good friend gave me a wonderful book last year—Let the Mountains Talk, Let the Rivers Run. In it, David Brower offers learned advice to those who work to protect the environment. I began to mark some of the pages with red tags so I could later refer to particularly inspiring passages. The book has now become so festooned with red tags that it will barely close. You guys should read it.
Brower warns environmental organizations to follow Rule Number 6, which is to “never take yourself too seriously”. And, he continues, “there are no other rules”. One of the weaknesses of the feminist movement, he points out, is that somewhere along the way they lost their sense of humor. That hadn’t occurred to me before, but maybe they—we—all of us—should laugh more. Especially at ourselves.
As the (yikes) new president, I hope to laugh a lot this year. At every board meeting we should, at least once, just kick back and howl. That’s hard sometimes when faced with troublesome issues. It was difficult to yuck it up when we received a vicious letter, dripping with hatred and malice (unsigned, of course) in response to our action alert about regulation of air tours. The fact that we received a tremendous amount of positive feedback allowed us to chuckle about the negative. Thanks for writing those letters, you guys. We received more than 300; they were convincing and well written.
Even that issue is pretty amusing, really. At the FAA hearings in Las Vegas in September regarding their rulemaking, representatives from the Hualapai Tribe sauntered over to the FAA’s airspace maps and colored in the boundaries of their vast lands with a bright pink highlighter. They questioned why all of the air traffic between Grand Canyon and Las Vegas is apparently to be channeled over Hualapai lands. “These are our lands, FAA... We are a sovereign nation...Why don’t you show this on your maps? Why do you keep ignoring us, FAA?” Cool, calm, with the perfect hint of humor, their message was powerful and effective.
But I digress. Within this BQR are continual reminders of how weird, wonderful and full of humor our community is. Have some of us lost sight of that? Are we taking ourselves too seriously? I’m certainly guilty of that all too often; only today Stoner had to remind me to laugh at a joke. “That was supposed to be funny, Jeri.” Oh, yeah. Of course it is. Ha ha ha. I always appreciate a good joke once it’s pointed out.
We do have a choice—to laugh or to cry, rejoice or despair. When you read Bill Beer’s interview, imagine his laugh—large, overwhelming, and genuine.

Casey Lott’s disturbingly accurate parody of Powell’s Journal can be read with remorse at loss of times past, or with humor and hope for a return to reason and balance. Let’s try the latter.
Instead of being appalled about the prospect of killer bee escape tents, try to be amused. If motors antagonize them, won’t coffee grinders really irritate them? Just what we need—swarming thugs with stingers–bee gangs with attitudes.
As we face revision of the Colorado River Management Plan, Adaptive Management of Glen Canyon Dam operations, and other major and difficult issues, we can be far more effective with a positive attitude. As for health regulations—the comical image of Clair Quist struggling into a beard net can revitalize, as well as amuse.
So hey you guides, keep up the humor. And start getting involved. Come to the fall meeting; let’s have a beer, a few good laughs, and talk about some things. Our organization is eight years old. Maybe it’s time to step back, reexamine our goals, and see where we’re headed and where we want to be. Are we clear on our priorities? Are we doing the right stuff? And where can you order those beekeeper suits?
Brower describes the Earth as a living, throbbing organism that needs CPR—Conservation, Preservation, and Restoration, on a regular basis. Are we doing all we can toward that goal in our own little corner of the world?
The board and officers fervently hope that Lew is right in saying we’ll have a smooth ride for the next year or so. Oh, wait. He’s making a joke too. Regardless, Lew, thanks for everything. You have one of the greatest laughs around.

Jeri Ledbetter