Kennie DeLoatch is a contributing writer with his own channel on One Planet Thriving: Kennie D’s Science Projects.

Humbly, I am known to many as a “renaissance man” having lived my life rooted with an insatiable curiosity. I apply my knowledge of math and science to my love for nature. I try to use my limitless imagination to create new approaches to complex problems, solving them in simple, understandable presentations. 

I was born in a small town in New York’s Hudson River Valley,  Nyack, NY.  As a child I was alway curious. I am the middle child of five children. My father was a Baptist Minster and my mother a Registered Nurse. When I started my first day of elementary school, my mother gave me my very own study desk. I named my new desk the “Figg-i-dee Out” which to me as a 6 year old, meant a place to go to “figure things out”. When I had a problem I would chant the mantra “I know what to do, I know what to do” over and over as I ran to my Figg-i-dee Out to find the answers. 

I often helped my mother preserve foods; drying, pickling and canning.  My father was an outdoors man, out necessity to provide for family.  I would work with him in the garden planting and harvesting plus my father would take me on fishing trips. We often sat at the waters edge all day and into the evening. I loved to collect flotsam and jetsam I’d find on the shore.  

My father cultivated worms in wooden boxes next to the outhouse for bait. He had red worms, night crawlers, and meal worms. Depending on what we were fishing for, he’d give me a paper cup and say “go get some worms”.  My father was also a small game hunter.  

So there it is. I am from a family of pioneers in comparison to today’s standards of living. In my childhood I rarely got new toys. I aways got things in need  of repair so I began honing my mechanical skills. 

Using my imagination, for fun, I would romp through dense forests near my home, mimicking the behavior of a deer. I would lie on the forest floor face down and smell the earth and then roll over and gaze at the sky through the tree tops. At night I stared at the moon and drifted into dreams. My bond with nature continues today in this era of uncertainty. I continue to create visions that are harmonic with the nature around me and create sustainable environments.