Who We Are

Keelan is a wanderer who began her journey in the traditional homelands of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa. She earned a BFA from the University of Art & Design in Santa Fe, NM and roamed the mountains and deserts of the southwest for more than a decade; hiking, rock climbing, camping, and sitting quietly. She returned to Maine to build a forever home along the Kennebunk River in Arundel, with her husband and two teenagers, surrounded by her father’s family - the Ingwersens.

She has spent over two decades in nonprofit educational administration, accumulating significant experience in fundraising and educational outreach management. She enjoys collaborating with others – forming dynamic partnerships with diverse individuals and groups to move forward shared visions for youth development, community empowerment, and positive social change. As a mother, teacher, artist, naturalist, wife, and woman with a curious mind she is eager to learn from others, understand places deeply, contribute her own knowledge, and help people of all ages find their passions in a way that fuels their best life while benefiting the natural world and society.

What type of movement do you practice regularly and how or why has it become a consistent habit?

Each morning I try to move my body to start the day, maybe with some casual Yoga or Tai Chi. However, my sense of place and purpose has been forged in the backcountry where mother nature’s great works inspire me as a creator and as part of creation. So, I walk in the woods whenever I can, for as long as possible, with or without a destination. Other times I dance barefoot in the grass right in my yard. Yet, with the most regularity, I sit still and silent and let nature move me … listening to seasonal bird song shift with migration, watching the moon’s reflection change shape on the water, or marveling at the productive mutual aid of ants.

What part of our food system are you most drawn to?

I am confused and frustrated by the fact that in our current American food system consistent access to healthy organic whole foods requires affluence, while highly processed and fake foods are pushed on the remaining masses. I've always been intrigued by the relationship between cultures and food, especially the history of key grains and vegetables, and the rituals around the way they're grown and prepared.

In my family it is a culture of garlic. From the hundreds of pounds of garlic my aunt grows annually and hangs to dry in her root cellar, to excessively seasoned garlic dishes, and magic garlic elixirs used as remedies. From tangy spring scapes, to sticky summer garlic sweat, to warm roasted bulbs in the winter; I love everything about garlic. One of my favorite recipes is Garlicky white bean soup with fresh parsley and crusty bread. I even love the word “garlicky”, don’t you?

If you were to write a book, what would it be about?

Maybe a selection of poems which I have been working on with my father asynchronously across the country for many years. His father was a poet, and he is too, and I sure hope it runs in the family. For now I relish the collaboration because he makes every stanza I write better by sandwiching it between his own. Now as we look back to the long ago poems we can’t even remember who wrote which parts.

If you had a chance for a “do-over” in life, what would you do differently?

I would have liked to have spent more time with my grandparents and great grandparents. I was so naive and distracted while they were alive. I would love to go back and just sit for long hours, hold their hands, ask questions and listen intently.