With the gentle and good words of professor Dave Mahan from the esteemed Au Sable institute, we were introduced to the basics of stream study and the importance of understanding and striving to protect the streams that are local to all of us, for "all of us live near a stream." What none of us knew however; was that we were in store for what Mahan called his "biggest first day ever" with a plethora of NZ stream species. The waters were crawling with shrimp and eel and crawfish among many other critters. The bugs were shaken off easily by the students when they caught the enthusiasm of Mahan as he giggled at the shrimp hopping around his nets and SQUEELED with delight as he caught sight of the first freshwater crabs he'd ever seen. Thanks to our students, this weathered instructor laid eyes on a new species today! Check out how excited Michelle was!
There must be something said about loving what you do.....This is what Dave Mahan does for work - he studies streams. But when you love what you do for work like Dave does, we all easily catch the bug of excitement! Khalil Gibran comments on work:
"And when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another, and to God. And what is it to work with love? It is to weave cloth with threads drawn from your heart, even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth....it is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with joy....work is love made visible."
Dave, thanks for working with love and exposing us to the wonder of stream life. And this is just day one!!!
1 comment:
David, Can you guess who said "Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country?". It wasn't first said by JFK.
from Dad
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