On the Road

Traveling stories.

There are three big occupiers of my time that have kept me from updating the blog for a few weeks and are likely to continue to do so for a few weeks more. There three items are as follows:

1. Web stuff
I spent a lot of time developing this blog. It does not look like much right now I realize but there's a lot of stuff programmed in the background that has not made it to the public interface yet. To be honest, it was a kind of a torture (physical and mental) to get the site to this point. Now that the grunt work is done - namely being able to post blogs, photos, and videos - it's time to work on the fun stuff.

Thing about the fun stuff is that I want to take my time on it, it's not the kind of thing I can force myself to do and day dreams are productive in this phase. Unlike making a basic blog which is a fairly straightforward in terms of what it should do and how it should do it, I now need to get down to the nitty gritty of how I want this application to function and, more to the point of what's challenging me, how to port the functionality to various social networks I'm building including mythis and tripintown.

I'll be cutting myself loose from the comforts of Nicole's house in October. It's been nice, maybe too nice in the sense that last year I remember being stuck in Ithaca New York with the rainbows kids actually wanting to spend time in coffee shops and such developing websites just to exercise that part of my brain. Something about being a homeless drifter makes me want to spend time programming just to remind myself...not really sure how to say it...to exercise my analytical side I guess.

After spending last winter in Nicole's house programming 24/7 and spending enough time sitting down to prove beyond any doubt that sitting down too much will aggravate my spinal injury (from 4 years enlisted USMC infantry service) to the point of paralysis, I just seem to have lost all motivation for putting much effort into further development.As much as I hate to admit it one of the lesser reasons I need to get back on the road is to find motivation to work on web shit.

So am I just a homeless Information Technology guy? Well not exactly, I'm a guy who is developing a web based application framework which I will use to power this blog and several social networks. When that's done I'll call myself a writer.

2. Van stuff
My van is near completion. Moving into a van is challenging. It's the most challenging downsizing I've ever done. Anyone who has ever moved into a smaller apartment knows that pretty much anyone can get ride of about 1/4 of the stuff they posses fairly easily. I'm down to about 1/4 of the stuff I started with. When you're down to the last 1/4 of the stuff you once possessed it's very difficult to get rid of more. Anything you still have has made it through multiple considerations of what's really needed. It's not like "gee wiz I wish I hadn't thrown that frying pan away, now I have to buy another one" it's more like "gee wiz I wish I had kept that nice bulky winter coat because it's fucking cold and I can't afford another one." The good news is that when it's all done I'll have some good advice on how to get ride of stuff, what one needs to get by (non primitively speaking) and how to priorities one's material goods.

So my van is and ever evolving project in efficiency of storage and decisions on what comes and what goes. Clothing for 4 seasons, for in town and out in the woods takes a lot of space it turns out. Of course the van and everything in it is has a kind of crutch, a stepping stone on the path to no possessions what so ever.

Yeah, I'll have a lot to say about van life...

3. Survival
So a little over two years ago I decided to dedicate myself to learning primitive survival skills and blogging about it. My perspective on what exactly survival skills has changed in ways with I'll be explaining later, but suffice to say that survival skills are more of a methodology of living life, a context in which to understand life itself and as such I am not longer considering it something I'm going to "spend three years learning." Looking back, and looking at how most people live there lives these days, I can say with utter confidence that I will be dedicating the rest of my life to learning what I once narrowly defined as "survival skills."

I'm also no longer going to make this blog so focused on teaching survival skills for this objective was misguided. As I learn skills I realize there is not much I can say that has not been said...the information is already out there, one need only put in the time required to learn. I'm not going to drop all posts about skills and such but what I've realized is that what I really wanted when I conceived of this blog was blog full of "look what I can do" posts. That works okay when you're leaning how to make fire and, to some degree, shelter. However the taking of life (be it animal or plant life) does not hardly lend itself to a "look what I can do" attitude.  

As far as I can tell the real challenge of survival skills is in finding gratitude and purpose enough to justify the conscious harvesting of life required to sustain ones own life. I guess that's what the blog is about know...my search for purpose with the belief that sharing my messy attempt to find this understanding will help others.

But I digress, what's been occupying my time in the survival skills and ancestral knowledge theater is Matt Corradino's (Matt is the head instructor at the Tracker school) primitive hunting class and philosophy classes at the Tracker School.  Learning primitive hunting, to including making primitive bows and arrows, takes a lot of time, self reflection and patience.  Philosophy classes at the Tracker School the same: time, patience, self-reflection, refining of purpose, needs and wants. Does not leave much room to write posts and I feel like all I'd be to writing about are things I barley understand yet...which is okay, just have not had the time.

My favorite stalking wolf quote to date...
Tom Brown to grandfather: What's the meaning of life?
Stalking Wolf: You can not know the meaning of life until your life has meaning.

The hunting class is in Virginia, here's a photo I took exploring VA after the last class...

from a hike I took in Virginia after my first primitive hunting class