Noticing xviii - passion

I don't like the word passion. Or, it's not the word I mind; it's a certain expectation that people seem to have, that if one is to be satisfied in life, one should find one's "passion." Certainly, some people do find a passion, and lead wonderfully productive and apparently joyful lives out of it (I think, for example, of Yo-Yo Ma and Ray Troll)—and good for them. But for most of us, I'd argue, passion is way too loaded a word. Many of us are fortunate to find something that we are simply happy to do, something that gives us satisfaction, something that engages us.

I wrote about this already in the first iteration of this daily blog, here. So what brings me back?

This weekend I encountered four different faces of passion and/or engagement, and it was an excellent reminder that it—whatever you want to call it—is all around us. And it's a good thing to notice, both in ourselves and in others.

First was the VWR "summit" I attended Saturday and Sunday, with a campout Saturday night. Those rangers are so committed! They love their trail work, they love connecting with people in the backcounty, they love their tools, they love mastering radio comms, they love their communal potlucks as they all come together and share stories around the tiny electric campfire (we are currently in fire restrictions, but it's likely these rangers wouldn't have a real fire even if we weren't). Here are a few photos I took today from our time together. It was fun!

Steve and Betsy finding "scan" on our radios

Steve and Colleen role-playing ranger and backcountry user

Brian putting his finishing touches on a fire ring

Bobby describing wound treatment

Steve and Mike discussing a radio protocol scenario

Lynn wrastling her radio

Almost all of us. Don't we make a handsome crew?

Second up: I left the summit early so I could attend a concert of the Monterey County Composers Forum in Carmel Valley. The MCCF has been in existence for . . .  17 years? Their online presence is poor, so who knows?—a while, anyway. But where their computer skills are lacking, their passion for music is strong. And every year for however many, three times a year, they—led by Steve Ettinger, a community college music teacher—present concerts of works by Monterey County residents. The pieces range from insipid (sorry) folk songs to wonderful multi-movement chamber music works—and everything in between. My husband, David, belongs to the MCCF and often contributes a piece, but not today. Still: I wanted to go because they were working with a professional cellist, and who doesn't love cello well played? The pieces were, as usual, varied, and mostly very enjoyable, ending with a bang by my perhaps favorite composer in the group, pastor Rick Yramategui. I took a couple of photos. They're not very good, but this post is about passion, and these people were displaying it.

Rick Yramategui (piano) and Doug Machiz (cello)

Barry Capiaux (bassoon), Hannah Ettinger (cello),
Bert Robinson (double bass), and Steve Ettinger (percussion)

Third up this weekend: we are hosting a couple, Kerin and David from South Carolina, who flew all the way to California to attend a weekend contradance, an event called Foggy Moon. I don't dance, though everyone insists I would like it—I tried it once and got blisters, but that could have been mostly me being ornery. Maybe I'll give it another try. Anything's possible. But what I want to comment on here is just the passion of people traveling all over the place to spend a weekend dancing, to live music, rousing callers, and good times. What's not to love about that? (Here's a general photo from a Monterey contradance by way of illustration. David is silhouetted in the lit doorway a quarter of the way in from the right.)

And finally, on our drive home from the concert I got a text message from my Red Cross casework "handler," Beverly, asking if I could take a new case, of a family (a 31-year-old and his 81-year-old grandmother) displaced by a house fire in Cachagua, out Carmel Valley. I don't recall how long Beverly has been a Red Cross volunteer, but she—and so many others I've met in my own few years volunteering—are tireless in their devotion to people in need, whether by deploying to national disasters or coordinating volunteers here at home on smaller disasters—but disasters nonetheless, to those affected. It always makes me angry, when a Katrina or Harvey hits, to see people badmouth the Red Cross. (Largely, I believe, because of some, yes, malfeasance that went on in Haiti years ago. There are bad eggs, for sure, and I'm angry that that happened too.) In the bigger picture, though, the Red Cross does important, large-scale, humanitarian work, and I'm proud to be a very small player in all the good that gets done.

In all four of these examples of passion, I'd like to point out, there is no personal monetary benefit. Just the opposite. The wilderness rangers donate their time, and purchase much of their own equipment; the composers compose and present their music out of sheer love of their art, of their creative community; the dancers spend their own money to travel and dance their hearts out; and Red Cross workers are for the most part completely volunteer (though deployments are covered). In the end, they do this out of sheer love, pleasure, and fulfillment. Isn't that grand?