Career . 05/07/2008 01:30 AM . Abigail Pilgrim

“Fire in the hole!” It echoed down the canyon and we stared, cameras rolling, for the moment we’d all been waiting (and working) for around the clock the last two days. It was an epic effort involving forty pounds of explosives at ten-thousand feet above sea level in sixty-two inches of snow through which eight strapping ski patrollers hauled five hundred pounds of scientific equipment up one thousand vertical feet. But who’s counting?

“BOOM!” A huge spray of snow and gunpowder flared from the top of the ridge and then…then…then – nothing.

We were stunned. The five of us stood and stared at the big snowy mountain – it was motionless. We were motionless. Radios were silent. Waiting for something to happen. Nothing happened.

And then my unflappable British producer stepped in front of the tripod and smiled brightly into the camera, breaking the collective shock with the words (destined to go down in historical fame right after, “Dr Livingston, I presume?), “Avalanche – take two?”

So now I pass on this handy bit of advice for you in your future endeavors: if anyone ever tells you that summoning an avalanche is easy, please laugh in their face.

• • •

That was Mission: Avalanche I, and thus Mission: Avalanche II came to be, which – just so you know – would be followed by Mission: Avalanche III. In between mission, I came back to the office for just a few days of prep before heading out for yet one more week of snowy filming by day and chilling in the hot tub under starry mountain skies by night. At this point, I confess to being content with my chosen profession. Maybe the long hours and low pay weren’t such a bad deal after all…maybe I actually would stay in tv for a while…and maybe my next show I could film somewhere warm…

All this was forefront in my mind as I sat down to grab lunch with a new friend. She had recently taken a settled nine to five office job and I was curious about why. Why, exactly, had she traded her former dream job – which involved glamorous travel all over the world reporting on amazing stories – for an office-bound career? So I asked. The answer she gave totally unsettled me, especially in my current dreamy state of mind. This was the jist of it:

“My former jobs took me amazing places – but always involved absolutely insane hours. So after I finished my last project, as a reward to myself for slaving for so long, I decided to take a break and go ona vacation around the world. But when I finally started that trip, I realized I was miserable. I was so lonely. I just wanted to go home – but I realized I had been gone for so long that I didn’t have any close friends to come back to you. For the last ten years I had gone from one amazing job to the next and had all of these amazing experiences – but I had no one to just go out to coffee with and swap stories about the weekend.”

So we talked about boyfriends and community and finding a church and how hard it is to cultivate friendships that last, and when I got up from the table I had a lot to think about.

• • •

I didn’t walk upstairs and quit my job after that conversation, but I did spend a lot of time meditating on that bittersweet little story. It’s caused me to see my life with new eyes the last few weeks. I’ve been a little shocked to find the privileges embedded in the mundane routines in my life: of talking on the phone with my mom on the bus ride in to work, of keeping tabs on the daily drama updates of my best friends. I’ve been startled to discover that these little routines are what ultimately connect me to my life, my family, and my friends – much more so than the epic adventures that I’m always craving.

So while I’m not going to turn down the next opportunity to visit some far-flung corner of the world to provoke another natural disaster, I’m also thankful to be finishing up just another day in the office, ready for just another bus ride to Glover Park, taking me to just another night at home.

Abigail Pilgrim is an associate producer at National Geographic Television currently working on a show about avalanches.



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