Clint Kingery

Lead Wilderness Steward

September 13-21

Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forest | East Moose Creek Trail #421

The last hitch of the season is freshly over and trail #421 is clear from Elk Summit to Moose Creek Ranger Station once more.

This has always been a particularly hard time of year for me and for most of us in this line of work. We will soon be leaving a workplace packed with the best. Rent won’t be getting the same pause as our paychecks. Light and laughter is traded again for long nights and cozy blankets. When the pay is the same as what every teenager makes and it only lasts for a handful of months, it’s not hardly possible to put away much of a safety net.

The upcoming month will be full of job interviews that follow the format “So, it looks like you are a seasonal worker, will you be leaving us next May?” and “Thanks for your application, but we are going to go with a candidate that will stay with us long term.” In the past few winters, I have worked front desk at a hotel, I have worked for an arborist that didn’t believe in hard hats or chaps or insurance, I have punched data into a computer, I have cleared snow, I have called and found resources for the ill and housebound.

This is the most challenging thing about modern Wilderness work. The off-seasons make hauling tools and 9 days of food up just shy of a mile in elevation feel easy. They make driving icy spears of rain feel almost comforting. They make you nostalgic for the clouds of biting flies. They make you look at soft skin and wish it was sun-scorched and blistered and peeling again.

So why do we do this? Well the cheap answer is ‘Wilderness is worth it’. And those of us wearing holes in the soles of our boots know this. It is true. It is worth it. I could wax poetic for years about all the good that we do for the micro and mega fauna, for the grand cedars and the soft moss, for the hikers and the hunters and the pilots and the rafters and the outfitters and the firefighters, for the surrounding communities that are built on opportunity created by Wilderness, for the smell of the crisp fall mornings and the dry grasses and sub-alpine firs, for our strong backs and stronger legs, for preservation of history and protection of indigenous heritage, for traditional skills, for equity and empowerment, for place and belonging, for adventure and freedom, for the honor and memory of those that preceded us, for the well-being and wonderful naive passion of those that will follow us, for a July strawberry ripened in the sun.

But that good that we do doesn’t even start to answer why we do this. That doesn’t make the off-season any easier. That doesn’t keep my car running or my belly full. It doesn’t mean I can suddenly afford that dentist appointment that I have been putting off for the last decade. It doesn’t mean that the daily trauma I put my body through during the season is magically healed and ready for another year. It doesn’t benefit us directly like a steady paycheck would.

If you were to ask me if I would keep working in and for Wilderness, I wouldn’t hesitate to say yes. If you were to ask me if you ought to get into Wilderness work, I wouldn’t hesitate to say yes. If you were to ask me if SBFC is a good place to do Wilderness work, I wouldn’t hesitate to say yes. I’ve included some pictures that might start to explain why we do this. But if you were to actually ask me why we do this, the only honest answer I’ve got for you is: “I don’t know, I just work here.”

*That’s a wrap! Walt on Storm Creek Trail #77* *in the Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forest; Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness.*

CLINT KINGERY

NEZ PERCE-CLEARWATER NF LEAD WILDERNESS STEWARD

Clint grew up in Helena, Montana. He first discovered his love for Wilderness while working on trails in the Sawtooth Wilderness. He has also worked in the heart of the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness and knows the Moose Creek area well. Clint is uncompromisingly passionate about Wilderness.