My most peaceful experience in memory involved observing a school of pipefish while snorkeling at a remote reef off the coast of Palau. Buoying myself amid the play of light among the native ecosystem within the immensity of the ocean filled me with a calm and wonder it is hard to replicate. I began SCUBA diving in 2018 when I earned my Advanced Deep Water Diving credential in Thailand. I have since been fortunate to visit multiple reefs in Thailand, Palau, and Guam, both free and SCUBA diving. These experiences have given me the utmost respect for the diversity and importance of reefs, as well as our complicated relationship to sensitive marine ecosystems, and I would like to play a part in preserving their health and longevity. I am currently enrolled in a Marine Systems program at a trade school in Washington State. My focus will be technical, and there is a sustainability component through which I will be learning to design and implement solar electrical systems to use on boats, which includes providing the electrical needs for both power and propulsion. Last year, the program helped to build and outfit the first all-electric workboat on the Puget Sound. My hope is to become proficient with innovating and building these types of systems to promote more environmentally conscious boating on our oceans and inland waterways. I will also learn to keep ships in working order, which itself cuts down on pollution from poorly-functioning engines, the leaking of contaminant metals from corrosion, and the discharge of improperly-wired electrical current into the surrounding water. There are growing concerns for the sonic health of ocean communities. According to a recent paper by the International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI), the greatest contributors to noise pollution around coral reefs are recreational motorboats. The added noise disrupts coral ecosystems in a myriad of ways, such as increasing physiological stress levels of marine organisms and disrupting communication and behavior patterns among all the creatures that make a home in the reef. The ICRI also reports that, while noise pollution is only one of the factors negatively impacting reefs, it is one of the easiest to address given our advances in technology. The beauty of this technology to me is that it cuts down on both noise and environmental pollution by keeping diesel and other oily waste from the water. There are also inroads to be made in gear and propeller maintenance and design to lessen the detrimental noise pollution being released. I am heartened by the growing interest in implementing cleaner technology for watercraft and believe that, as we explore these options, there will be room for continued innovation. This will require skilled technicians who also care deeply about protecting marine life and ocean ecology. I would like to become adept at designing and maintaining greener systems aboard boats so that I can be a part of this ongoing conversation. My ultimate dream would be to use my diving experience in concert with my marine systems skills to provide a sustainable platform for marine scientists to study reef ecology and ocean health as well as to train for and participate in reef restoration projects. Further, I believe it will be necessary to make these sorts of technologies affordable and available to remote and poorer populations who rely on the ocean for their livelihoods but who often have limited resources for maintaining their workboats. I hope that as I garner more experience, I could help to promote the use of eco-friendly workboats in coastal communities, especially those who live around sensitive coral reefs and coastlines.

Throughout my life, I have been continually enriched by activities and occupations that require using my hands. I have also found that trade work is often closely linked to community engagement and care because of the fundamental nature of the services trades provide. I trained as an artisan bread baker in rural New Hampshire, which taught me important skills and gave me a role to play in helping sustain many thriving and wonderful communities of farmers, tradespeople, artists, and families (not mutually exclusive roles!), which I have treasured over the years. In 2020, I switched careers to begin working in the maritime industry—specifically in the Engine Department—both out of my interest to become more mechanically inclined and also to pursue a career path that might have more varied long-term prospects for me. The job has brought exciting travel experiences, cross-cultural connections with shipmates, and a variety of new skills; however, with the transient nature of the work, I find that I am missing the close community connections I once enjoyed. I would like to continue advancing in the trade at a more local level by enhancing my skills working with diesel, electrical, plumbing, propulsion, and HVAC systems. I have been eager to find rigorous and structured training, and I am currently enrolled to begin the Marine Systems program at The Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding in Washington State this fall. This is a full-time, accelerated trade school that is taught by industry experts with small student-to-teacher ratios, an emphasis on safety and hands-on experience, and a dedication to the craft and high-caliber work. In this program, I will learn to install, service, and repair all the mechanical systems such as are found on watercraft, and I will sit for important industry certifications. I am excited to participate in a program that I believe will help me become a more capable, confident, and well-rounded tradesperson with skills to offer a local community. My goal post-graduation is to work as an electrician and electronics technician, with the auxiliary skills to troubleshoot and maintain marine diesel engines, corrosion issues, hydraulics, plumbing, and HVAC systems. These skills will have broader applications as well, such as for recreational vehicles and tiny homes. Long term, I hope to be involved with envisioning and designing sustainable electrical systems that provide new ways of powering our electrical needs aboard ships and in small-footprint homes. I believe there will be a growing number of jobs—and the potential for creative innovators—within the transportation, construction, and energy sectors. One of the aspects of the Marine Systems program I am most excited about involves building electrical systems that integrate solar power and utilize the most current technology for batteries and other necessary components. I have seen and been affected by the housing difficulties and over-use of resources that leave a large swath of the population in less-than-adequate living conditions. I would like to use my knowledge of sustainable electrical systems to help power boats, tiny homes, and recreational vehicles in a more affordable and sustainable way. I believe that a lot of people might be surprised at the quality of life possible in smaller-footprint living and would appreciate the chance to contribute to and maintain beautiful spaces for current and future generations.

I am pursuing an education and training in Marine Systems at a trade school in Washington State. In this program, I will learn to service the mechanical systems such as are found on small watercraft and recreational vehicles, including electrical, diesel, propulsion, HVAC, and plumbing systems. I am excited to participate in a program that will help me to become more capable, confident, and well-rounded in the maritime industry. For the past three years, my primary work has been aboard commercial ships, but before working as a mariner, I trained as an artisan bread baker—a craft that calls for skills in time and resource management, math, science, dexterity, stamina, and, above all, a sensitivity and intuition connecting the mind with the hands. I believe it prepared me well for learning other skills that require creativity, agility, and abstract and practical thinking. For example, I took an introductory course in masonry to learn the fundamentals of mixing mortar and laying block, which knowledge I was able to apply when mixing historic lime mortar to tuck point my home’s 150-year-old foundation. I also practice bookbinding and sewing, which require the ability to visualize patterns and translate them through my hands to achieve usable finished items. More recently, I have been working in the engine rooms of commercial ships as an assistant to engineers, which involves frequent troubleshooting of various mechanical systems with limited time and resources. I am drawn to the Marine Systems program because I see it as an extension of these hands-on skills in an exciting career field. Ships’ crews are often quite small, and this type of training and certification will make me more of an asset in the engine room and provide additional work opportunities for me. My goal after completing the program is to work as an electrician and electronics technician on ships, with the auxiliary skills to perform maintenance on the engine and other systems as needed. Further, with the rising interest in more sustainable energy options, I would like to have the skills and experience to help envision and build new ways of powering our electrical needs aboard ships or even in homes and other vehicles. While the industry is becoming more diverse, from my experience there are still not a lot of women crewing the engine department, and so, on a personal level, I would be honored to represent women in my trade. I would like to one day embark on a blue water sail of some distance; my having the necessary skills to oversee the ship’s systems—and perhaps even offer these skills to others as I travel—would be of great benefit and add to the enrichment and safety of such a trip. I believe the skills I will learn in the program will have such a broad application that I will be drawing on them both personally and professionally throughout my life.

I would recommend Robert Macfarlane's THE OLD WAYS: A JOURNEY ON FOOT (2012). I first read THE OLD WAYS while tucked into my rack on a ship crossing the Pacific Ocean. In the dark hum of night, with only red lights to guide the watchstanders fore and aft, the book was a treasure of language for my imagination, and the author invited me into his memory palace of siltstones, elevations, poets, and gatekeepers, met as he left footprints on historic paths all around Scotland, England, and, remarkably, Palestine. In his own words, it is “a book about people and place: about walking as a reconnoitre inwards, and the subtle ways in which we are shaped by the landscapes through which we move.” The balance of scope and minutiae inherent to place is described so lovingly in this book, as too are the toponyms he traverses (so much so that I repeat the placenames aloud just to try the sounds: Pools of Dee, Icknield Way, Sula Sgeir). I live to explore, and most enjoy investigating by foot (and more recently, by water); through his narrative, Macfarlane sets scenes in beautiful detail, and one gets the sense of discovering sea roads and ridgeways along with him. From a purely “readerly” standpoint, I find his narrative enriching to my senses in a way that rivals some of the most engrossing cinematography. He is generous with his references as well, and I have discovered intriguing new authors from mentions within this book. I find myself recommending THE OLD WAYS to other readers, and if they take me up on the suggestion, I am drawn to thumb through the chapters again and again to revisit the language and places so that I can re-experience the book alongside them. I think that, by way of his exploration, Macfarlane makes a strong case for thoughtful preservation—of memory, of geologies—and I wonder, if we could describe our own environments as perceptively as he does, whether we might be inclined in turn to be more careful with them. In this way, the book inspires me to look more closely at the places in my purview: to note the seemingly inconsequential, tiny things and to wonder at the epic vistas. I walk around more attuned to the world and more awake to the biographies (my own included) that exist over the surfaces of our earth.

When I think about helping others, one of the first things I consider is how to bring happiness to others. And, when I think about happiness, one of the first people who comes to mind is Thich Nhat Hanh, a Buddhist teacher who speaks clearly to the power and necessity of happiness as a conduit for love and shares thoughts on how each of us has the innate ability to love ourselves and others. In his book Teachings on Love, Nhat Hanh identifies, as the root of happiness, the qualities of “love, compassion, joy, and equanimity” and further defines our capacity for these as being “immeasurable,” noting that “if you practice them, they will grow in you every day until they embrace the whole world. You will become happier, and everyone around you will become happier, also.” I believe there are many ways to help others in the sharing of our time and resources; I also propose that what precludes the act of helping others is practicing the power of kindness (love), acknowledging the dignity and worth we all contain (compassion), upholding these connections in support of the human spirit (joy), and being present in our human interactions (equanimity). It is often just the slowing of a few seconds to engage genuinely at the grocery store, in traffic, on a walk, in our online social spaces, with the people in our daily spheres. In this way, I think of every interaction, however inconsequential, as a microcosm of the immense concert being played out globally every day among all humans. Just as we can wonder at the infinite wisdom contained in an atom and, further, contemplate the blueprint that atom gives us for understanding the cosmos, so too can we find in ourselves all the elements necessary to enact the potential of humanity by embracing these “immeasurable” qualities that reflect the boundlessness of that potential. I did not know Dr. Lane, but I note the importance that those who did place on a scholarship that both honors compassion and perseverance and acknowledges the importance of the trades in respecting her legacy and convictions. This speaks to me because I see a great deal of potential in helping people through the skilled trades. I think that they provide a tangibility to the conceptual principles discussed above: building the infrastructure to provide clean water to those who have access to none (love), rebuilding a home after an environmental catastrophe (compassion), providing instruction and training as a mentor or teacher (joy), and responding with tools in hand to a community in crisis (equanimity). Despite the demand for trade work, it is not an especially lucrative profession. Just as there are invisible costs to losing the wisdom we have invested in our trades, there are invisible rewards for honing our efforts to continue passing these skills down through generations. For many trades workers there is the simple necessity to earn a livelihood (yes, most certainly), but I see also the capacity for using these skills to provide safety, humanity, peace-of-mind, and joy to others if we allow the work to inform our lives in this way. Can you remember a time when a friend or stranger made you feel acknowledged by a simple act of kindness? Can you think of an instance in which you gave or received a gift of skilled labor? How did it help you surmount an obstacle, grow your love for self or another, or fill you with something like happiness? Can you imagine the power of that multiplied by eight billion? How fleeting a concept that is also so possible.