by Lisa Damerel (ELP 2023) | Watershed Conservation Manager, Contra Costa Resource Conservation District
"The earth laughs in flowers." -Ralph Waldo Emerson
As I napped, each of my little hands squeezed tight a pansy I had picked from a neighbor’s front yard during a walk near our house in L.A. My mom lovingly reminded my 4-year-old self that I shouldn’t pick the neighbors’ flowers, even if they were pretty. I would wake up from my naps with flowers still in my hands. She called me her “flower girl.”
Growing up, I shifted my attention to excelling in school. I was a voracious reader and when it came time to attend college, I majored in English literature at UC Berkeley. But I also studied anthropology, linguistics, history, Italian…I didn’t know what I wanted to do in life, but I knew I loved learning about all kinds of things I had never truly delved into before. I graduated with honors and was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. I set my mind to becoming an editor and starting a career in the book publishing industry. What could be better than to help create a book?
After a positive internship experience with a trade publisher in San Francisco, I returned home to L.A. to care for my mom, who had by then been diagnosed terminally ill. I was glad to be with her, to be helpful to her, to make her smile. She was my favorite person, and I was her flower girl. She died two months before my wedding. I laid flowers at her grave 13 years ago. She might have preferred that I kept them to enjoy their beauty, but I preferred the traditional gesture.
Upon returning to the Bay Area with my husband, I got a job in educational publishing and began editing college-level science textbooks. At first, the work was rewarding enough to justify the long hours, but after almost four years of rising through the ranks of the company’s editorial department and still spending endless hours checking manuscripts on the computer, I decided I needed to make a change.
I was grateful to be able to take some time off to figure out my next steps, but I was in my thirties and back at square one. I turned to some of the typical measures that people take when they’re trying to figure things out: regular yoga practice, career books, journaling, you name it. In the end, I decided to follow a feeling. I applied to a local community college and enrolled in an Intro to Horticulture class.
I was captivated by what I learned about plant biology, ecosystems, and native plants. I had appreciated plants for so long; learning about them was like meeting up with old friends. What’s more, I enjoyed the hands-on aspect of helping in the school’s teaching nursery. I ended up taking several horticulture classes and even training with a local florist, just to learn more about the plant materials. I completed a horticulture certificate, began an internship at the Contra Costa Resource Conservation District (CCRCD), and was subsequently hired as a CCRCD staff member in January 2019.
Working for this Resource Conservation District, I have had the opportunity to work on creek restorations, native plant establishment projects, invasive plant removals, local native seed amplification efforts, creek and shoreline cleanups, and environmental education programs. Sometimes, when I find myself in waders knee-deep in a creek to help a colleague sample benthic macroinvertebrates or when I’m teaching a child how to plant a tree, I think about the metamorphosis I underwent and how lucky I am to be able to do what I do. The 2023 Beahrs Environmental Leadership Program has helped me to see that I have indeed ended up in a field where I can make a difference.
The most recent large effort I took on at work was the creation of a Monarch Conservation Program for the CCRCD. I find it fitting that the monarch, a threatened California native butterfly, is famous for its glorious metamorphosis. The black, white, and yellow striped caterpillar could never possibly know that she would wait patiently in a green and gold pupa to emerge with wings capable of taking her far from her place of birth. But we know this, and we can help her on her journey. The flowers we plant now will feed generations of monarchs and other pollinators in the future. Whenever I see one of these animals alight on a flower to nectar, I am a flower girl anew.