Hi friends. Today's episode is hosted by the poet and writer Victoria Chang.

Don't worry, I'll be back on April 8th. I'm Victoria Chang and this is the slowdown.

I'm Victoria Chang and this is the slowdown.

Because I'm a very organic person and rather compliant if someone suggests something I often go along with the idea

One of those ideas was that I should attend business school. I had no idea what I had

signed myself up for and yet it turned out to be a fascinating two years.

As part of our orientation we could select a trip to go on with other students.

I picked hiking because the other choices like mountain biking seemed a bit dangerous. That turned out to be true. Many people came

back with broken bones from that trip. I love the outdoors and the natural world,

but I'm not an overnight camper. This trip required us to carry

really heavy backpacks, hike up and down hills, and sleep overnight in a tiny tent with an assigned stranger.

Everything about this trip gave me anxiety.

One day, in the morning, before everyone everyone got up I decided to go down to the river by

myself and wash my hair which felt particularly grimy and dirty. I brought a small bottle of shampoo and washed my hair in the freezing cold water.

I felt reinvigorated by this small private activity. By the time I returned to camp most people were up and gathered

around the fire. A woman in our group looked at me, paused, and then very quietly

explained to me that using shampoo and soaps in a river can cause harm to the fish and other aquatic life.

Their toxic ingredients can reduce oxygen in the water and cause other problems.

At that time, I was surprised by her forthrightness, but decades later I'm still chagrined for not knowing something so basic.

Yet I'm also thankful for the generous but firm way in which she educated me. How can we learn if no one helps us to learn? How can we help each other learn if we don't speak up, if we don't talk to each other honestly?

How can we learn if we don't look harder at ourselves and the things we do or don't do know or don't know every single day.

Today's poem asks hard questions of all of us individually and communally, the kind of questions that we have to continue to ask

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