Names tell a story. Mine is Zach. My mom and dad call me 'Zip'. My grandfather called me 'The Professor'. Some of my friends refer to me as a Feral Deer, some a Gremlin Fay. They're all relevant. All revealing of one aspect of self or another. Some aspects are more fundamental, more essential to the story of self that my names represent--both to myself and to those who name me. These aspects are four; these aspects are:
Parkour. Your body is the tool you use to navigate the world, Parkour is the knowledge of how to use it. I’ve been training the discipline both recreationally and professionally for nearly a decade. As an athlete, an instructor, a program director, and most recently a business partner.
Adventure. Whether it’s roving twenty miles into northern Iceland in search of a literal mountain of obsidian; stopping to rest with fellow travelers beneath the largest Sequoia groves in North America; or stumbling on and subsequently spending the night eating, singing, and celebrating with a midwestern religious sect; adventure is in my blood, my bone, my way of life.
Psychology. I work in the Psychiatric field. My father raised me on the philosophy of people, having himself come from a family where untreated mental illness and maladaptive neuro-divergence was prototypical. He taught me to see past the veil of sickness to the person suffering beneath--and with that sight make considered decisions on when and how and who to help.
Writing. This weaves everything else that I do, everything that I am, into a uniform story of self. It’s my way of making my mind manifest. My attempt to serve as a creator instead of settling into passivity as a consumer. My effort to share in the most primeval skill of humanity past, present, and posterity: telling a story and telling it well.
I also forage, hunt, hike, throw knives, shoot bow and arrow (ever play arrow catch?), and prefer troublemaking wherever I think a bit of trouble might do. Innocent trouble, I promise. Baldr will be fine.
