Wiser With Age

Tag: Audrey Peterman

  • A Love Story Between Two Lovers of Nature

    A Love Story Between Two Lovers of Nature

    A woman with short hair wearing red necklace.
    Audrey and Frank Peterman (Courtesy Audrey Peterman)

    I’m a Jamaican-born immigrant to America where I met a man so elegant and gorgeous, he reminds me of James Bond. After seven years of friendship, when I tried to fix him up with all my most beautiful girlfriends (sometimes they took an instant dislike to each other), we finally realized that we were perfect for each other and got married within six months. We’re now approaching our 28th wedding anniversary, and we love and trust each other more than ever.

    Three years into our marriage, we got in our truck and drove 20,500 miles around the country, visiting the spectacular destinations such as the Badlands, the Grand Canyon, Yellowstone, Yosemite and the Hoh Rainforest in Olympic National Park, Washington State. That journey gave us a lot of time to talk and get to know each other even better. When we didn’t have even one blow up, Frank says he knew we would make it.

    He had been married twice before and gently shared the lessons he learned. For example, one day he said,

    “Honey, there are three of us in this marriage…â€

    “Wait!†I exclaimed! “I didn’t sign up for that!â€

    “There’s three of us in the marriage,” he continued unfazed. “There’s you, there’s me, and there’s the relationship. The relationship is made up of how we treat each other, how we speak to each other, and whether or not we make each other our priority.”

    Well, that made sense. So we decided that, whatever happened, the two of us would make the decision together, then consider our mothers, our children, and our family and close friends, followed by everyone else.

    Another time he said, “You know, each of us is going to go crazy sometimes. But it is very important that we don’t both go crazy at the same time.”

    He explained that, if I was upset about something, it would be his job to listen and hear me out, then repeat back to me what he’d heard to make sure he got it right. If he had, he’d explain what had happened to produce that result. If I said he hadn’t got the point, we’d start over. I would do the same for him if he was upset.

    Realizing that communication is difficult and that meaning doesn’t come directly from one person’s mouth into another’s head in just the way it is intended, keeps us open to being gently corrected.

    I share some of our key principles for a successful, smooth and happy relationship in my brand new book, “From My Jamaican Gully to the World,†which tells the story of our environmental journey resulting in the White House taking action. As a result of our efforts to protect the national parks and share them with all Americans, President Obama issued a Presidential Memorandum promoting diversity and inclusion in January of 2017.

    This Valentine’s Day, I wish everyone the privilege of looking at their partner with new eyes and appreciating what you saw in the beginning. No one is perfect, including you, and once you accept that, the relationship can become much easier and happier.

    Read our interview with Audrey Peterman to learn more about her, and Frank, (and how they live on a boat in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida) here.

  • The love of nature bringing people together – one national park at a time

    The love of nature bringing people together – one national park at a time


    A woman with short hair wearing red necklace.
    Audrey and Frank Peterman on their boat “Limitless.” (Courtesy Audrey Peterman)

    Audrey Peterman grew up on the lush island of Jamaica where she says there was often no choice between outdoors and indoors. She was always at home in wildlife.

    “We bathed in the river,†she recollects. “We went to the woods to collect firewood. We went to the fields to get green bananas and potatoes. I was very much into nature.â€

    Little did she know however, that at 64, she’d be living on a sailboat, with her husband Frank, off a marina in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and be a U.S. national park expert – having visited a total of 171 around the country. It’s been 20 years since she and Frank started their own business, Earthwise Productions – inspiring hundreds of thousands to discover and support our national parks. In 2012, she wrote “Our True Nature,†the first travel guide to the national parks written by an African American woman.

    Peterman moved to New York at 28 to join her mother in 1979. Six years later, after moving to Fort Lauderdale, to escape the cold winters of NYC, she met Frank.

    “We became instant best friends,†she says in her gregarious manner. “He was so exciting as a writer and a person, I tried to set him up with all of my girlfriends, and it was a disaster. It’s not often that you have a great male friend. We did get together, several years later. It’s been 23 years now that we’ve been married.â€

    She says their entire married life has included a close relationship with nature.

    “When Frank and I got married, we’d go for our morning walks,†says Peterman. “Not only would he identify the birds that he saw, but also the birds that he heard. Now I can tell by the call too, but I never thought it was possible to do that. We are very attune to the outdoors.â€

    Peterman says it wasn’t until 1995 when they decided to drive around the country and see America. They were about to open a bed and breakfast in Belize, but while Frank was having a drink there before flying home, a local asked him about the Badlands and the Grand Canyon, and Frank said he’d never been.

    “The gentleman said, ‘What? What kind of American are you?’,†recalls Peterman. “Frank said, ‘We cannot go to Belize if we do not know our own country.’ So we decided to take two months off to travel. We bought a Ford truck. We drove from the Atlantic to the Pacific – Yellowstone to Yosemite, and we didn’t see any blacks or Hispanics…We thought, ‘How is this possible?’ We decided that we would make a change. A lot of friends didn’t know of these places.† 

    She says seeing so many beautiful places they did not know about encouraged them to start their own company to bring information about our national forests to other people who didn’t know.

    “The French philosopher, Albert Camus, once said, ‘All a man’s life consists of the search for those few special images in the presence of which his soul first opened.’ That’s what I’m all about,†says Peterman. “From the first moment I saw my first national park – Acadia in Maine – my soul opened so extensively like I was looking into the face of God…When I had that feeling, I wanted to share that with everybody. What it feels like to feel so small, and yet you’re safe. I experience it over, and over, and over, again. That’s why I can’t stop. I didn’t choose my mission, my mission chose me.â€

    Peterman says they’re busier than ever now, because now they have to travel the country speaking about climate change,†says Peterman. “At this point, it’s all hands on deck. It’s affecting us right now.â€

    What is the most important piece of life advice that she would give her younger self at her age now?

    “I would say keep a more open mind and not to jump to conclusions so readily,†she says. “I think that when we’re younger we see something as it is, but there could be so many reasons it appears that way, but it’s not so at all. Because you think it, doesn’t make it so. There could be another interpretation. Especially something that hurts you – don’t assume that that’s what it is. Even now at 64, I find that as much as I’m striving not to do it, it really takes work not to jump to conclusions.â€