So Much More Than Glaciers

I’ve been telling friends for years that I wanted to get to Alaska before all the glaciers melted. I was concerned that climate change would irrevocably change the possibilities of what I would see there.

I first encountered a glacier up close and personal when I was fourteen years old. Our family met up with an aunt and uncle in western Canada. I don’t remember exactly where the glacier was, but I remember us standing practically at the foot of it, talking with each other while this craggy wall of ice loomed behind us. Or maybe it’s more accurate to say that I remember the photo that was taken of us talking there. I’m not really sure I recall being there. The wall of ice is behind us, but we’re focused on each other.

I find irony here. So often when we visit someplace, we spend as much time focused on each other as we do on the place we have traveled to. I’ve been blogging about my recent impactful trip to Greenland and Arctic Canada for over a month now—and I could go on, and on. I learned so much by traveling to these places that are vastly different from the desert where I live—and much of what I learned was from taking time, in those places, to talk with the people alongside me.

Some of them, of course, were the Inuit whose homelands we traversed. The most prominent of our Inuit expedition team members was the first female prime minister of Greenland, Aleqa Hammond. Another “big name” was Tom Paddon, the son of a doctor who cared for the Inuit in Labrador. Tom now works with the mining industry to “successfully reconcile the commercial interests of developers with the rights of Indigenous peoples.”

For me, as a writer and editor, the most intriguing and surprising team member was the novelist and poet Margaret Atwood. She has traveled on Adventure Canada ships for years, often as an expedition team member—and if her name isn’t familiar, it’s likely that her most famous book is: The Handmaid’s Tale. She gave a talk provocatively entitled Ask Me Anything and read from her new memoir, which officially launched a week ago. It was a pleasure to hear her speak about writing and about the impact of her time in the arctic on her life and her art.

When Mom and I signed up for this trip, I didn’t focus on the possibility of seeing glaciers. I was focused on traveling with Mom to places she hadn’t been that were of interest to both of us. We got that—and we got glaciers (as you can see in the image above), the Torngat Mountains, and so much more. I’m deeply grateful for the opportunity to travel to faraway places and humbled by how much there is to see and learn on this precious Mother Earth.

I’m also aware of how much I could learn from the people who live right here in Tucson. There’s a great folklife festival here called Tucson Meet Yourself. I went this year and had a lovely conversation with a young Indigenous woman selling earrings she’d crafted herself. Such events remind me that I don’t have to travel halfway across the globe to have meaningful conversations—though I won’t find any glaciers here in southern Arizona!

What about travel is most impactful for you?