before i get into that, some background. i came back from afghanistan to the states in 2005 to try to heal my digestive system (which has taken almost two years to get close to normal) and also to date, and then to marry, my beautiful wife Denise, who i met over there through direct providence. when i came back to the States i tried to figure out what i could do that would build on what i had done and learned over there and ended up finding a job as a social worker, which i've been doing now for two years (as of yesterday - anniversary!). i work with children who have been abused, neglected or abandoned and with families dealing with these same issues. my work is very one-on-one, and can be very intense and emotional at times, even as i have had to steel myself and put up barriers and strong boundaries just to stay sane.
however, when i first came into this job i found myself spending a lot of time drawing back and looking at the bigger picture, looking at the system itself and wondering how it came to be this way (built up slowly over time through reactionary laws designed to fix flaws in the system), seeing the ways it works and doesn't work. that was my first train of thought in Afghanistan was well, and i believe this is where my greatest strength lies - being able to step back outside of the box and to think big, to try to see large things that simply exist as the framework of people's lives. once you get down on the micro level, and get into the system trying to help people, you lose that perspective and it's hard to get it back. don't get me wrong - that micro level is where much of the one-on-one change is done, and where people like mother theresa and paul brand operate, and it's very needed. but i keep having this desire to back up and see what needs to change from the outside.
in pulp fiction there's a character called The Wolf, played by Harvey Keitel. his job is to walk into an impossible situation and think creatively to find a big-picture solution. that's what i've been feeling like i want to become - The Wolf of developing countries.
that takes training. and in Afghanistan i realized my real lack of it. sure i knew some basic things about agriculture, but i was daily up against how little i really knew that was useful to me there. since i've been back in America this desire has been building in me (and in Denise) to go back to school and to train with the idea of becoming that person that can step in and change big things, systemic things. and not just to learn about agriculture, although that is my main focus, but to learn about resource management (of water, land, trees), ecology, economics, and all of the other things that shape a region's livelihood.
over this past year this desire has grown in me, and as i've been looking around there are relatively few schools in the states that can offer this kind of training. Denise and i have started to focus in on one in particular - Oregon State, in Corvallis, Oregon. the horticulture program at Oregon State is unlike most i've found in other schools, in it's big picture focus on sustainability of agriculture, organic ag, integrated pest management (creative use of insects and other plants to manage pests), and resource management. they also have the option to get a Graduate minor in international agricultural development - it's the only school i've found that has that, and OSU faculty has consulted for development in countries like Iran and Egypt.
this is what is heavy on my mind these days, what excites me, what i've been praying about. this is why i've been studying dry GRE prep books on my weekends. this is why i'm starting a Plant Pathology class in august at the distance learning center of the University Of Florida in Apopka. more on this to come...
Ryan
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