I spent six years living in Eugene, Oregon in the early '00s. During that time I worked for Permaculture Designer Heiko Koester of Urban Eco Gardens. He taught me a lot about how to take care of plants and trees and soil, along with composting, the value of diversity, and just generally shared his enthusiasm about the natural world. I also at that time was deeply involved in Wilderness Awareness School's Kamana Naturalist Training Program. Which took a balanced, left AND right brain approach to learning about the ecology of your specific place on planet earth.
When I moved back to my small, high-desert home town of Joshua Tree, California I began a process of integrating and transfering the knowledge I had gained in the drippy-wet Pacific Northwest to this polar opposite dry, prickly and starkly beautiful desert. After several years of getting settled, watching the desert's natural cycles and being a working musician for money, I was moved to get involved with permaculture in a much deeper way. Partly, I credit the Transition Town movement, which appeared in my town, and helped rekindle that fire, but for whatever reason, I felt an absolute need arise inside me to start moving, little by little, towards a world where humanity lives in harmonious relationship with nature.
I took my PDC in Geoff Lawton's first-ever online course, drinking in the precious information, while contemplating this very dry desert I live in. After my PDC, I have continued my studies taking a more specifically focused drylands orientation: learning about desert plants, native cultures of my region, desertification, rainwater harvesting, and water issues in general. Now I am designing for friends, family, and my neigborhood--gaining valuable experience by getting to implement my designs and see what works in this very unique place.