Members of the Outings Committee have put in many long collective hours now in launching Mountain Odyssey 2001. As chair of the committee, I want to share that one of the great personal satisfactions that I have had in working to develop the outings program is the anticipation of the unique opportunity that out of doors experience affords me to connect with people in ways that are not available in a world that is too much guided by the clock and a pernicious consumerism.

Very few of us are immune from these forces, not matter how much we rage against their impact upon out lives. But we have known ourselves in other places.

We have known ourselves and others on the trail, punching through rapids in canoes, kayaks and rafts, groping through caves, gliding and postholing through the snow, drifting down through the air on ropes, and cycling through the wonderful backways of the West Virginia countryside. Sitting around a campfire bullshitting, falling into silence before a panoramic view of the rugged Allegheny hills or of a waterfall -- or lying on a sunbaked river rock in the afternoon caught in the trance of water flow and riffle.

All places that liberate our soulful best. Places where we share a kindredness of adventure that most of the time seems to elude us. Places where there is no difference between the human and natural communities. Places where we pace our activities more by the position of the sun than our wristwatches. Places where we make promises to ourselves that, by God, we are going to take care of this planet and all the beings in it. Places where we merge our deepest and most tender energies. Places where, for a little while, we become a tribe.

I really believe that the more often we participate in the thrill and the quiet of the wild with other folks, the better chance we have of developing a shared imago of the earth that stands as a counterpoint to that generated by the global market place. The more inspired we feel to become better earth stewards for the generations to come and to keep our friendships alive and ongoing. The more generosity we have and the more hope we have for the future. It is worth remembering, I think, that the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy began with a bunch of crazy footloose people on the trails -- who decided that they needed to band together to do something to protect what they loved.

We have to keep these origins alive so that our work continues to be endowed with solid earthy underpinnings.

Signs of Spring are around us now. I hear birds every morning, and I saw two Robins today. The sun is longer and much warmer; Skunk Cabbage is blooming in the mountain bogs. Soon Spotted Salamanders, Toads, Wood Frogs will be strewing their eggs in vernal ponds and in marshes - and our legs are itching to get outside and be ravished by all this. So if you feel like you may be falling prey to the doldrums of living in a world that, in the words of John Hay, is being "swallowed by its own history," by all means bestir yourself to seek the antidote of a Mountain Odyssey 2001 outing. In fact, treat yourself and your family, your spouse, your partner, and your friends to regular doses of Mountain Odyssey 2001. You won’t regret it. It’s the Spring tonic.

And you’ll be where the spirits are gathered.