Do folks in the recreation field get the last laugh? What it truly means to be a recreation and park professional.

Have you ever wondered why you chose recreation and parks as a career? I have. On more than a few occasions. Sometimes it happens when I walk out of a meeting, feeling like I just lost two hours of my life talking about nothing; sometimes it's when I read a newspaper and see the most recent criticism given to the field courtesy of a harsh politico.

Some of the most memorable times have been when I'm on an airplane, headed to a conference, involved in casual conversation with a seat mate. Inevitably it comes to, "So, you're a professor, that's interesting ... What's your field?" Often, my answer has been followed by stunned silence or tittering laughter. After further conversation, some of my neighbors come around a little, and some of them don't.

It started back in the '80s when it was hard to explain to the folks in my rural Appalachian community just why I would throw away all of the good things a National Merit Scholarship could bring and instead go off to major in the park and recreation field. Kind adults with my best interests at heart pled with me not to waste my life in such a career.

I guess the ultimate challenge to my professional security came about four years ago from a student taking one of my classes as an elective. While in my office to check on a test grade he was quizzing me about my career choice, which he clearly considered dubious, when he asked: "How do you sleep at night?" I was stunned. This question opened my eyes to the outright disdain that some held for my humble field. Indeed, such a question seemed more appropriate for Saddam Hussein of Slobodan Milosevic than for me.

I decided to respond to my student's questions publicly, as well as personally. I can recall a few of my finer points easily. They're probably worth repeating, not only for their educational value, but for our own reassurance. So here goes.

Despite the opinions of some, our field is a good one. It is the moral descendant of the marriage between the original 19th century conservation movement to the children's welfare and playground movements. Today, it is carried on through curricula at hundreds of college programs in the United States, Canada and around the world, and represented by prominent national and international professional organizations. Last year's National Recreation and Park Association Congress filled the whole city of St. Louis, Mo., with its attendees. Our field is part of a diverse family of other fields whose kin include health, wellness and exercise science, as well as forestry, landscape architecture and wildlife management.

Broadly construed, the leisure services industry is the largest in the world. But even being a bit more restrained in our estimates, it's still clear how vast its economic impact is. Every state has a park service; every town of any size has a recreation department. Recreation centers are often the showcase that represent a community's progressiveness and quality of life, and tourism development is a battle cry for regions across the country trying to rebuild their economies. Every university either has a shiny, new student recreation center or wants one.

Leisure helps us define our very lives--and perhaps even makes them livable. And when we're honest with ourselves as a society, as we should be every once in a while, we must admit that we desperately need what it has to offer: recreation, play, test, contemplation and the possibility of wholeness.

But perhaps the best thing about our field is the work itself. It's not for everyone, but for those who find their place, it can be more of a calling than a job. As a friend of mine, who makes his living as an outdoor educator in a big city, once said: "It's living an ideal and ideally living."

When I was in my park uniform in years past I met person after person, world-weary by age 35, who wished out loud that "I'd done what you are doing." And while some of the jobs don't offer spectacular salaries, we do get a better chance than most to "take our pay in sunsets," as park rangers have been known to say.

On the other hand, it's also wrong to think that all jobs in the field are low-paying. Recreation jobs exist in all sectors of the economy--commercial, non-profit and public. Some sales, marketing and management positions even offer extraordinary salaries. And if you're inclined toward research, the recreation, park and tourism field is rich with possibilities for inquiry in the social, behavioral and natural sciences.

But aside from all that, for many of my students and colleagues, just the opportunity to walk gently on the Earth, make a contribution to their communities and earn a decent wage is reason enough to choose the field.

So, sometimes when I'm feeling a little nagging doubt, I remind myself of my nearly-forgotten apologia, prompted by a skeptical student a few years ago. It helps me to remember that the old digs don't have much sting anymore, and that the majority of folks are on our side anyway. As I get older I feel much less defensive about my career, and much more at ease. I even laugh along with the tired old jokes every now and then.

But most reassuringly, beyond a maturing ability to engage in self-deprecation, aside from my abiding belief that my choice of a profession was a good one, is the point of my original response to my student back then.

You know, I sleep just fine.

David Matthew Zuefle, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in the Park and Recreation Management Program at the University of Mississippi. He can be contacted at [e-mail].