I believe two major events contributed to my life-long interest in science and trying to understand the world around me. The first event was my initial glimpse of Saturn through a telescope, and the second event was the day Mt. St. Helens blew her top off. Both of these events took place during the phase when children ask too many questions, and witnessing these events turned my questions into quests. I still ask too many questions. My daily life is a quest to answer as many as I can. As for the rest: I explore the possibilities.

I remember the day as well as I remember yesterday, perhaps even better. On Sunday morning of May 18th, 1980, the world around me changed. Some heard an explosion like dynamite. Others heard a rumble. The echos of the news came to everyone. All eyes turned to the mountain. Her fury released in a blast sending ash rising into the sky. A question turned into a jingle echoed over and over again during the following months: “Where were you when the mountain blew?” I was having breakfast, but it was not long before the family piled into the car and sought out a viewpoint where we watched the world change. Over the next few years we visited bridges destroyed by mudslides and a land transformed. My first visit inside the blast zone was even more ominous and breathtaking.

Last year, I posted pictures of the blast zone showing the change. Here are two pictures from the same vantage.

1983 Photo by Jerry Shrock

Today, as I write this blog post, the mountain sits just beyond a ridge outside my window. I look at her as if all the answers to the mysteries of the universe might erupt from her top. Certainly not, but she holds some of them. And a fun place to start looking.

See National Geographic “Mountain Transformed.”

Visit Mt. St. Helens: Visitors Centers