Several years ago, my associates and I published a research study about “what parks mean.” We found that parks, whether local, state, or national had personal and social benefits as many of us have experienced. However, the unifying theme that clearly emerged from the essays analyzed was the idea of memory-making. Parks make memories.
I think about parks often since I either volunteer or hike essentially every day in Rocky Mountain National Park. I recognize that an iconic beauty like Rocky can be different from a local park or green space. And yet, the theme of memory-making applies across the board.
I had a favorite childhood park. It was a county park, Pinicon Ridge, only three miles from our farm. Growing up on a farm is a nature experience but going to a park with trees and picnic tables and a tower to climb to see the panorama above the trees was a treat. I have many recollections of the numerous Sunday nights when the family went to the park, sometimes with another family, grilled steaks/hamburgers, ate fried potatoes or potato salad, enjoyed our fresh garden veggies, and often had homemade (my favorite was apple) pie for dessert. Now that my parents are deceased, I remember the times with my family even more fondly.
My adult life includes evocative remembrances of parks: hearing the wolves howl on a very rainy and challenging backpacking trip at Isle Royale, climbing my first mountain (Twin Sisters) at Rocky Mountain National Park and developing a lifelong passion for high places, traversing most of Mt Ranier on the Wonderland Trail, and seeing the BIG 5 animals at Kruger National Park in South Africa.
In dissecting the essays for the paper we wrote, we found reminiscences were most often based on the human interaction with landscapes as well as the connections people had with others during their park visits. People talked about coming to a particular park as a child and then wanting to bring their children, and later grandchildren, to experience those meaning-imbued places.
Hundreds of thousands of people want to visit Rocky Mountain National Park this summer. Some have been visiting Rocky for years but missed last year because of the pandemic. Others are visiting for the first, and perhaps only, time. I want them to experience positive memory-making, but I am worried that it may not always happen.
Rocky Mountain National Park has currently restricted access to the park to certain places at particular times. This approach is not popular with some people, and I certainly miss the freedom in the summer to go wherever I want when I want. However, this land and our wildlife simply cannot sustain opportunities for memory-making if overrun and overcrowded. Our park is being loved to death.
Parks can be protected in the future if people feel an affinity and desire to support these places in their local communities as well as nationally. Limits exist, however, to how many people can enjoy an outdoor spaces before they become depreciated. Parameters are necessary. To save National Parks requires that more outdoor spaces for memory-making are made available on municipal, county, regional, and state lands.
Parks make life better because they provide a connection to personal and social pasts, and present realities. They must be preserved, managed, and remembered to foster enduring connections into the future.
All this is so true and makes such good sense. Protecting the land/animals/beauty of the place has become a number one priority in how the parks are managed. Having people like you involved is so valuable in this endeavor. Thanks for all you do, Karla. Anne
Having people like you, Anne, who advocates for the parks is also so important. I also was thinking about you as I wrote this blog. I recall how many times you talked about hiking with your Pop in Rocky Mountain National Park. You have so many wonderful memories.
This essay is a good one as we struggle with all of the visitors to Rocky Mountain National Park. I hope for each one of them that they have positive memories of this place. However, like you, I worry that our parks are in danger of being “loved to death”. I believe most people try to do the right thing, but it gets discouraging to see trash, human (or in some places, dog) waste, animals frightened by visitors who think they are in a petting zoo instead of a park, or “social trails” and trampled areas when people think the signs to stay on the trail are for everyone else but them. I think sometimes people just “lose their minds” when they see that first wild elk or want to get to that spot off the trail because it’s a better picture spot… so some how the individual’s right wins over doing the right thing for the greater good… It’s still about “making memories” but at what cost and to whom?? I like to think all of the memories are the kind you mention- being a rosy glasses sort of person, I’ll continue to lean that way. But I still have a nagging place about the cost of memory-making.
Good points, Deb. I do want people to have positive memory-making in Rocky, but I also hope that we can find many ways to have memories about the outdoors in local areas, including backyards, as well.