure for me that felt like he was good for America at that time.

This was the 1980s when capitalism, money, and wealth were overly idealized in the U.S. The popular TV shows in America and our home at that time was Dallas, Dynasty, and Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous. I graduated from high school in 1987. I had no idea what to do with my life, so I took a gap year to travel a bit in the U.S. and work at the neighborhood gas station.

During that time, I was enthralled with the move Wall Street and Donald Trump’s book The Art of the Deal. Like Trump, I wanted to be a success in business and be rich. As I became 20 years old, America seemed like the perfect democracy. It was ‘the land of opportunity’ if one just worked hard enough in business and the free enterprise system.

To pursue that dream, I decided I would major in Business Administration when I started my freshman year at William Jewell College in Liberty, Missouri, which is just outside of Kansas City. I enjoyed my business classes. However, I could see that I was too much of a free spirit to spend my entire work career in an office cubicle and trapped inside an office building. I wanted to be outside or at least working close to the great outdoors. While I attended college, a recruiter for A Christian Ministries in the National Parks (ACMNP) convinced me to work a summer job in the national parks. They would find a concession job for me in the parks if I agreed to help lead interdenominational Christian church services on Sundays. At that time, I was very religious, so that seemed like a good deal for me.

Leaving Missouri to work summers at Crater Lake National Park, Oregon

I graduated from William Jewell College on May 17, 1992. That evening, I stepped on board an Amtrak train on a three-day train ride to take me from Kansas City to Los Angeles. I then changed trains in Los Angeles to take the very scenic Coast Starlight train from LA to Klamath Falls, Oregon. The train ride was phenomenal to see the Pacific Ocean beaches in Santa Barbara, watch the train weave into the Mediterranean interior climate of San Luis Obispo and then head up towards the Bay Area. We arrived at the Oakland Train station late at night to see the city lights of the East Bay, the sparkling twinkling lights of San Francisco, and the lights of the majestic bridges that span across the wide bay.

I woke up the next morning with the train veering around the massive snowcapped Mt. Shasta. Growing up in the low elevation of the Midwest, I had always dreamed of living close to mountains with snow on top. As the train wheels squealed going around the huge mountain. I felt like I had arrived in my new home. Mt. Shasta was a very welcoming sight for my blurry eyes that did not get much sleep sitting in the train coach seat that night.

A Crater Lake gift store park employee named Kevin picked me up at the Klamath Falls, Oregon train station. As we drove over an hour to get to Crater Lake National Park, I was so anxious to see it that I kept asking Kevin soon after the drive started, ‘Will we see the lake after we go over this next ridge?’ He assured me that we would see it on this drive. I just had to be patient. To make small talk, I asked Kevin about the dumb questions that visitors ask the employees. He said that he had heard that visitors sometimes asked park employees, ‘What time of year do the deer turn into elk?’

I laughed and responded, ‘Ha! That’s funny! How could they ask such a thing?’ Internally, I was thinking: ‘I don’t know a thing about deer or elk or really anything else about the park. I am going to have to learn quickly!’

When I saw Crater Lake for the first time on May 20, 1992, it changed my life. The scenery did not disappoint. Crater Lake was one of the most spectacular sights I saw in my life. The lake was 6 miles across at its widest point with this deep cobalt blue color. The rim mountains that surrounded it were decorated with snow, looking like an amazing cake decoration with the white icing on top. The pine trees where so tall, unlike the much smaller deciduous or leaf producing trees in my home state of Missouri. It was so quiet standing on the rim admiring the lake, except for the very light whistle of the wind and an occasional airplane flying overhead.

Seeing Crater Lake for the first time reminded me of a quote I later read from the founder of Crater Lake National Park, William Gladstone Steel. He saw it for the first time on August 15, 1885. One year afterwards, he wrote:

“Crater Lake is one of the grandest points of interest on earth. Here all the ingenuity of nature seems to have been exerted to the fullest capacity, to build one grand, awe-inspiring temple, within which to live and from which to gaze up on the surrounding world and say: ‘Here would I dwell and live forever. Here would I make my home from choice; the universe is my kingdom, and this is my throne.’”

I loved my summers at Crater Lake. I spent the summers of 1992-94 working in the Crater Lake gift store. Because this was a seasonal job, I had to find a different place to work in the winter.

Spending my winters working in Everglades National Park, Florida

I had to find another seasonal job for the winter in those months to mark time before returning to Crater Lake for the summer. Fortunately, the peak season for Everglades National Park visitation in Florida was from late November to early April. I arrived at the Flamingo Outpost in Everglades National Park in December 1992. My first job was working in housekeeping. I then transferred to a Front Desk job at the Flamingo Lodge.

Unlike Crater Lake, I was disappointed with my first views of the Everglades. The sawgrass prairie, which made up much of the park, looked as flat as the eye could see. It looked like a Midwest farm field, not at all like the iconic western national parks with towering mountains. The only high features in the Everglades were the lofty clouds that I had to imagine they were as high and dominating as the Rocky Mountains, Cascades or Sierra Nevada Mountain ranges.

My seasonal housing unit looked out into the subtropical Florida Bay, which made up the lower third of Everglades National Park. Numerous mangrove islands dotted the shallow Florida Bay. In the western part of the bay, the water blended into the Gulf of Mexico. As a child growing up in the landlocked St. Louis, Missouri, I dreamed of living close to the ocean to see that horizon line where the ocean met the sky with no land to interfere. Flamingo was probably the cheapest place in Florida to live next to the ocean, even if Florida Bay was considered an estuary, a place where inland freshwater met and mixed with seawater from the ocean.

It felt very tranquil to live by so much water. Surrounding our housing area and Flamingo were subtropical mangrove trees living in the shallow waters and coconut palms stood by the higher solid grounds of the buildings. The Everglades had a fascinating variety of wildlife with alligators, crocodiles, dolphins, manatees, deer, raccoons, and a wide variety of colorful wading birds. November to April is the dry season in the Everglades where it rains occasionally and is most sunny most of the time. The high temperature from December to April is in the upper 70s to lower 80s. South Florida is a fun place to comfortably wear shorts in the depths of winter.

To mark time until I could return to Crater Lake, I made the best out of working winters in the Everglades. I relished exploring all around the park and seeing the unique wildlife I saw, such as alligators, crocodiles, dolphins, manatees, and the wide variety of birds. The canoeing in the Everglades was a fabulous experience. My high point was the overnight canoe trip with friends to Alligator Creek and Florida Bay in February 1993.

Reading books t deepen my connection with the national parks and the environment

In my first year of working in the national parks, I yearned to read everything about them. I bought picture books and guidebooks on the national parks, hoping to see them all someday. I wanted to learn the history of our national parks, so I purchased at the Crater Lake gift store, Regreening The National Parks. This was a 1992 book by Michael Frome, a conservationist writer and Professor of Environmental Journalism at the Huxley College of Environmental Studies at Western Washington University. In this book, Frome critiqued the over commercialization of the national parks and offers advice on the policies needed to truly protect them.

While working at the front desk of the Flamingo Lodge in Everglades National Park in January 1998, I had a chance encounter with Michael Frome. I recognized his name while checking him into the hotel. I complimented him on his book, and he appreciated my kind words. When he checked out the next day, he generously signed my copy of his book.

Besides Frome’s book, I read Dr. Tony Campolo’s 1992 book, How to Rescue the Earth Without Saving Nature: A Christian’s Call to Save Creation. At that time, I was a devout Christian with leading ACMNP Sunday church services at the campground amphitheaters at Crater Lake and Everglades National Parks. I felt a calling to save the environment, the national parks, and our planet in a way that honored God. I knew Dr. Campolo as a fantastic public speaker. He spoke twice to William Jewell College when I was a student. He was known as a progressive evangelical Christian theologian. He was a professor of sociology at Eastern College in Pennsylvania.

During my first winter in the Everglades, I figured one of the best ways to learn about it was to read the 1987 book Voice of the River by Marjory Stoneman Douglas, the mother of Everglades National Park. She ended up having a big impact on my life when I became a naturalist guide in Flamingo in 1998 and an environmental advocate for the Everglades. Unlike Dr. Tony Campolo, Marjory Stoneman Douglas was not religious at all. She did not seem to have much use for it. She ended her book with a quote that had a huge reverberation within me. She wrote,

“I believe that life should be lived so vividly and so intensely that thoughts of another life, or a longer life, are not necessary.”

Marjory was a huge voice speaking out for the protection of the Everglades and the natural environment. She lived as an outspoken advocate for the Everglades until she died in 1998 at the age of 108 years old. Even though she was an atheist, I thought at that time, ‘If there is a heaven and Marjory is not there, no one deserves to be there.’

I think Tony Campolo would have agreed with me on that point. Both Marjory and Tony loved people and getting to the truth of the matter. I think if they had ever met, they would have really liked each other.

In early 1993, another book that had a massive influence on me was the 1992 book Earth in the Balance by Al Gore. He wrote the book while he as a U.S. Senator from the state of Tennessee. The book came to my attention when he ran for Vice President in 1992 as Bill Clinton’s Presidential campaign running mate. The book examined the threat to our planet’s environment from global warming, pollution, and deforestation. I thought that the book was very compelling, well researched, and very insightful how humans were threatening life on our planet and ourselves.

To back up, in November 1992, I supported Ross Perot for President. My thinking was then the federal deficit and debt had greatly increased under President George H.W. Bush. I considered myself to be a fiscal conservative then and I did not find Bush to be an effective leader. At the same time, I was intrigued for years by Al Gore with his strong stands to protect the environment. My older sister shared with me afterwards her favorite moment of the Vice-Presidential Debate between Vice President Dan Quayle, Admiral James Stockdale and Al Gore on October 13, 1992. Forty two minutes into the debate, Dan Quayle attacked Al Gore for supposed statements made in the book. After Quayle finished attacking Al Gore, he responded, ‘Dan, I appreciate that you read my book.’

My older sister said she laughed when she saw that on TV and she noticed laughter from some members in the audience at the debate. Thus, I was curious to Gore’s book. I found it to be a very helpful reference for the global environmental problems happening at that time. I remember thinking, ‘Thank God that Al Gore is our Vice President. After reading his book I became a big admirer of Al Gore. I still considered myself to be a Republican at that time. By 1996, I voted for Bill Clinton to be re-elected as President primarily because Al Gore was his Vice President. To me, Gore seemed to be by far the strongest environmental champion in politics. I eagerly looked forward to supporting and voting for him for President in 2000.

Becoming a Crater Lake park ranger and a naturalist guide in Everglades National Park

I left the Everglades in the middle of April 1993 to return to work at the Crater Lake National Park Gift Store for the summer. I briefly worked at Furnace Creek in Death Valley during the spring of 1994 before working again at the Crater Lake gift store for the summer. The General Manager of the Crater Lake concessionaire talked me into working the night auditor position at the rehabilitated Crater Lake Lodge during the grand re-opening summer of 1995. I quickly discovered that working graveyard shifts was not my cup of tea. I was sleeping during the daytime beauty of Crater Lake.

In 1996, the National Park Service (NPS) hired me to be an Entrance Station ranger at Crater Lake. I wore the ranger uniform with pride as I welcomed visitors to Crater Lake and charged them the $5 entrance fee. I was working in a tiny entrance station booth, which was more like a box. The park entrance road was surrounded by the tall skinny lodgepole pine trees. Except for the stream of vehicle traffic in the summer, it felt like I was working in the woods.

For the summer of 1997, it was soul satisfying to return to this Crater Lake entrance station ranger job. That summer NPS changed the job title to Visitor Use Assistant. I did not care what they called me. I was delighted to spend my summers at Crater Lake. Yet, I found myself drawn to spend my winters working in Everglades National Park.

I skipped two winters, 1993-94 and 1994-95, to spend time with family in St. Louis. I returned to Flamingo in the 1995-96 winter to work as a night auditor at the lodge front desk. I thought I would use my Business Administration college degree to do this accounting job to balance the lodge’s daily receipts. Like my 1995 summer at Crater Lake, I was a glutton for punishment working this overnight job. It was stressful to complete all the office work in time. The computers were finicky and glitchy with no one around to assist if I ran into technical issues. The sleep schedule was brutal and hard on my dating relationship at that time. I vowed to never do that job again.

I skipped working in the Everglades in 1996 to 1997 to visit family in St. Louis. It was good to be home that winter because to be at the hospital hours after my oldest niece and goddaughter, Rachel was born. When I returned to Everglades National Park in November 1997, I worked front desk at the Flamingo Lodge. In early January 1998, a naturalist guide position opened to narrate the boat tours in Flamingo. I applied for the position and started in late January 1998.

My admiration for Marjory Stoneman Douglas while working as a naturalist guide

It was great to talk about how and why the Everglades became a national park in 1947. Unlike western national parks which were protected for their dramatic scenery, the Everglades National Park was the first national park in the world protected for its biodiversity. Florida conservationists wanted it protected because of its wide diversity of plants and animals.

I greatly admired “The mother of the Everglades” Marjory Stoneman Douglas who fought many years to protect the Everglades. She wrote the most renowned 1947 book, The Everglades: River of Grass. She opened the book by writing,

“There are no other Everglades in the world. They are, they have always been, one of the unique regions of the earth, remote, never wholly known…The miracle of the light pours over the green and brown expanse of saw grass and of water, shining and slow-moving below, the grass and water that is the meaning and the central fact of the Everglades of Florida. It is a river of grass.”

I shared that quote and others from Marjory Stoneman Douglas during my boat tour narrations. Sadly, She passed away in May 1998 at the age of 108 years old. This happened just months after I became an Everglades naturalist guide. It felt like her torch moved on to me and others in my generation to cherish and protect the Everglades. When possible, I made sure park visitors knew about her during my interactions.

Most of all, this job gave me a great opportunity to talk about the importance of saving the Everglades, our precious environment, and our planet from the harm caused by humans. In most of my programs, I talked about how the Everglades was one of the most threatened national parks in the United States due to over development and over drainage. In December 2000, Congress passed and President Bill Clinton signed a multi-billion-dollar plan to try to save the Everglades.

I ended most of these narrations with a famous quote incorrectly attributed to Marjory Stoneman Douglas to this day. In fact, a lesser-known Everglades activist named Joe Podgor gave Marjory the iconic quote: “The Everglades is Test. — If We Pass, We May Get to Keep the Planet.”

During those four years that I was a naturalist guide in Flamingo, I did my best to live up to that quote. I gave around 20% of the tips I received from passengers to environmental advocacy groups, such as the National Parks and Conservation Association, the Sierra Club, the Florida Sierra Club, the Save Manatees Club, and the Friends of the Everglades, the organization Marjory Stoneman Douglas founded in 1969 to “Preserve, Protect & Restore the Everglades.”

Becoming active environmentalist whiling working in Everglades National Park

During my time off from work, I attended monthly meetings of the Miami Chapter of the Sierra Club and the Tropical Audubon Society, located in Miami. After I became a Flamingo naturalist guide in 1998, I read all the articles I could find about what was happening in the Everglades.

I soon discovered that developers, the City of Miami, and even the state of Florida wanted to turn the former Homestead Air Force Base into a commercial airport to deliver products from Latin America, Europe and around the U.S. to the south Florida area. The Hurricane Andrew destroyed Homestead Air Force Base in 1992, leaving a large hole in the local Homestead and south Miami economy.

The outgoing George H.W. Bush Administration, incoming Bill Clinton Administration, and the U.S. Defense Department did not think it was vital to rebuild the Homestead Air Force Base for American security or military training. Instead, local Miami business leaders and many local, state, and federal officials supported building a commercial airport where the Homestead Air Force Base was located. They believed a new commercial airport would grow the economy and provide jobs for Homestead and the surrounding south Miami area.

The problem was that this airport would be located just a few miles between Everglades and Biscayne National Parks. The Everglades was already one of the most threatened national parks in the U.S, if not the world. This was due to over drainage, pollution from Miami, introduction of exotic plants and animals, etc. The last thing that Everglades National Park and Biscayne National Park needed was a constant sound and emissions pollution from jet airplanes constantly flying overhead with up to 600 flights a day. I was not a scientist, just a naturalist guide who loved the Everglades. The idea of constant low flying jets over the Everglades and Biscayne National Parks sounded like a terrible idea to me.

In 1999 and 2000, I attended public hearings and meetings about the proposed Homestead Jetport plans. The meetings became very contentious with yelling on both sides. Local environmentalists strongly opposed the jetport. However, business leaders, local businesses, and members of the minority communities who wanted the jobs pushed hard for this airport.

I will never forget one public meeting where arguments broke out. One individual even said, ‘This airport would be under construction right now except for you rich people on Key Biscayne that don’t want it.’

I remember a gasp from the audience that hung in the air after that very blunt statement. A friend and I turned to each other thinking, ‘This airport will eventually lose. Don’t ever piss off rich people. They have lawyers and they know exactly how fight the system for their advantage.’

A final decision to approve the construction for the jetport resided in a federal environmental review by the Clinton Administration. This environmental review final statement would have definite winners and losers. The quandary that this decision was bumping up against the 2000 Presidential election and the end of the Clinton Administration on January 20, 2001. One group of Florida voters would be very happy, and the other side would be very angry with the final decision of the environmental review. In the fall 2000, it seemed very likely that the Presidential race could result in Florida determining the outcome for the Electoral College.

My heartbreak seeing up close Al Gore lose the 2000 Presidential election in Florida

For Democratic Presidential candidate Al Gore and Republican candidate George W. Bush, both of them needed those votes to possibly win Florida and then win the White House. Some south Florida voters wondered, ‘Why won’t Al Gore, ‘Mr. Tree Hugger, pro-environment, anti-global warming candidate’ stop or at least come out publicly to oppose the Homestead airport?’

Great question! The problem for Al Gore was that Miami-Dade County Mayor Alex Penelas, a key Gore ally in Florida, was a strong supporter of the airport.

Sadly, the Homestead airport ended up costing Al Gore the 2000 Presidential election.

To this day, this is an open wound for me that never healed. In 2000, Florida environmentalists were upset with Al Gore for not publicly making statements against the Homestead airport. From my perspective, he was staying silent until the environmental assessment was complete, so it did not appear he was interfering in the process. Even more, it looked like the Clinton Administration was slow walking the environmental decision until after the election so they would not upset the Gore supporters who strongly advocated for the proposed commercial airport.

On January 16, 2001, four days before the Clinton Administration left office, the Air Force rejected the airport plan as “inappropriate.” By then, the election was over, and Al Gore lost.

In the fall of 2000, I pleaded to no avail with environmentalists in south Florida who were upset with Al Gore to not vote for Green Party candidate Ralph Nader. In late October, Nader flew to south Florida and publicly spoke out against the Homestead Airport, criticizing Gore in the process. This was music to the ears of many environmental activists trying to stop the airport.

For the November 3, 2000 Presidential election, Ralph Nader ended up 96,000 votes in Florida. Al Gore lost the state to George W. Bush by 537 votes. In his 2002 book Crashing the Party, Ralph Nader admits on page 276 that the Homestead Airport issue was a ‘”another ‘what-if’ that might have brought Gore the state of Florida and the White House.”

In his June 23, 2002 article, Washington Post writer Michael Grunwald quoted Nathaniel Reed, a prominent South Florida conservationist who served in the Nixon administration, who said the airport issue cost Gore “conservatively, at least 10,000 votes.”

To this day, I still feel raw that the strongest candidate on the environment at that time was abandoned by many Florida environmental voters. Al Gore was the man who wrote the landmark book Earth in the Balance that impacted me to be become an environmental activist. He was a strong advocate for protecting the Everglades. If one read between the lines, you could see that Al Gore was not favor of a Homestead commercial airport.

Al Gore was a visionary for climate action who would be featured in the 2006 documentary An Inconvenient Truth. That film won the Academy Award for the best documentary at the 2007 Oscars ceremony. This is the same man who would go on to co-win the Nobel Peace Prize, along with the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, for his climate advocacy. It’s the same person who would take his proceeds from An Inconvenient Truth to create the Climate Reality Project. That organization led by Al Gore would train thousands of volunteers to become effective climate advocates, including me.

From 2012 to 2019, I attended eight Climate Reality Trainings, seven as a mentor to guide new Climate Reality Leaders. Al Gore led all those trainings, giving up to a 3-hour slide show explaining the problem and solutions to the climate crisis. Plus, he led many of the panel discussions during these trainings. Even more, I met and chatted with him during the 2015 Climate Reality Training in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. At each training, I marveled how much he knew about climate change and his passion to make a difference on that issue. These trainings were bittersweet for me to see him in person. Yet, I was angry because he should have elected President in 2000.

End of Part I of For Climate Action, let’s protect our democracy

In part 2, of this blog series, I will cover my experience living in the years 2001 to 2007 with my disgust with President George W. Bush and my thrill with the return of Al Gore. Stay tuned!  

“Very few people on earth ever get to say: ‘I am doing, right now, the most important thing I could possibly be doing.’ If you’ll join this fight, that’s what you’ll get to say.”
– Environmental author and activist Bill McKibben speaking about the climate movement.

How would you like have fun getting involved in the climate movement? Heck, you might even meet the person of your dreams. That’s what happened to me!

Since 2008, my life’s mission is to take action to reduce the threat of climate change. From 1992 to 2017, I was a seasonal park ranger in the national parks. I worked in my summers at Crater Lake National Park, Oregon and winters working in Everglades National Park, Florida.

In 1998, I started giving ranger talks in Everglades National Park. Visitors then asked me about this global warming thing. Visitors hate when park rangers tell you, “I don’t know.” Visitors expect park rangers to know everything. Don’t you?

Soon afterwards, I rushed to the nearest Miami bookstore and to the park library to read all I the scientific books I could find on climate change.

The information I learned really scared me, specifically sea level rise along our mangrove coastline in Everglades National Park. Sea level rose 8 inches in the 20th century, four times more than it had risen in previous centuries for the past three thousand years. Because of climate change, sea level is now expected to rise at least three feet in Everglades National Park by the end of the 21st century. The sea would swallow up most of the park and nearby Miami since the highest point of the park road less than three feet above sea level.

It shocked me that crocodiles, alligators, and Flamingos I enjoyed seeing in the Everglades could lose this ideal coastal habitat because of sea level rinse enhanced by climate change.

I became so worried about climate change that I quit my winter job in Everglades National Park in 2008. I decided to move back to my hometown of St. Louis, Missouri. I had no idea what I was going to do there. However, I knew I had to speak out, write and organize locally to inspire others to take action to reduce the threat of climate change.

It took me several years to try to figure out what to do. In March 2011, I got a short-term job at the St. Louis Science Center at their temporary climate change exhibit. At that job, I met local businessman Larry Lazar, who was also very worried about climate change. We would regularly meet for coffee early in the mornings to brainstorm. In November 2011, we co-founded the St. Louis Climate Reality Meet Up (now called Climate Meetup-St. Louis) group to discuss, learn, and take climate action.

At one of the Climate Reality-St. Louis Meet Ups in early 2012, a beautiful slender woman with long blonde hair sat at the bar drinking a birch beer. As one of the founders of the group, I walked up and introduced myself. She was shy and quiet However, she seemed interested to meet me since I was one of the leaders of the group. Her name was Tanya and I asked her how she liked her birch beer soda. She let me try some of her drink. I invited her to a planning meeting for our Meet Up group and she came.

Tanya and I struck up a friendship. I asked her to meet me for coffee to hear one of my climate change talks and she said yes. Thus, we met for coffee at a Starbucks in December 2012 and again in February 2013. I practiced climate change talks for her both times. During the second meeting, I asked her if she would be interested in having dinner and seeing a movie. We ended up eating at a fun local Indian restaurant and seeing the Jennifer Lawrence and Bradly Cooper movie, Silver Linings Playbook.

Right away, there was a wonderful chemistry between us. We started dating in March 2013. She kept coming to my climate change talks around St. Louis. In April 2013, I took the train to see her Little Rock, Arkansas when she performed with the Little Rock Sympathy. One week later, Tanya played the violin for my parents’ 50th Anniversary Party.

Tanya invited me to her parents’ house for dinner in April 2013 so they could meet me. Around that time, I dropped 7 Mentos into 2-liter bottles of diet Coke to make 25-foot fountains to demonstrate how volcanic eruptions work when I was a guest speaker for St. Louis area schools. Tanya has a quirky sense of humor like me. She thought I should bring the Mentos and Coke to demonstrate to her parents in their backyard after dinner. Her parents, Nancy and Rex Couture, didn’t say much about that demonstration in their backyard. They seemed to enjoy it and they liked meeting me.

That summer, Tanya came to visit me at my summer ranger job at Crater Lake National Park. She saw me narrate a trolley tour around Crater Lake. We then went to see Redwoods National Park in northern California. We stayed at a beautiful beachside motel just south of Crescent City just yards from the ocean. It was fun to hike along the beach and along the big trees. She thought it was hilarious how I craned my neck up to look at the Redwoods and remark, “Big Trees!” She then mimicked what I said. When I asked her if we could take a selfie with my digital camera, she had never heard that term. Afterwards, she kept going, “Selfie!” to because the sound of that word sounded so silly.

Through Tanya, I was invited to speak at a climate change event when I returned to St. Louis for the winter that October. In December 2013, her good friend Connie who manages a library in north St. Louis asked me to give a climate change talk at her library. January 2014, Tanya and I started filming goofy videos for YouTube where we promoted ourselves as the “Climate Change Comedian and the Violinist!”

By the summer of 2014, we had so much fun being around each other that each of us was starting to think about marriage. Tanya got a job at the visitor center at Crater Lake for the summers of 2014 and 2015 so we could be together. We had fun driving from Crater Lake to St. Louis in October 2014, briefly stopping for a day to visit Yellowstone National Park. I proposed to her on Christmas Eve, 2014 at Castlewood State Park, located west of St. Louis. My proposal was on one knee at a bench high on a bluff overlooking the Meramec River and a vast Missouri forest.

Throughout 2015, we had so much fun planning our November 1st wedding with Tanya’s mother, Nancy. Tanya and Nancy laughed and approved all my goofy ideas for the wedding. My inflatable Earth Ball that I use for all my climate change talks played a dominant role in the wedding. The minister for our ceremony, Darla Goodrich, talked about our love for the earth and protecting creation from climate change during her homily. Tanya chose to wear a beautiful green dress. The front of our wedding bulletin had an image of the earth.

The day of our wedding was a sunny warm autumn day. We could not have asked for better weather to take our wedding photos outside. Tanya’s mother, Nancy, is originally from Denmark. Nine of her family members flew from Denmark for this wedding. We must have had around 100 people attend our wedding and reception. Nancy gave a fabulous toast at our reception. She welcomed me into the family and stated she admired my climate advocacy.

My best man was Larry Lazar, who I had co-founded the Climate Reality-St. Louis Meetup. Without Larry asking me to co-create this Meet Up, I am not sure if I would have met Tanya. Thus, all the credit goes to him. Larry gave a wonderful toast how Tanya and I met and about all my climate change efforts. During the toast, he invited the reception guests to come to our next meet-up, a screening of the Merchants of Doubt documentary, on Sunday, November 14, 2015.

Surprisingly, two people from the reception came to this event two weeks later. Larry joked during his toast, and I concurred, that people should come because maybe they too might meet the person of their dreams, like Tanya and I did.

Tanya has been so supportive of all my climate change organizing, public speaking and lobbying over the years. She flew with my mom and I in April 2016 to Los Angeles when the Comedy Central TV show Tosh.o taped an episode with host Daniel Tosh interviewing me. I appeared as “The Climate Change Comedian” and my mom played the comedic role as the overbearing mom. In November 2016, Tanya joined me for a short trip to Ottawa, Canada, when I spoke at the Citizens Climate Lobby Canada Conference. Tanya and I then attended separate lobby meetings with members of the Canadian Parliament to lobby them for climate action.

In October 2018, Tanya joined me for a speaking tour across Missouri. During this trip, I gave climate change talks at my alma mater William Jewell College, the University of Missouri in Columbia MO, St. Louis University, St. Louis Community College, and Oakville High School, where I graduated in 1987. Over the years, I have given over 200 climate change talks in over 12 U.S. states. I could not have done all my climate actions without her.

She is my best friend. We have fun hiking together and just hanging out. Today is our 8th wedding anniversary and we are still very happily married.

In all my climate change talks, I share the story how Tanya and I met. I then say, “If you join the climate movement, you might meet the person of your dreams!”

The audience members always laugh. Some of the older men jokingly respond, “Sign me up!”

So, what are you waiting for? It’s time for you to join the climate movement. You might meet the person of your dreams!

“Speak the truth even if your voice shakes.”
– Maggie Kuhn, American activist and founder of the Gray Panthers movement.

On June 1, 2023, I had the opportunity to speak truth to power. I first heard that expression “Speak truth to power” from former Vice President Al Gore from the 2017 documentary about him An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power and his 2017 companion book by the same title.

According to dictionary.com, “The specific phrase speak truth to power is credited to Bayard Rustin in 1942. Rustin was a Black Quaker and a leader in the Civil Rights Movement, advocating nonviolent methods in his fight for social justice. In a letter written that year, Rustin stated that ‘the primary social function of a religious society is to “speak the truth to power.” The truth is that war is wrong.’”

As a climate change organizer since 2010, I found that expression, “speak truth to power,” to be very empowering when Al Gore spoke it in 2017. After I was aware of the phrase, I wanted to find opportunities to “speak truth to power” about the climate crisis and urge elected officials to enact policy solutions to reduce the threat.

On May 31, 2023, Ethan Krow called and texted me. He is the Senior Campaign Strategist at Stuart Collective, a Portland Oregon communications organization that organizes for progressive causes and candidates. Ethan asked me to come to the Oregon Capitol on Wednesday, June 1st at 5 pm to attend a legislative hearing.

Just an hour before Ethan contacted me, Oregon Senate Republican Leader, Senator Tim Knopp, issued a press release. It announced, “The first Joint Committee on Oversight and Accountability will be held on Thursday, June 1st at 5:00 PM in H-174. Members of the Oregon Legislature and members of the public are invited to bring their experiences and observations related to state government and where it requires greater oversight.”

This was a strange public statement. Julia Shumway, Deputy Editor of the Oregon Capitol Chronicle and a media reporter at the Oregon Capitol, tweeted an image of the press release. She commented on Twitter, “As (Oregon Republican Senators’) walkout enters its fifth week, they are holding an unofficial committee hearing about government oversight tomorrow.”

Ethan alerted me that Oregon Republican Senators scheduled to hold an unofficial “sham” hearing with no Democratic legislators planning to attend. As of May 31st, Oregon Senate Republicans had “walked out” the Senate floor for five weeks, the longest legislative walkout in Oregon history. The Oregon Constitution has a quorum rule that 2/3rds of the members of each legislative chamber, the House and Senate, must be present on the floor to vote and pass legislation. The Republican Senators walked out to prevent Senate votes on bills to address abortion access, gun control, and gender affirming care.

Even though they refused to set foot on the Senate Floor to vote on legislation, Republican Senators still joined the Democratic Senators in committee meetings to hold public hearings and work on legislation. Oddly, GOP Senators and their Republican House colleagues created this unofficial Joint Committee on Oversight and Accountability for greater scrutiny of state government without input or an agreement with the Democratic legislators. Thus, no Oregon Democratic Senators or Representatives joined this committee.

With only one-party present, this committee meeting looked to be more of a media spectacle than a committee working on serious legislative business. There was a possibility the committee would invite the public to come forward give comments. Thus, Ethan wanted to pack the room with progressive leaning advocates like me to call out and embarrass the GOP Senators for attending this committee meeting while they refused to end their Senate floor walkout.

In my phone call and text with Ethan, I told him that I could attend. However, I don’t like to drive to Salem. My wife, Tanya, and I share a car. Tanya uses our car daily to commute to work. Even more, I don’t like the heavy traffic on I-5 from Portland to Salem which can make the hour drive much longer. I don’t like the wear and tear on my car to drive to Salem, plus there are parking fees to park by the Capitol Building. Even more, as a climate advocate, I don’t like to burn my own fossil fuels using my car to travel to Salem. Therefore, I made it clear to Ethan that I would be happy to go to Salem the next day if I could find someone to carpool with to the Capitol.

Ethan agreed he would help find a ride for me to Salem. I asked around some of my climate friends. I discovered that Rich Peppers, who I know from the Metro Climate Action Team, planned to go to Salem to attend this committee meeting. Rich offered me a ride in his electric car, a Chevy Bolt. Thus, I was all set to go to Salem for the committee meeting the next day.

Rich and I arrived inside the Oregon Capitol Building around 4:30 pm. Ethan and other paid organizers directed us to the Committee room inside the Capitol where the meeting scheduled to start at 5 pm. Ethan was uncertain if there would be public testimony. However, if there was, he encouraged us to testify to strongly urge the Republican Senators to end the walkout.

When we arrived in the committee room, we saw around 20 people seated. They all looked like Oregon Democratic allies. We were surprised that we saw no Republican supporters. We figured that some would show up, but they never did. It was shocking and amusing that the Republican legislators and their staff were disorganized by not inviting their supporters.

The Republican legislators walked into the committee room and sat in their chairs behind the dais. They called the meeting into session. Each committee member gave an opening statement for why this committee is necessary for more government accountability and oversight. They stated that they hoped their Democratic colleagues would eventually join this committee.

After they finished with all their opening statements, which took 24 minutes, they announced they would open the meeting for public comments. They made it clear that this committee was about promoting a better and more efficient state government. They intended to expose corruption and unethical actions by state government officials and agencies. They wanted to hear from the public at this meeting, especially any potential whistleblowers, to let them know where the state government was falling short on the job.

Yes, all of us seated in the gallery were ready to let them know exactly where we were completely unsatisfied with state government: The Republican Senate walkout. One by one, citizens walked up to the microphone to introduce themselves. Each person expressed in their own words how unhappy we were the GOP Senate walkout. We insisted they end the walkout immediately and start voting on bills.

Julia Shumway from the Oregon Capitol Chronicle was in the room. She posted live tweets with frequent updates about the meeting, including a summary of what each speaker said.

I was the fifth speaker. This was my opportunity to “speak truth to power.” It was my chance to let these Republican Senators I was furious with their walkout. I insisted that they end it immediately to vote on vital bills, including legislation waiting votes for climate action.

This was an unofficial committee with no nonpartisan legislative staff. Instead, Senator Knopp’s and Rep. Breese-Iverson’s aides filled in as staff. Oddly, they did not post agendas or stream video on the official legislative website known as OLIS (Oregon Legislative Information System). However, the Oregon Senate GOP Twitter page posted a video recording of the meeting.

The video camera pointed at the legislators for the entire committee meeting. Thus, you cannot see me or the other individuals who gave oral testimony. However, you can hear us clearly on the video. From that video, I created a video of my oral testimony, that I uploaded to YouTube. Below the YouTube link, I typed out a transcript of my oral testimony for you to read.

My June 1st oral testimony to Oregon Joint Committee on Oversight and Accountability

“My name is Brian Ettling. Members of the committee, thank you so much for this opportunity to be here today. I live in outer northeast Portland.

For 25 years, I was a seasonal park ranger at Crater Lake National Park. Hopefully, everyone has been there. One of the most beautiful places in the world. It is such a gem in Oregon. I know with my job that I had to show up for work every day, and I had to do all the duties with my job. I could not choose which programs I could, or I did not want to do. I had to do all the programs assigned to me by my boss.

That’s the same thing for all of you, all the Republican Senators. Show up on the floor. Do your job! You don’t have to vote for the bills. Do your job!

When I was working at Crater Lake, I saw climate change. Climate change is happening here in Oregon. I saw our snowpack going down in the 25 years that I was working there. I saw the fire season getting worse and worse. We need to pass bills for protecting our forests. We need to address issues such as homelessness and affordable housing.

This will only happen if YOU show up on the floor and vote. Please don’t waste this legislative session just to have a tantrum here. Do your job! Be adults in the room. Put on your big boy pants.

That is why so many of us are here today because we are tired of the games that you are playing. Thank you so much for this opportunity.”

The aftermath of my testimony to this Oregon Legislative Committee

Eleven Oregonians gave testimony demanding the GOP Senators end their walkout to return to the Oregon Senate floor immediately to vote on bills. That was the only message from the public. After everyone testified, Republican Senator Tim Knopp gave a statement that the reason for their walk out was that the Democratic Senators were treating them unfairly with an “unlawful, uncompromising, unconstitutional agenda.”

The audience did not buy Senator Knopp’s message. As the GOP legislators stood up to leave the committee room, the crowd clapped and chanted “QUORUM!” I will never forget how the Republican legislators left the room with their shoulders hunched and looking downcast. This committee meeting did not go anything like they planned. The looks on their faces showed it was a publicity disaster. The media accounts that evening and the next day indicated it was.

That evening, local CBS Portland TV station KOIN 6, reported on the committee meeting and quoted me for the story. KOIN 6 noted, “None during public testimony spoke in support of the walkout. As the committee meeting wrapped, there was no direct response to the public testimony pleas.” They showed video footage of us chanting “quorum” as the GOP legislators left the committee room.

On June 2nd, Julia Shumway wrote a story for the Oregon Capitol Chronicle about the committee meeting. This article quoted me and others who gave testimony. Julia reported in the article that “11 Oregonians – most from the area around the Capitol, but some who had driven in from as far as Tillamook County – calling on Republican senators to return.”

This article was picked up by newspapers across Oregon. It was a publicity fiasco for the Republicans. The next day, I received texts and emails from friends who work at the Capitol as legislative aides and lobbyists thanking me for my oral testimony.

A friend working for the Democratic Senate President texted me, “Your testimony looked so cathartic! Thank you for putting words to all our feelings. Your KOIN interview was great too! They ran with it.”

Meredith Connolly, Director of Climate Solutions, an Oregon climate advocacy group that lobbies the legislators emailed me,
“Deep appreciation for you, Brian.
Thanks for all you do, speaking no nonsense truth to these irresponsible ‘leaders’ still in power.”

She added, “I hope your message sinks in too. I think it is reflective of the majority of Oregonians.”

My legislators, Senator Kayse Jama and Representative Andrea Valderrama, complimented me on my testimony when they saw me at public events that summer. At an August 29th town hall, Rep. Valderrama told the audience that she was proud I was one of her constituents when she saw me on TV. She happened to see the KOIN 6 News story about the committee meeting. Her 8-year-old daughter was curious about the story and wanted to meet me at the town hall.

The Republican legislators ended the walkout two weeks later on June 15th. The Democrats watered down their bills on abortion rights, gender affirming care, and gun safety to entice them to return to the Oregon Senate floor. The full Oregon Senate barely had enough time to pass pass hundreds of bills before the legislative session came to its constitutional end on June 29th.

On Saturday, June 28th, it was a relief for me that major climate priority bills for the 2023 passed the Senate before the session ended the next day. On April 8th, I testified to the Joint Ways and Means Committee to support the Natural Climate Solutions Bill. It allows financial incentives for voluntarily managing Oregon’s farms, forests, ranches, and natural lands for carbon sequestration. In addition, I urged them to support the four Building Resilience Bills.

The Building Resilience bills align energy efficiency programs and building codes with state climate goals for rapid deployment of heat pumps, weatherization, and building retrofits for Oregonians. Even more, these bills will improve energy efficiency of existing large commercial buildings and state government buildings, including schools.

On that Saturday afternoon, I watched the Oregon Senate floor session live as those climate bills passed with a few hours to spare before the session ended. I was nervous to see if those bills would squeak through with all the other hundreds of bills that the Oregon Senate needed to pass on the final days of the session. I was very relieved and happy when those bills passed. Whew! I texted the Oregon Senators that I know personally to thank them for their support.

Final Thoughts: pay attention to your state legislature and SPEAK TRUTH TO POWER

The best advice I received as a climate organizer was from my fellow Climate Reality Leader and Citizens’ Climate Lobby friend, Greg Hamra. He once said: ‘Do you know who your member of Congress is? Wait! Better yet: Do they know who you are?’

I extended Greg’s advice getting to know state legislators and local elected officials. I show up at many local events and chat with them, so they know who I am as a climate organizer. I hope I leave an impression to make passing and enacting climate action a high priority for them as elected officials. To be effective at climate organizing or any kind of organizing, one must know who are the key elected officials that can pass significant climate policy.

For members of Congress to know who you are, they want to see that you are reaching out in coalition to other climate or environmental groups. Even more, the members of Congress listen to key stake holders of the community, such as local elected officials when deciding on policy positions. For five years now, I have contacted my Oregon representatives and senators and other Oregon legislators to urge them to pass strong climate legislation. Even more, I organized two large events, one in September 2019 and the other in January 2020 to urge Oregon legislators to pass a statewide cap and invest bill to address climate change.

In 2019 and 2020, cap and invest bills in the Oregon legislature fell short of passage. Not because of lack of Democratic votes. There were enough Democratic votes to pass these bills. These bills failed because of Republican legislative walkouts denying the 2/3rds chamber floor quorum to pass these bills. As with many climate advocates in Oregon, I felt devastated when Republican legislators used that trick to stop these bills.

An Oregon media source, KGW 8 News, noted 10 legislative walkouts in the Oregon Legislature since 1971, over a period of 52 years. However, 7 of those 10 walkouts happened since 2019. A four-year time frame! At a town hall lead by Oregon Senator Michael Dembrow that I attended earlier this year, he shared a quote from a legislator commenting about a walkout that happened decades ago, ‘If they become accepted, they will be expected.’

Sadly, the walkouts have become accepted by Oregon Republican Senators and expected by many of their constituents. In 2021, the Republican Senators decided not to walk out over a gun control bill. As a result, the conservative constituents of Senate Minority Leader Fred Girod and Senator Lynn Findley unsuccessfully tried to organize to file recall petition against them after they didn’t walk out to prevent a vote on a Democrat-sponsored gun control bill. Thus, Oregon Republican Senators face intense heat from their constituents to walk out to prevent passage of Democratic Senate bills on gun control, raising taxes to fund schools, abortion, gender affirming care, and prominent legislation to address climate change.

Many Americans don’t realize the power their state legislators have in shaping nationwide policies. In 1932, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis referred to state governments as ‘laboratories of democracy’ that can “try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.’

In the past century, state legislatures led efforts, such as for workers’ rights in Wisconsin, Louisiana creating a precursor to President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal programs, Mitt Romney’s efforts to healthcare as governor of Massachusetts served as a template for President Obama’s Affordable Care Act, and multiple states pushed in the legalization of gay marriage. Unfortunately, David Pepper, a political activist, former elected official, adjunct professor, and the Chairman of the Ohio Democratic Party between 2015 and 2021, warned in his 2021 book that conservative leaning states have become Laboratories of Autocracy.

In recent years, states with Republican dominated legislatures have passed laws to reverse workers’ protections, ban abortions, loosen gun control laws, suppress voter turnout, and allow for heavily gerrymandered districts to keep themselves in power against the will of the voters.

Why is this happening? According to David Pepper, “Too few people, including those in politics, understand the immense power–the potential for both good and ill–in our nation’s statehouses.” He went on to say, “If the average voter doesn’t know or care what state reps do and can do, but insiders and interests know exactly what they do and can do, that’s dangerous. And a huge vulnerability to the common good.” (his emphasis)

David Pepper then explains the overlooked importance of state legislatures. They distribute federal funding to local communities and citizens. Local governments must operate within the defined powers given to the by the state legislatures. State legislatures write the laws the defines the parameters and duties as well as the laws that must be followed by statewide office holders, such as the Governor, Attorney General, Secretary of State, State Treasurer, etc. They hold the power over how federal, state, and even local elections are administered in the state. They draw Congressional and legislative districts after the U.S. Census is held every 10 years. Oh, and they set the state budget, among their other powers.

The people who are elected as your state legislators matter. Even more, the party that controls your state legislative chambers matter. It is important to know if they are passing effective bills for climate action. If your legislators are, thank them. If they are not, call their offices, email them, write a letter, or attend their town halls to urge them to support strong climate legislation. If they refuse or ignore you, support their opponent in the next election. If they don’t have an opponent, run for office. It is jaw dropping how many state legislative races and even local election races go uncontested with just one candidate running.

When your legislators hold public hearings on good or bad legislation that impacts the environment and the climate, show up to give public testimony. I have given oral testimony to legislative committees numerous times. I enjoyed testifying to look legislators to tell my story why they should support or reject a specific bill. It is a very empowering experience.

Even more, your legislators might hold bogus hearings on oversight and accountability. While they hold that hearing, they could be refusing to perform their required job duties such as showing up on the chamber floor to vote on vital legislation. If they do that, like what recently happened in Oregon, make sure you show up and SPEAK TRUTH TO POWER!

“A man or woman could hardly ask for a better way to make a living
than as a seasonal ranger for the National Park Service.”
– American environmentalist author Edward Abbey from his 1973 book Cactus Country

From 1996 to 2017, I proudly worked as a seasonal park ranger in the national parks. When I write about my life, I mostly simplify to say that I worked as a park ranger at Crater Lake National Park, Oregon and Everglades National Park, Florida from 1992 to 2017.

Upon graduating from William Jewell College with a Business Administration degree in 1992, I knew that I did not want to office cubical or for a large corporation in my work career. The idea of making money just to make money just never appealed to me. My desire was to get the most out of life, see as much of the world as I could, while living in beautiful and scenic locations.

My first seasonal summer jobs working at Crater Lake National Park, Oregon 1992-2005

I arrived at Crater Lake National Park on May 20, 1992, to work in the Rim Village gift store for the summer. With the deep cobalt blue color of the lake and the glistening snowcapped mountains surrounding it, I felt like I found my new home. I enjoyed hiking up the mountain peak trails to get a bird’s eye view of the area and the satisfaction of the exercise it took to reach the mountain summits. I loved how quiet the park was during the day, except for an occasional airplane flying overhead. You could hear the wind whispering through the trees. The sunsets over the lower western Cascade Mountains on a clear night were not to be missed. The sky over Crater Lake were so dark on a moonless night that I had never seen the Milky way as clear or so many stars in the sky.

I loved my summers at Crater Lake. I spent the summers of 1992-94 working in the Crater Lake gift store. The General Manager of the Crater Lake concessionaire talked me into working the night auditor position at the rehabilitated Crater Lake Lodge during the grand re-opening summer of 1995. I quickly discovered that working graveyard shifts was not my cup of tea. I was sleeping during the daytime beauty of Crater Lake.

In 1996, the National Park Service (NPS) hired me to be an Entrance Station ranger at Crater Lake. I wore the ranger uniform with pride as I welcomed visitors to Crater Lake and charged them the $5 entrance fee. I was working in a tiny entrance station booth, which was more like a box. The park entrance road was surrounded by the tall skinny lodgepole pine trees. Except for the stream of vehicle traffic in the summer, it felt like I was working in the woods.

For the summer of 1997, it was soul satisfying to return to this Crater Lake entrance station ranger job. That summer NPS changed the job title to Visitor Use Assistant. I did not care what they called me. I was delighted to spend my summers at Crater Lake. I typically worked at Crater Lake from early May into sometime in October. I skipped the summers of 1998-2001 to work year-round as a natural guide in the Everglades. I returned to work summers at the Crater Lake entrance stations from 2002 to 2005.

My first seasonal winter jobs working in Everglades National Park, Florida 1992-1995

The weak point of the Crater Lake jobs was that they were only temporary summer jobs. Thus, I had to find another seasonal job for the winter in those months to mark time before returning to Crater Lake for the summer. Fortunately, the peak season for Everglades National Park visitation in Florida was from late November to early April. I arrived at the Flamingo Outpost in Everglades National Park in December 1992. My first job was working in housekeeping. I then transferred to a Front Desk job at the Flamingo Lodge.

Unlike Crater Lake, I was disappointed with my first views of the Everglades. The sawgrass prairie, which made up much of the park, looked as flat as the eye could see. It looked like a Midwest farm field, not at all like the iconic western national parks with towering mountains. The only high features in the Everglades were the lofty clouds that I had to imagine they were as high and dominating as the Rocky Mountains, Cascades or Sierra Nevada Mountain ranges.

My seasonal housing unit looked out into the subtropical Florida Bay, which made up the lower third of Everglades National Park. Numerous mangrove islands dotted the shallow Florida Bay. In the western part of the bay, the water blended into the Gulf of Mexico. As a child growing up in the landlocked St. Louis, Missouri, I dreamed of living close to the ocean to see that horizon line where the ocean met the sky with no land to interfere. Flamingo was probably the cheapest place in Florida to live next to the ocean, even if Florida Bay was considered an estuary, a place where inland freshwater met and mixed with seawater from the ocean.

It felt very tranquil to live by so much water. Surrounding our housing area and Flamingo were subtropical mangrove trees living in the shallow waters and coconut palms stood by the higher solid grounds of the buildings. The Everglades had a fascinating variety of wildlife with alligators, crocodiles, dolphins, manatees, deer, raccoons, and a wide variety of colorful wading birds. November to April is the dry season in the Everglades where it rains occasionally and is most sunny most of the time. The high temperature from December to April is in the upper 70s to lower 80s. South Florida is a fun place to comfortably wear shorts in the depths of winter.

To mark time until I could return to Crater Lake, I made the best out of working winters in the Everglades. I skipped two winters in 1993-94 and 1994-95 to spend time with family in St. Louis. I returned to Flamingo in the winter of 1995-96 to work as a night auditor at the lodge front desk. I thought I would use my Business Administration college degree to do this accounting job to balance the daily receipts at the lodge. Like my 1995 summer at Crater Lake, I was a glutton for punishment working this overnight job. It was stressful to complete all the office work in time. The computers were finicky and glitchy with no one around to assist if I ran into technical issues. It was a brutal sleep schedule and hard on my dating relationship at that time. I vowed to never do that job again.

Working as an Everglades naturalist boat tour guide 1998-2002

I skipped working in the Everglades in 1996 to 1997 to visit family in St. Louis. It was good to be home that winter because to be at the hospital hours after my oldest niece and goddaughter, Rachel was born. When I returned to Everglades National Park in November 1997, I worked front desk at the Flamingo Lodge. In early January 1998, a naturalist guide position opened to narrate the boat tours in Flamingo. I applied for the position and started in late January 1998.

In the summers of 1992-1994 at Crater Lake, I volunteered to lead church services at the campground amphitheater on Sunday mornings for A Christian Ministries in the National Parks (ACMNP). I grew up as a church going Christian, plus I was influenced by my maternal grandfather, Arthur Johnson Sr, who was a charismatic Baptist Minister. Since I was a child, I enjoyed giving speeches at school. ACMNP recruited me while I was in college to volunteer for them leading church services in a national park and they would find a job for me. They found my first gift store job at Crater Lake in the summer of 1992 and my housekeeping job working in Flamingo in the winter of 1992. Thus, I was an ACMNP volunteer in Everglades National Park during the winter of 1992-93.

I liked the opportunity to do public speaking leading the church services. It was extra responsiblies while working full time in the national parks. The good news was that it was typically a new group of visitors attending each weekend. I could recycle my sermons and not necessarily come up with a new talk every weekend. As I worked in the national parks, I knew that I eventually wanted to become an interpretive park ranger. They lead the public ranger talks, guided hikes, guided canoe trips, narrating boat tours, presenting evening campfire programs, etc. They looked like they had the most fun of any job working in the national parks. Flamingo had the tradition of the ACMNP volunteer leading the sunrise Christmas and Easter boat trip each year.

Everglades did not have an ACMNP volunteer to lead the Christmas morning sunrise tour in December 1997. I volunteered to lead the service. The service went exceptionally well. We had over 40 people on board the boat that held over 97 people. It was an astonishing sunrise over Florida Bay. I spoke briefly on the meaning of Christmas before we experienced a captivating sunrise. Leading that service helped me land the concession naturalist job. The lead naturalist, Rob Parenti, was on board that board that morning as the first mate to assist the boat captain. He saw me in action. Rob noticed I was very comfortable with public speaking. He joked after I got the Flamingo boat tour naturalist guide job that he knew I would be a good fit because he could tell that “I liked to talk a lot.”

This naturalist boat tour guide job was my first time talking full time for a living. I loved that job at the time. I narrated two different boat tours, one into the more open waters of Florida Bay and the other boat tour up the Buttonwood Canal into the backcountry waters of the Everglades. I pointed out alligators, crocodiles, manatees, dolphins, and various wading birds to the boat passengers. It was fun to learn about the history of the Everglades, the Native Americans, and the outlaws that settled in the Everglades.

It was great to talk about how and why the Everglades became a national park in 1947. Unlike western national parks which were protected for their dramatic scenery, the Everglades National Park was the first national park in the world protected for its biodiversity. Florida conservationists wanted it protected because of its wide diversity of plants and animals.

I greatly admired “The mother of the Everglades” Marjory Stoneman Douglas who fought many years to protect the Everglades. She wrote the most renowned 1947 book, The Everglades: River of Grass. She opened the book by writing,

“There are no other Everglades in the world. They are, they have always been, one of the unique regions of the earth, remote, never wholly known…The miracle of the light pours over the green and brown expanse of saw grass and of water, shining and slow-moving below, the grass and water that is the meaning and the central fact of the Everglades of Florida. It is a river of grass.”

I shared that quote and others from Marjory Stoneman Douglas during my boat tour narrations. She lived to 108 years old. She passed away in May 1998, just months after I became an Everglades naturalist guide. It felt like her torch moved on to me and others in my generation to cherish and protect the Everglades. When possible, I made sure park visitors knew about her during my interactions.

Most of all, this job gave me a great opportunity to talk about the importance of saving the Everglades, our precious environment, and our planet from the harm caused by humans. In most of my programs, I talked about how the Everglades was one of the most threatened national parks in the United States due to over development and over drainage. In December 2000, Congress passed and President Bill Clinton signed a multi-billion-dollar plan to try to save the Everglades.

I ended most of these narrations with a famous quote incorrectly attributed to Marjory Stoneman Douglas to this day. In fact, a lesser-known Everglades activist named Joe Podgor gave Marjory the iconic quote: “The Everglades is Test. — If We Pass, We May Get To Keep The Planet.”

At that time, I felt like I was doing what I could to save the planet by narrating those boat tours. I hoped I planted some seeds to inspire some individuals, especially younger individuals on these boat tours, to become environmentalists.

Working as an Everglades City winter seasonal interpretation ranger 2003-2007

By the spring of 2002, I was burned out narrating the Flamingo boat tours. I was tired of fighting with boat captains. I had enough their giant egos who were not interested in providing quality customer service and working as a team with me to provide a lifetime experience with the passengers. I detested the 10-hour days in the winter leading up to 4 two-hour tours. It was too much talking for me and started to strain my vocal cords. I became so concerned that I went to see a doctor about that. I had lost faith in the Flamingo management that did not care for my well being and low pay with the long hours and impacts on my health.

On top of all that, I missed Crater Lake National Park and the western part of the United States. I was tired how flat south Florida was. I wanted to see hills and snowcapped mountains again. Fortunately, my friend Amelia Bruno, who oversaw the Entrance Station fee program at Crater Lake, offered me my old seasonal job back of working at the entrance station. Just a few months before, I bought my first car a green (my favorite color) 2002 manual transmission Honda Civic, which I still own to this day. I wanted to go for a long cross drive in my new car.

I never worked at Flamingo again. I had a wonderful summer at Crater Lake. It was a superb summer for me to return because the park was celebrating its centennial. Congress passed a bill establishing the national park and President Theodore Roosevelt signed it into law on May 22, 1902. It was great to make new friends working in the park since I was gone for four years. It was a joy to rediscover all the trails in the park that I enjoyed hiking.

The stressful part was I did not know what I was going to do for the winter of 2002-03. I ended up going back to St. Louis to stay with my parents. I returned to the entrance station ranger job the next summer. In the summer of 2003, I had a new housemate at Crater Lake, David Grimes. He had worked seasonally in other national parks such as Congaree Swamp in South Carolina and Zion National Park. We struck up a friendship. We both applied to work as seasonal interpretation rangers in Everglades National Park that winter.

As summer turned to fall, Grimes (as he likes his friends to call him) accepted a winter seasonal position in the Everglades City district in Everglades National Park. Unfortunately, I received no word for a winter position in the Everglades. I decided to return to St. Louis for the winter, not sure what I planned to do after I returned there.

In late November, I received a phone call from Candice Tinkler, the District Supervisor Ranger at the Everglades City Visitor Center. Someone she hired for the winter declined to work there. She needed to hire a new ranger fast. She saw my name on a list of eligible candidates. Grimes highly recommended me, so she called to offer me an interpretative ranger position for the winter. She needed me to come down fast, within a week if possible. I started throwing my ranger uniforms and other belongs in the car to drive from St. Louis to Everglades City, Florida. I left shortly after Thanksgiving and arrived during the first week in December.

This was my first National Park Service interpretative ranger job. After my four years as a naturalist guide in Flamingo, this new ranger position was a ideal fit for me. I enjoyed narrating the boat tours in Everglades City, narrating the canoe trips, and giving ranger talks on the water drainage issues and the Everglades Restoration plan. I liked spending the winter in Everglades City and I ended up spending three more winters there from 2004 to 2007.

In subsequent winters working in Everglades City, I expanded to do additional ranger programs, such as guided bike tours and an evening program on the birds of the Everglades. At that time, I knew nothing about PowerPoint. Candace Tinkler left Everglades City in 2005 to work in Redwoods National Park. The new District Supervisor, Sue Reese, quickly taught me how to put together a PowerPoint presentation. I became quickly hooked on PowerPoint to create presentations. I am still enamored with PowerPoint to this day, as well as Mac Keynote since 2013, to create over 100 climate change talks since 2010.

Sue gave me an opportunity to be creative to make a temporary display in the visitor center honoring Marjory Stoneman Douglas with pictures, quotes, and brief information about her. She allowed me to create a wooden box with a mirror on the inside. The visitor center had a small display about the ecological damage and restoration plans for the Everglades. The wooden box hung by those displays. On the outside of the box, I printed out a sign, “Look inside at the person most responsible to save the Everglades.”

When the visitor opened the box, they would see a reflection of themselves. The other rangers and park visitors got a good laugh out of my display. I doubt that box with that message is still there today. However, I loved the message I conveyed that each of us is responsible for saving the Everglades, the environment, and the planet. No excuses.

My first seasons as an Interpretative Ranger at Crater Lake National Park 2006-07

I delighted as a winter seasonal interpretative ranger in Everglades City from 2003 to 2007. During those winters, I became eager to become a summer interpretative ranger at Crater Lake National Park. I applied to be a summer interpretative ranger at Crater Lake in 2005. However, Martha Hess, the Interpretative Supervisor Ranger at Crater Lake, decided that I was better suited to stay as an Entrance Station Ranger. I felt dismayed when she shared that with me. However, I was not discouraged. I applied the next winter and Martha called me in May 2006 offer me a summer season interpretative ranger position at Crater Lake. I dreamed for several years hoping to get this position. I felt ecstatic when she extended the job offer to me.

Like my previous winters working interpretation in Everglades National Park, I was overjoyed working as an interpretative ranger at Crater Lake National Park in the summers of 2006 and 2007. After many years of working other jobs at Crater Lake, I felt triumphant leading a lodge talk about the park founder William Gladstone Steel, giving a geology talk, and narrating the boat tours that summer. In late August, I had to debut a junior ranger program and an evening campfire program when other rangers left for the season to return to their teaching jobs.

I loved using PowerPoint, but I found it stressful to pull together an evening program while working full time without much office time to craft it. I pulled a couple of all-nighters without much sleep, and I presented a new evening on the birds of Crater Lake at the campground amphitheater in late August 2006. It was a huge relieve to have this ranger program completed. Most Crater Lake rangers are required to debut their evening program in their second season at Crater Lake. However, Crater Lake was short of rangers to give evening programs in August 2006. Thus, I was required to present an evening campfire program my first summer.

I received good audience responses from my Birds of Crater Lake evening program. It soon became my favorite ranger talk. I loved making the campfire and interacting with the large audience of visitors before, during and after my evening ranger program. When I returned to Crater Lake for 2007, I was eager to give this talk. After I had created this program, I was thankful Grimes pushed me hard to debut it in 2006. Otherwise, like most Crater Lake interpretive rangers, I would have spent the winter worried about constructing this program.

The lead interpretative ranger, David Grimes, was impressed with my Lodge talk I put together about the founder of Crater Lake National Park, William Gladstone Steel. He thought we should videotape my talk. We would then submit the video to the NPS Interpretative Office as Harper’s Ferry to see if they would certify this program. We filmed my talk in August 2006. I waited that winter to see if the NPS Office certified this talk.

When I returned to Crater Lake in June 2007, I received the good news announced during seasonal training that they certified my talk. Twelve years later, I uploaded this video to YouTube so you can see this talk. Learning about William Gladstone Steel when I assembled this talk had a big influence on my life. I wrote about him earlier this year, The historical person who inspired me to be a Climate Lobbyist.

In 2007, I had a terrific summer as an interpretative ranger at Crater Lake. I worked hard the previous summer to create all my ranger programs. Thus, I could enjoy my free time more in early July knowing that my ranger talks were ready from the previous summer. I just had to review my notes for all these programs. I felt like I improved each time I gave these ranger programs. It was a terrific summer, but then tragedy struck.

The tragedy of losing my Everglades and Crater Lake mentor, Steve Robinson

In August 2007, we received news that fellow Crater Lake ranger Steve Robinson had pancreatic cancer. It was stage 4 and incurable. I knew Steve since I attended his ranger evening program in Flamingo in Everglades National Park in February 1993. When I returned to Crater Lake National Park for the summer, he narrated the boat tour I traveled on as a passenger in July 1993. I discovered that Steve and his wife Amelia Bruno were seasonal park rangers like me that spent their winters in Flamingo and their summers at Crater Lake.

In the years that followed, I stuck up a friendship with Steve and Amelia. He became a mentor to me how to be a good ranger, human being, and a man. When I worked in Flamingo and Crater Lake, I came to Steve and Amelia’s house to spend hours with Steve to learn his wisdom.

I learned a lot from Steve trying to absorb his wisdom. At that time, I wrote down inspiration quotes from to pin on my bedroom bulletin board. Steve was an optimist who would respond to cynicism, “Just because it has not happened yet does not mean it can never happen.”

Steve was a fourth generation Floridian who had a deep love for the Everglades and natural world. For 25 years, he worked as a seasonal park ranger in Everglades National Park. Steve had the good fortunate to meet the ‘Mother of the Everglades’ Marjory Stoneman Douglas one time when he worked as a ranger. He happened to see her at one of the scenic overlooks in the park and struck up a brief conversation with her when they were both admiring a scenery. Steve loved to quote Marjory and share her stories.

Steve had the gift of connecting with park visitors and people caught up in momentary short term, knee jerk, superficial thinking. One time, Steve told me, “My goal in life is to remove the rocks that other people’s paths.”

Steve had great stories to try to shift other people’s perspective. At the start of my March 8, 2012 blog and March 2012 Toastmasters speech, I shared this story about Steve. In his spare time as a seasonal ranger in the Everglades, Steve would drive up to a scenic overlook in the park known as Pa-hay-okee. He loved to sit there and look over the beautiful scene of a saw grass prairie stretching out to the horizon as far as the eye could see. One occasion, when he was there for a time, a park visitor drove his car up to the nearby parking lot. The visitor grabbed his camera from the car and quickly ran to the overlook. When he got there, the visitor felt disappointed in the lack of action and the flatness of the plain saw grass vista. He mumbled, “Nothing.”

Steve smiled at him. He looked at the sawgrass prairie, stretched out his arms, and proclaimed “Everything.”

The last several summers that Steve worked at Crater Lake National Park, he worked at the Watchman Peak Fire Lookout. He would scan for wildfires. In addition, he relished the opportunities to engage with park visitors who hiked the trail, which was less than a mile long with over an elevation gain of 420 feet. The view at the summit provided one of the best panoramic views of Crater Lake and the surrounding area. Visitors often were flabbergasted on the summit, unsure of what to say with this 360 bird’s eye of view of the area. One visitor commented to Steve, “Looks like I reached the end.”

Steve was amused by the statement. He responded, “No, you reached the beginning.”

Steve and I laughed at this story because I could totally relate. As a park ranger and avid hiker, I observed that visitors often did not know what to do when they reached a mountain summit. Some look disappointed or restless because they hoped for something more. Others would quickly enjoy the view, but then they hurry down eager to get to their next destination or point of interest at Crater Lake. They use a mountain summit to like a mental check list of something that they conquered and then they wanted to move onto their next goal.

Steve and I both looked at a mountain summit as a place for deep reflection. A place to truly enjoy the view. It’s a spot to truly ponder life and our place in the world. A location to bring a lunch, meditate, read a book, and observe the world. With patience, one might see a bird soaring or other wildlife. It’s a great place to people watch or even start up a conversation with a stranger, as Steve liked to do there. Steve and I both thought of a mountain summit as the beginning, not an end. It’s a place for renewal and to reflect upon our lives.

One of the pearls of wisdom that Steve gave to me was, “Every single person makes the world every single day.”

A mountain summit can be an ideal spot to contemplate that.

In August 2007, I assumed I had years to absorb Steve’s knowledge. It shocked me when I learned he had stage 4 pancreatic cancer, one of the deadliest and aggressive forms of cancer. I visited Steve often in the hospital as his health deteriorated. During my hospital visits, he was too weak and on too many medications to talk. Sadly, Steve passed away on October 1, 2007.

I was in a daze for a year after Steve’s death. His mortality made me re-exam my own life. Steve’s quick passing at the age of 57 years old showed me that tomorrow and a long life is not guaranteed. Steve truly made the most of his life as a park ranger, musician, husband, father, friend to many, someone who loved all people, and a mentor to me. He loved life and lived everyday like it was a gift to be alive. After Steve’s death, I felt lost no longer having my mentor around. I needed to do something different with my life to overcome the loss, make the most of my life. I wanted somehow be beneficial to the world as Steve was when he was alive.

Transitioning away from spending my winters in Everglades National Park 2007-08

In early September, around the same time that my mentor Steve was tragically losing his battle to pancreatic cancer, I received an email from my Everglades City District Supervisor Sue Reece. She told me that she would be happy for me to return to Everglades City for the winter. However, she had an opening for a winter seasonal ranger in the Shark Valley area in Everglades National Park. She thought I could be a good fit to work there. The Supervisor Ranger at Shark Valley at that time, Maria Thomson told Sue, ‘I want a good seasonal interpretative ranger to work at Shark Valley this winter. Someone who cares about the Everglades and can relay that to visitors. Someone like Brian Ettling.’

With Steve’s prospects of recovering from pancreatic cancer looking dim in September 2007, I needed some good news. It was heartwarming to hear that I was needed in Shark Valley. Therefore, I decided to work at that location in Everglades National Park for the winter. I would be narrating the tram tours, giving a short ranger talk, leading bicycle tours, and possibly providing a guided bird walk. This looked like a good opportunity to try a new location in the Everglades. Maria hoped I would work there. I had an opportunity to make a difference there.

When I arrived in Shark Valley in November 2007, it did not feel like a good fit for me. I had a housemate with a very surly personality. I missed my friends in Everglades City and other parts of the park. I felt like I was living in the middle of nowhere off of Hwy 41, the Tamaimi Trail. The park housing was just a few miles west of Shark Valley, but it felt very isolating there. I could not sleep at night, and I fell into a very bad depression. I wanted to leave the Everglades, but I did not know where I wanted to go.

In my sleeplessness, depression, and restlessness, I found my life’s purpose. I wanted to carry forth my mentor Steve’s message of protecting our Earth and environment since he could no longer share that vision with others.

I recalled 1998 when I started giving ranger talks in Everglades National Park. Visitors then asked me about this global warming thing. Visitors hate when park rangers tell you, “I don’t know.” Visitors expect park rangers to know everything. Don’t you?

Soon afterwards, I rushed to the nearest Miami bookstore and to the park library to read all I the scientific books I could find on climate change.

The information I learned really scared me, specifically sea level rise along our mangrove coastline in Everglades National Park. Sea level rose 8 inches in the 20th century, four times more than it had risen in previous centuries for the past three thousand years. Because of climate change, sea level is now expected to rise at least three feet in Everglades National Park by the end of the 21st century. The sea would swallow up most of the park and nearby Miami since the highest point of the park road is three feet above sea level.

It shocked me that crocodiles, alligators, and Flamingos I enjoyed seeing in the Everglades could all lose this ideal coastal habitat because of sea level rinse enhanced by climate change.

By the winter of 2007-08, I had read a number of books on climate change. I saw the documentary film about Al Gore, An Inconvenient Truth, and read the companion book in 2006. I knew I needed to do something on climate change, but I did not know what. I was very clear though that I was not going to find the answer by continuing to work winters in the Everglades. It was time for me to move on with my life. In the winter of 2007-08, I was burned out of the south Florida climate, flatness, and the long cross country drive to spend the winter in the Everglades. Even worse, as a single man, it seemed like I was not going to find a wife there.

I said goodbye to the Everglades at the end of April 2008. I decided I would spend my winters in my hometown of St. Louis Missouri to organize for climate action. I had no idea how I was going to do that, but I was excited I found my life’s purpose.

Creating a Guided Ranger Hike in Summer of 2008 using my wisdom and Steve Robinson’s

In late May of 2008, I returned to work at Crater Lake National Park for the summer. Soon after I arrived in the park, I mentioned to my superiors that I wanted to give a ranger program about climate change. My Crater Lake supervisor, Eric Anderson, and the lead interpretive ranger, David Grimes, supported and encouraged my idea. I just did not feel like I knew enough or was brave enough to do such a program. It would take me three more years before I felt courageous and had enough knowledge to give my climate change evening program at Crater Lake.

For the summer of 2008, David Grimes announced in early June that we had a large enough staff for the first time in years to lead ranger guided hikes up the Watchman Peak. Standing barely over 8,000 feet tall, the Watchman Peak is located on the western side of the Crater Lake rim. It receives the deepest snow accumulation in the park with snow drifts up to 50 feet thick. In some years, the West Rim Drive does open for the season until late June. This is due to the time it takes for the road snow removal crew to plow the tremendous amount of snow on the West Rim Drive, especially around the Watchman Peak.

After West Rim Drive opens sometime in June, it takes another month for the snow to melt back for the trail to the Watchman Peak summit to open. Thus, the ranger guided hikes would not start until the end of July. The summer of 2008 would be my first opportunity to lead a ranger guided Watchman Peak hike. I had several months to prepare. Ranger David Grimes allowed me to shadow one of his first hikes for the season at the end of July. I would then have about a week to prepare for my own Watchman Hike in early August 2008.

After I saw Ranger Grimes’ hike, I had ideas how I would create my own guided ranger hike up the Watchman’s Peak. I wanted to give the visitors on my hike a “mountain top experience” using the wisdom I had accumulated as a person, a park ranger, and the advice I received from my mentor Steve Robinson. When visitors went on guided hikes, I used to ask them as a park ranger, ‘Why are you going on this ranger hike?’

Visitors often replied, ‘Because I want to learn something. I don’t feel like I know anything about this national park or trail. I feel like the ranger can share something that I did not know.’

Thus, I determined to construct my hike around the visitor longing to learn something insightful from the ranger. I thought I would even give them something to take home with them for their next hike when I was not with them.

I decided to give each person attending my hike a pocket-sized card to take home with them called “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom.” I would present it to them at the conclusion of my hike. It would be at my last narrated stop, which was a short distance before the Watchman summit and the fire lookout. A tip that you quickly learn as a national park ranger or naturalist guide: don’t talk during a sunset or sunrise. The audience will be absorbed in the moment taking pictures and watching the sun move on the horizon line. They won’t hear a word that you are saying.

I timed my talk so that I would give my gift 10 minutes before the sunset. If I tried to give my conclusion and my pocket-sized card less than 10 minutes from the sunset, the park visitors on my hike would skip my final stop to go to the fire lookout to watch the sunset.

At the introduction of my guided hike, I told my audience that the trail is always open. They are more than welcome to walk past me to hike to the summit. I don’t want to hold them back if they are anxious to see the view from the fire lookout and worried that they might miss the sunset. I assured them that I will be watching the time closely so that we will be at the summit in plenty of time to see the sunset. However, I warned them that if they blew past me to get to the summit, they would not receive my free gift right below the fire lookout.

Like kids waiting for gifts on Christmas morning, the visitors were anxious to know what gift I would have for them. They would even ask me during the introduction: “What’s the gift?”

I would coyly answer: “You will have to stay with me to find out.”

Giving out these pocket-sized gifts became very rewarding for me. I used these cards in May 2011 a Toastmasters speech I gave when I was a member of South County Toastmasters. This speech was a success with this Toastmasters group. I joined this club in February 2011. It was my third speech to the club. The members voted for me as “Best Speaker” for the first time in the three speeches I gave to the group. A fellow Toastmaster filmed most of this speech which I uploaded to YouTube five years ago.

The Significance of the words of “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom”

Steve Robinson passed away just one year previously on October 1, 2007. I started giving my Watchman sunset ranger guided hike in mid-August 2008. It was less than a year since I lost my mentor and friend. He was very much on my mind as I wrote out these words.

I remember Steve remarking,
“For Every Question,
There Is Not Necessarily an Answer.
Yield to the Mysteries of Nature.”

As a park ranger, visitors wanted me to have answers to all their questions. Sometimes there were no answers to some of their questions. The visitors would occasionally give me a frustrated look if I could not answer a question about Crater Lake, the Everglades, the wildlife, the age of specific tree, etc. I never wanted to lie or mislead visitors when I did not know the answer. In fact, there is beauty in the unknown. One can find joy in researching and finding a scientific answer to question. Or better yet, conducting research to answer a scientific question that has not been answered yet.

As far as my second three lines,
“Take Time to Enjoy the View
and Smell the Roses.
Find your Own Sacred Place.”

That might have been a synergy of thought between Steve Robinson and me. I was frequently dumbfounded as a park ranger seeing how rushed people were on a vacation to visit Crater Lake and the Everglades. I often wondered, ‘Are they really enjoying themselves?’

Even more, it astonished me how park visitors would tell me they were on a mission to see all the national parks. To those visitors, I would sometimes respond, ‘Don’t miss the good stuff in between the national parks.’ Or ‘After you see all the national parks, what are you going to do?’

I loved working and living as a summer seasonal park ranger at Crater Lake for 25 years and a winter seasonal ranger in Everglades National Park for 16 years. In between seasons, I cherished visiting Yellowstone, Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Arches, Sequoia, Mt. Rainier, North Cascades, Olympic, Death Valley, and other national parks multiple times. I never had the mindset of ‘one and done’ with visiting a national park. I wanted to see the parks that I visited again and again.

Steve and I had many conversations about visitors who seemed to have mental checklists to visit as many national parks as possible and the sights within a national park once. With “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom,” I wanted to slip in a message to “Find your own sacred place.” Even more, it’s good to visit your happy place multiple times.

This was one of Steve Robinson’s favorite observations:
“If Nature is Your Hobby,
You Will Never Be Bored.
You Can Never Step in the Same Stream Twice.”

If one hung around Steve long enough, he would share this deeply held belief he had. He then would give stories of wildlife, weather patterns, and situations he encountered in nature. He was a master storyteller of his interactions in the outdoors.

When given a chance, Steve loved to preach this thought when he had an audience:
“There Are Things We Love, Things We Hate,
And Things to Which We are Indifferent.
However, In Nature, Everything Matters.”

When park visitors and friends would chat with Steve, they would assert that they hated snakes, mosquitoes, insects, wildfires, cold weather, etc. Steve would then get a twinkle in his eye and a charming smile behind his long beard. He would then find a way to politely counter that we might not like those parts of nature. It’s not necessarily his favorite things in the outdoors. However, Steve would point out that the things that we don’t like in nature that are not cute, fuzzy, adorable, and majestic are still a vital part of nature.

This was Steve’s quote, “Every Single Person Makes the World Every Single Day.”

It was an inspiring statement that had a deep impact on me when it heard Steve say it. I matter. You matter. Everyone matters. Every action we take every single day makes a difference in the world. That goodness I received from Steve’s gem of wisdom stays with me to this day..

Finally, I originated the line, “Think Globally, Act Daily.”

Decades ago, I saw that bumper sticker on cars “Think Globally, Act Locally.” My reaction was, ‘That’s nice, but some days I don’t want to act locally. However, I can act daily for the environment, our planet, and for our local neighborhood.’

I loved creating Ranger Brian’s Wisdom. I must have given way several hundred of these cards over the years. I laminated them so they would last longer. I always trimmed off the sharp edges with scissors at the Crater Lake interpretative work room, so visitors would not get paper cuts from handling these cards. Hopefully, these cards have planted some seeds to influence people to care for our parks, the environment, and our planet.

Videotaping my ranger guided Watchman Peak sunset hike

The visitors and David Grimes responded positively to my ranger guided Watchman Peak sunset hike. Grimes scheduled another seasonal ranger, Terra Kemper, to video this hike in September 2008. Like what occurred with my lodge talk in 2006, we submitted the video to the NPS Interpretative Office as Harper’s Ferry to see if they would certify this program.

When I returned to Crater Lake in June 2009, I received the good news announced during seasonal training that the NPS did certify my talk. Nine years later, I uploaded this video to YouTube so you can watch this talk.

I initially inserted the YouTube written transcript into this blog of my ranger guided Watchman Peak sunset hike, but it doubled the length of this blog. Thus, I decided against it. Hopefully, you will take the time to see the video or read the transcript on YouTube.

Final Thoughts

American author and environmentalist John Muir wrote,
“In every walk with Nature one receives far more than he seeks.”

My favorite memories as a child were exploring the woods by my parents’ house and hiking in nature by myself during family camping trips. I intuitively lived by the John Muir quote about the fulfillment I received from spending time in nature without an awareness of John Muir or this quote. I did not know about John Muir until I started working in the national parks.

In fact, you can sum up my life in this nutshell: I loved spending time in nature as a child. My first job out of college was working in the national parks so I could be close to nature. As I spent time in the national parks, I wanted to be a park ranger so I could educate others about the national parks and our natural world. As a national park ranger, visitors expected me to be knowledgeable about climate change. As I became informed about climate change, I decided to transition from a park ranger to a climate change organizer. As climate change organizer, I am now deeply concerned about the state of American democracy.

As I wrote this blog, I stumbled across another John Muir quote, “Between every two pine trees there is a door leading to a new way of life.”

That’s what happened to me. I had no idea when I took a seasonal gift store clerk job at Crater Lake National Park in 1992 how much it would change my life. When I hiked between the pine trees there, it completely led to a new way of life for me. I hope that others that visit and work in national parks experience a life transformation.

Even more, I had a mentor seasonal Ranger Steve Robinson who looked like a cross between John Muir and Dr. Suess’ The Lorax who was willing to guide me. He showed me how to be a better man, park ranger and ultimately a climate advocate. He taught and showed me that all my actions and interactions with others matter. As Steve liked to say,

“Every single person makes the world every single day.”

I am deeply proud of my 25 years as a seasonal park ranger at Crater Lake and Everglades National Parks. Every day was a blessing to work there. On my worst days living in the national parks, I dealt with situations such as feeling lonely, depressed, heartbroken after a relationship breakup, a bad encounters with park visitors, a demanding supervisor unhappy with my work performance, a difficult co-worker making an unhealthy work environment, and upper park or concession management creating toxic politics on the job. With all that, I might get very little sleep that night or subsequent nights. However, all I had to do was to walk outside. The serenity of the national parks renewed me with its peaceful energy embracing me and whispering, “You are going to be ok.”

It’s that energy of the natural world rejuvenating me as a park ranger that inspired me to become a climate change organizer to protect our planet.

Working in the national parks, over 97% of the visitors I met were good people who were happy to be there. They loved their families and partners deeply. They wanted to show their families, children, loved ones, and good friends some of the most beautiful scenic locations on the planet. They cared profoundly about nature, the environment, the outdoors, the national parks, and our world. It was park visitors who insisted I learn and care about climate change. For years, I was scared to talk about climate change, fearing I would receive arguments from park visitors. When I started giving climate change talks at Crater Lake in 2011, it was park visitors who were very supportive, enthusiastic, and encouraging me to keep speaking out on that topic.

John Muir noted, “Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life.”

Last month, on a weekend in September 2023, my wife, her parents, 8 of her Danish relatives, my in-law’s best friends, and I (14 of us total) visited Glacier National Park. It was one of the most magnificent places I saw in my life. I stopped working at Crater Lake National Park in 2017, six years ago. Yet, I felt like I was home when I went to Glacier. I could immediately relate to the John Muir quote that “going to the mountains is going home.”

Sadly, Glacier National Park had little visible signs of glaciers from areas that we traveled by car, boat, and foot. Like my experience working in the Everglades and Crater Lake, Glacier sent a very loud message to ‘Please take action to reduce the climate change threat.’

I understood this clear and loud message. I ensured others got the message with my two previous blogs about seeing climate change at Glacier National Park calls for climate action. Visiting national parks for a day or working in them for 25 years should change us as individuals.

Edward Abbey penned so splendidly, “A man or woman could hardly ask for a better way to make a living than as a seasonal ranger for the National Park Service.”

It truly was a gift to work and live in the national parks for 25 years as a ranger. I hope my experience and wisdom I gained from that experience can benefit others, such as you.

P.S. Should I have given more credit to Steve Robinson in “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom?

As I write this blog in October 2023, I am wrestling with the realization that half of the thoughts on my pocket sized card for “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom” came from Steve Robinson. My original thought was to call it, “Advice from a Ranger.” This title would have been more broad to allow for that the advice was a combination of Steve Robinson’s and mine. I used that title, “Advice from a Ranger” for my first couple of guided hikes on Watchman Peak in 2008.

I showed my “Advice From A Ranger” card to Steve’s widow, Amelia Bruno. She was touched I had written this to honor Steve as well as my own advice for park visitors. She immediately posted it on the bulletin board at her Crater Lake Fee Program Manager Office.

At that time, I was influenced by Ilan Shamir‘s Your True Nature collection that was sold at the Crater Lake Visitor Center gift stores and elsewhere. Ilan’s company is now called Advice for Life by Your True Nature. Ian’s story is that he was a former marketing businessman with 7UP and free-spirit backpacker. One day in 1999, Ilan walked by a tree in his Colorado neighborhood that he frequently noticed. This time he stopped at the tree and asked for advice. Ilan heard the tree say to him: “Stand tall and proud…Be content with your natural beauty… Go out on a limb!”

Ilan turned the tree’s wisdom into a poem, “Advice from a Tree,” He then included it in his book Poet Tree: The Wilderness I Am. In 2000, Ilan started the Your True Nature Company with the “Advice From a Tree” poster. Then came a bookmark, minibook, and postcard giving the tree’s advice. Then inspiration hit him to share the advice of the river, mountain, garden, and hummingbird. He went on to pen the advice of the bear, moose, owl, horse, dog, butterfly, etc. Ilan and his company now offers more than 50 different advice by animals, plants and natural places.

I shared my “Advice from a Ranger” card with Vickie Grieve, Executive Director at Crater Lake Natural History Association, which runs the Crater Lake Visitor Center gift store. Vickie was thrilled that Ilan’s “Advice from a Tree” and the other Your True Nature Advice items sold in the Visitor Center inspired me to write “Advice from a Ranger.” Vickie knew Ilan personally and she gave me his email address.

I emailed Ilan in early 2009 and I did hear back from him on March 9th. He wrote:

“Brian,
Thanks so much for the Advice from a Ranger poem. I will show it around here in the office and be back in touch soon.
Ilan”

The next day, I responded:

“Ilan,
Thanks for the nice e-mail. I am always hoping that when I do a ranger program that I am making a difference and people might remember it months later. I enjoyed composing the Adviced from a Ranger. Half of it was inspired and is attributed to my mentor, Steve Robinson. He was a naturalist ranger at Crater Lake and Everglades National Park for over 25 years. Unfortunately, he passed away from cancer less than a year and a half ago. He used to love to share his thoughts and observations with me. The other half is just thoughts and observations from my time of being a ranger.”

Ilan replied: “Thanks Brian… for sharing about the creation of Advice from a Ranger. What are your thoughts on how you would like to see it used?”

I wrote: “As far as my thoughts for advice for a ranger. I am open to any suggestions you might have. I thought about selling them alongside your Advice poems. I would only want my poem to compliment, not compete against your poems. Your advice poem series certainly inspired me to create my Advice from a ranger. I had never heard of them until I saw Vickie Grieve selling them in the Crater Lake bookstores. Vickie seemed interested in selling my advice poem in the bookstore too when I first showed it to her last fall. However, we both wanted to seek out your input before we proceeded.

I thought selling them as bookmarks, postcards, and possibly even notecards. I have never sold anything artistic before for retail. Thus, I would like your advice. I would be more than willing to split and profits and revenue with you. I am willing to shorten or edit the contents, if you felt that was needed. I am very flexible. I am visioning a green backdrop with mountains and a river, maybe even an arrowhead, similar to the NPS logo. I thought it would be fun to have a drawing of a ranger. Again, I will be curious to your thoughts and ideas too.

Again, I do not want to compete again your advice series. I think they are so beautiful and inspiring. Furthermore, they inspired me when I had to create the content for my ranger sunset hike at Crater Lake. The visitors attending my program have really seemed to enjoy receiving them too. If I could make my Advice from a Ranger Poem marketable and sell them, but in a way that honors your product too, that is my goal.”

Unfortunately, I soon received a cease and desist letter from Ilan’s attorney that I could no longer use the title, “Advice from a Ranger.” I felt crushed. The email was very cold and unfriendly. I went from hoping to partner with Ilan on this project to losing respect for him. Vickie Grieve and Amelia Bruno both advised me to change my card to a different title. Thus, we agreed upon “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom.”

Since half of the thoughts on the card were Steve Robinson’s, I now wonder if I should have called it, “Ranger Brian and Steve’s Wisdom.” However, that seems to be a long title. For Steve Robinson’s quotes on my pocket sized card, I now wonder if I should have directly cited him. However, at that time, Amelia was fine with me calling it, “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom” and how I displayed the information on the card. Thus, I kept the title and content simple to this day. If you watch my Watchman Peak Hike YouTube video where I discussed “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom,” you will notice I talk a lot about Steve Robinson.

With a new title, Vickie seemed interested in selling “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom,” at the Visitor Center Gift Stores. She advised me to create quality artwork with it so she could present it to the Crater Lake Natural History Association Board of Directors. Two years later, I asked fellow Crater Lake interpretative park ranger Ross Wood Studlar, who is a cartoonist and illustration artist, to create artwork for my “Ranger Brian’s Wisdom.” Ross created a lovely color drawing.

In 2011, I presented Ross’ color artwork and my text to Vickie to present to the Board of Directors. Sadly, they voted to decline to sell the product that Ross and I created. Their decision stung, but I quickly forgot about it as I became devoted in 2011 to follow my passion as a climate change advocate.