1.1-The Light at the Beginning of the Tunnel
It was a warm, sunny morning in Madison, WI on July 2,1990. My mother had been in labor for almost 14 hours now and the time was finally here. That one last push was all that was needed, and I would be here. She described that moment as everything falling into silence as chaos was erupting around her. I’d love to say I was a happy and healthy baby but that’s not the case. I was in and out of the hospital for the first two years of my life. Those two years would change my life indefinitely. My health put a major strain on my mother and fathers relationship, they were constantly fighting, and ultimately it ended up in divorce.
Since my parents were divorced by the time I was 2 years old I guess I never really understood the concept, I just accepted it, until later on- but that’s a different story. My father would have us on the weekends, holidays and the summer break. He really tried to be around as much as he could. Growing up with two older brothers brought me into a tomboy-esque state in my younger years. In kindergarten I met this boy, Devon. He had long blonde hair, and bright blue eyes. Almost assuredly, he was the love of my life when I saw him playing around in the dirt. He was searching for worms, as that was one of my favorite things to do while I was playing outside. I went right up to him and started to help, I was fearless. After a few sandbox dates we decided it was only natural that we got married. We exchanged our vows and then to officially tie the knot, we both had a dead worm in our hand and we placed them into one another’s mouths- because kissing is gross and boys have cooties, right?
2.1 Learning/ Unlearning
In elementary school I spent my summers up at my grandmother’s cottage. It was in a village called Hancock, Wisconsin. Population: 419. She lived in this big blue house right on the edge of Pine Lake. You stepped out of the car and you could smell pine blended with lake water hanging in the air. It was always so quiet up there; I could hear the sound of me breathing and the crunching of pine needles below my bare feet. I always got so excited to go up there and stay.
I liked to pretend that I was a Native American when I would stay at my grandmothers. I would pull seaweed out of the lake and dry it on the pier by hanging it up; I am not sure if I actually ever ate it or just made arts and crafts with it. I vividly remember stalking fish; I would get into the paddleboat, or canoe with my fishing pole and just watch the fish intensely. I always loved fishing and would get so happy when I would catch one that was big enough to serve to the family. I’d go home with it and my grandfather would help me prepare it for dinner and soon I was good enough to do it on my own. That’s something I cherish to this day. I was constantly outside every minute I was there. My grandmother even had a bell on the porch that she would ring when she would want me to return. Other fond memories I have are observing animals, rescuing turtles, and testing the turbidity with my grandmother. My grandparents’ home was a huge learning space for me, coupled with nature and hands on experiences. I learned so much without knowing I was learning and I think that was the intention. It was a place where I could unlearn the life-style of a suburban fast paced life and learn how to cherish moments and our nature. This knowledge all moved on with me at school.
1.2 Wild Suburbia
I remember my best friend Melissa and I would go on these adventures behind my house. There was a huge sewer pipe behind the willow tree in my backyard. We would go out and explore all the time. I remember one time in specific: it was a rainy fall day and I had my yellow raincoat and boots on, we were always told to not go past the sewer pipe but this time we did. What was beyond the sewer pipe was unimaginable, it turned into a huge forest and there was a river with a tree fallen over to cross it- we just continued to go further and further.
In second grade, we moved out of Madison into a small city called Verona, WI and we would remain here until the end of high school. I remember I made quite the impact on my first day. I was asked what my favorite song was and without hesitation I responded, “I’m a Bitch, by Alanis Morisette”. Well, we all know where I ended up-the principles office. Who knew that you couldn’t just share your favorite song? Oops. Verona was a nice suburb, full of middle class folks and the schools were rich with diversity since our schools were combined with a bigger city called Fitchburg.
2.2 High School Daze
Middle school was just filled with drama and awkwardness. I don’t think I really need to go into too much detail here because I’m sure you have all experienced that middle-school awkwardness. I will share some of the major moments from that phase in my life. I definitely was seeking a lot of attention from my parents, as they were busy with work and I felt like they weren’t around. This led me to experiment with drugs and alcohol but it never became that serious of an issue. My grandparents also passed away when I was in middle school, which left me pretty heavy with feelings, as they were a big part of my life growing up and taught me a lot. By the end of 8th grade I had established my circle of friends, and surprisingly I still have a few of those friends.
Onto high school, let’s start with freshman year. It was nothing out of the ordinary; I attended Verona Area High School. It was a public high school with about 1,500 students or so. As a freshman you had all your basics: Science, Math, English, and History but the fun with it was you got to choose the specific subcategory you wanted to learn within those basics as well as pick extracurricular classes. My schedule had Spanish, biology, geometry, ceramics, and English/history combo. I wasn’t really focused freshman year, I goofed off quite a lot actually but that dissipated once sophomore year came. I stayed with most of my classes just upgraded to bio 2 and Spanish 2, was able to exchange history for global issues and English for theatre arts.
All throughout high school I was really interested in Science, English, Art and Spanish. Majority of my classes were surrounded by those 4 courses and my grades were showing that I was interested and had the attention for those subjects and I continued on that pathway for the remainder of high school. Senior year came rather quickly; there I was sitting at my desk with an envelope from, the University of Milwaukee, in my hands. It was the moment of truth. What most high school seniors were anxiously awaiting. But I could barely find the courage to open it, I just felt nauseous. I wasn’t really sure what I wanted and high school was coming to an end, roads were diverging and this made it much more real.
I sat there. My hands were shaking and sweating as I slowly started to work my fingers to open the letter. Finally I pulled the letter from the envelope:
“Dear Jensen Buehler,
Thank you for applying to UW Milwaukee. We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted…”
I put the letter down on my desk. It was like I wasn’t even excited. Why wasn’t I happy? I was just an indecisive person, afraid to make the wrong choice.
There were so many options; Move out and go to Milwaukee with an undecided major, go to the community college right in Madison then transfer, or, take a year off.
1.3 The Shift
It was the start of 5th grade, my mother used to always pack my lunches, a salad and some fruit. Well, this day was different, I had to get ‘hot lunch’ or formerly known as school lunch. It was chicken strips. Surprisingly, chicken wasn’t common in my household. We mainly focused on red meats, so I was a little nervous- as most children are when it comes to new foods. About five minutes after consumption I was having severe stomach aches. To the point where I thought someone was sticking knives into my stomach, I was warm and I was sweating excessively, I could hardly move. It turns out I had an intolerance to a specific protein in chicken that my body just could not digest. This in turn contributed to me becoming completely vegetarian. I continued to be vegetarian up until this May of 2013. It all ended when I was at the Farmers Market and my body was just craving beef jerky, there were stands of venison jerky and it smelled so delicious. When I say craving, I mean my body was cravvvvinggg this jerky. So I went with it, and my pallet has been reintroduced to these amazing flavors. I still am very conscious of the meat that I am putting into my mouth. I am only eating local, grass-fed, or hunted by my brother. For the longest time vegetarianism defined who I was as a person, so for me to begin eating meat was a huge shift for me personally, but also for my family and friends. I was vegetarian for 13 years so for them when I began to eat meat I felt like I was constantly being observed and asked a million of questions. In specific, my Aunt and I went out to lunch the other day and she said, “I have my phone ready so I can document that you’re going to eat meat.” Funny thing though, I didn’t eat meat that meal. Like I said, I am picky about where it’s coming from. Being so young and making the decision to become a vegetarian was a huge step at 10 years old.
2.3 The College Years
I chose to stay in town and attend Madison Area College, also known as the technical college. I decided I was unsure of what my life plan was and didn’t want to waste money. As the year 2008 progressed I was doing exceedingly well in my classes, sociology and earth science were my favorite to attend. I finally started to feel a sense of comfort as understanding what my passions were. So when the summer of 2009 started I arrived at Northland College, which is a small private environmental school in Northern Wisconsin. My emphasis for school was Sustainable Agriculture. I didn’t have much technical experience in that realm it was just something I was passionate about since growing up at the cottage and wanted to focus my attention on. Well, after a semester I was completely overwhelmed. Sitting in a classroom was so difficult and I was paired with all these people who had extensive experience with sustainability. I learned that I couldn’t sit and be talked to without doing something with my hands or my mind wandering somewhere else. It wasn’t that I didn’t enjoy the content, I loved it, I just couldn’t focus. This led me to discover I needed “living curriculum” or hands on curriculum. I ended up dropping out and moving back to Madison and attending the community college to complete my 2nd year of schooling and that was not one of my better decisions. I was still in this struggling mindset of sitting in a classroom and had no motivation for school at this point. In hindsight, I should have withdrawn from my classes to maintain my GPA but I was in a knot. I needed help but didn’t know how to ask for help and it led me to fail two classes and lower my GPA and that alone had made me terrified to try to even go back to school as GPA’s are imperative to get into most Universities.
2.4 Self-study
Since then, I have participated in a few different self-directed studies. The first being ecology/environmental studies. I lived in California and became very hands on with classes and workshops and eventually landed an internship to become a Naturalist. I also participated in some Early Childhood Education coursework that I completed this last spring in order to get a promotion at work. I have noticed work isn’t something that I have really noted in this OP, so a little bit a bout that… I have a very strong work ethic and have worked since I was about 14. I have mainly worked with children in a variety of settings and I think the influence of working with children stemmed from my mother, as she is a pre-school teacher. There were a few cases of working in retail but it was just a job to make money and it hasn’t been something I continue to pursue. I actually have been actively involved in the lives of our youth and I think it is vital to continue to work with them in a way where they can self-regulate and be immersed in the culture of our environment. Within this career field of education we are required to obtain continuing education hours on our own time through courses, workshops, conferences, and books which all aids my self-studying.