Another Week, Another Walk

Posted by: Nate
Posted: Sun, November 29 2009 at 10:47am

My job is a mixture of some field work and some office work, usually about a 50/50 split.  Some of my field work in early November involved a trip to a property that I’ve been working on for the purpose of collecting and documenting the diversity of the plant communities found there.  While it’s not always the most exciting thing in the world to do it generally involves a pretty walk through the woods and fields.  The season added a touch of fall colors and it made for a truly beautiful outing. 

I hope I don’t belabor the idea of taking a walk in the fields or woods but it’s kind of what I do.  The point being that, as an amputee, I’m able to do all of these things with the aid of my C-Leg, as a normal able-bodied person would. 

The purpose of this hike was primarily about the plants found on the property.  I have to document what is currently found on the property so that we have a baseline point to start from.  If the plant community changes in the future we can go back and document what was on the property when we began.  I grabbed my backpack, camera, GPS unit, and walking stick and headed for the property.  I walked the fence line surrounding the property to see what the boundaries looked like, following it through ravines, over hilltops, across creeks, through brush and grassy pastures.  It was a good walk, probably about a mile and a half and I was able to document a lot of great plants and wildlife.  I was fortunate to see a very large whitetail buck and found bobcat tracks in a muddy creek crossing.  It’s the little experiences like this when I am truly thankful to be able to walk as much as I do. 

On another project I walked another tree-choked pasture that followed a small creek for a mile on the landowner’s property.  The topography was somewhat flat but dropped quickly near the creek.  I walked the entire pasture up one side and back down the other; a minimum of two miles of vigorous walking zigzagging through the pasture.  Again it made me thankful for my C-Leg; I remember long walks on other knees and how much energy it took to ambulate.  At the end of the two miles I was amazed at how good I felt. 

This kind of stuff isn’t like climbing mountains, it’s not extreme sports, or anything like that; it’s just life.  These are the kind of day in and day out activities that I am able to do as an active amputee.  I wouldn’t change it for the world. 

Until next time.
Nate

Otto Bock HealthCare pays Nate a small fee for his essays.