Navigating the Outdoors: A Case Study on Outdoor Equity

Abstract

Summary My ties to the outdoors began very young. I don’t think I am unique in that. I come from a lineage of caretakers of the land and knew that the reason I ended up on American soil at age 4, was because the land my abuelo 1 in Colombia had been tending was seized by a rebel group called the FARC. I remember playing in the deep woods of the piedmont of North Carolina, running through puddles with bare feet, collecting unknown plants to make forts. I was raised on picking honeysuckles, eating biscuits, and arepas, so many arepas 2 . I always knew that I was different though I tried so hard to erase every bit of what made me who I was. I would ask my parents to not introduce themselves with their names, I would try to copy what the other girls wore, I desperately wanted my thick curly hair to be stick straight, and I avoided inviting friends over to my house, as if giving up a world to move to another world was embarrassing. In high school, I started to realize that pretending was exhausting but also felt like the pressure was far more than I could take, and I continued to mask my identity. I would spend my time continuing to run through neighborhoods, jump in lakes every chance I got, but never did I think that these now known coping mechanisms to find balance in my turbulent mental space were an attempt to try to find a connection to the land. Information © CAB International 2024