During her 1983 high-school internship, she was 'just another zookeeper,' and she loved it
Shifts that start at the crack of dawn? No problem. Many repetitive tasks? Not an issue. Long hours catering to the needs of unpredictable personalities? All in a day’s work.
Shields walked the red carpet, hobnobbed with Olympic snowboarder Shaun White, and posed for photos with an umbrella cockatoo and a sloth. But in 1983, Shields spent a glorious month trekking the concrete paths of the zoo and the wide-open plains of the Wild Animal Park, where the teenage star of “The Blue Lagoon,” “Endless Love” and an iconic Calvin Klein commercial was just another human on poop patrol.
“She was such a hard worker. She came in at 6 a.m., and she did anything she was asked. And she had a real affinity for animals. She was not nervous around them, and the animals were not afraid of her,” said Irvine, now the director of publishing for the San Diego Wildlife Alliance. Neither the zoo nor the Wild Animal Park had official high-school internship programs, so Shields ended up doing everything from cleaning enclosures to helping in the animal nursery. And because zoos and other wildlife organizations were much more hands-on with their animal care than they are now, Shields was able to interact with some memorable animals in ways that she will never forget.
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