Going Home

I live in two worlds. From 9am to 5pm, Monday through Friday, I live a typical modern lifestyle, interacting primarily with 21st century humans in an air conditioned, high-tech corporate facility. But when I go home, I live with the birds and trees and insects and grass and deer and other life forms that surround my home.

Over the past year, I've grown more and more comfortable at my place. I really feel at home there now, and I think I've finally been welcomed into the neighborhood. I don't fight with the insects like I used to when I first moved in. And I'm getting to know the habits of the birds around me. I know where the deer live, too. I've visited their beds when they were out for the day, and smiled to myself thinking about how each of them picked out their own little spot to rest.

Over the past several generations, we modern human have progressively separated ourselves from all the other life on this planet. I don't think that we intentionally set out to do that, but that's where we find ourselves nonetheless. We've placed ourselves so far away from other life forms that one might conclude that we are indeed something unique, something really different. But we're not.

A plant cell (left) and an animal cell (right).
All plants and animals, from humans to insects to a blade of grass,
are nearly indistinguishable if you look close enough.

The rest of life on this planet is still there, like it always has been, waiting for us to come back home. We've been gone for a long while now, so it takes some time to get reacquainted, but I think the feeling of belonging that comes from living close to nature is well worth the effort of going back home and getting to know our cousins again.

Staying Cool in the Summer

It's mid-July and it's getting hot in Virginia. July and August are the most uncomfortable months to live in the woods. It's hot and humid. Spring and Autumn are easy, and even on the coldest Winter nights my wood stove keeps me comfortable, but in the dead of Summer there's just no escaping the heat.

So how do I stay cool? I don't. I sweat a lot. But I've acclimated, too, so 90 degrees in the shade feels pretty comfortable now. I spend a lot of time in my living room laying on the hammock or swinging in the shade, sipping a cold beer, wearing just a pair of shorts.

At night just before bed, I take a pot of cool water outside with me and bathe. I go through a lot of water in the Summer but it's well worth it.

Being uncomfortably hot in the Summer is the price one pays for living close to nature. But I'm in good company. All the creatures that I live with are struggling to stay cool, too. Seeking shelter from the mid-day Sun. Sitting quietly, waiting for the cool evening to arrive. It's all part of Summer.

Trade-offs and Values

I was about 14 years old the first time I went backpacking. I'd camped a lot as a child but backpacking was something new. It wasn't just about sleeping in the woods. It was about figuring out what to pack, too. And there was a real penalty for packing too much, so I carefully considered every item.

I took way too much on my first trip, so I learned a lot. Like the value of a light pack. As I packed for successive trips, I'd leave behind a few items that weren't worth their weight on the previous trip, and add a few items that I'd missed on the trail. After a lot of trial and error, I came up with just the right pack...for me.

I imagine every backpacker has a similar story of trial and error, yet each comes up with different solutions since everyone seems to pack different stuff. I remember seeing someone with a hatchet on one of my first hikes. We were staying in a shelter on the AT in Tennessee. We had hiked all day through the rain. The shelter had a fireplace but everything was wet. It was evening and I was cold and damp. Right about then a couple of hikers arrived at the shelter. I don't know why but they looked experienced, like they had hiked a lot and knew what they were doing. They introduced themselves and sat for awhile and chatted, but it wasn't long before one of them got up and went to his pack and pulled out a hatchet. He then went out into the rain, found a medium-size, short, dead log, and proceeded to split the log right down the middle. Then he split it again, and again, until he's had a nice pile of dry kindling. He built a nice fire for us all that night, and I decided right then that I wanted to be able to do that on my next rainy hike.

Hatchets are heavy so I had to think twice before I put one in my pack, but I just couldn't stop thinking about how nice that fire was, so I packed one in on my next few trips. But it didn't rain. Still, I couldn't just leave it behind. After a few more trips, I traded the hatchet for a machete, which wasn't much lighter really, but it was a whole lot cooler when I was a kid. The machete was a lot more versatile, too, so I could use it for other things, but it was still pretty damn heavy for what I got out of it, and I still hadn't run into a long, cold, rainy day that made it worth it's weight.

After a few more trips I stopped packing the machete, too. And I never missed it. I still have it, and it brings me some great memories, but the cost vs. benefit for backpacking didn't work out.

Living close to nature is easy, and it's hard. It's a stress-free life full of insects. It's cold water running over the top of your head on a hot Summer's day. It's peaceful nights spent playing a guitar and sipping a warm beer. It's spare time and extra cash and long boring days spent watching all the other life around you.

But then, living the modern lifestyle is also easy, and it's hard. It's driving a new, air conditioned car and making the car payments. It's relaxing in front of a TV after working for someone else all day. It's enjoying a freshly-cut lawn after sweating behind a mower on your day off. It's working all year to pay the bills, then taking a two-week vacation...to go camping.

Use it or Lose it

Life forms are incredibly efficient. We constantly transform and optimise ourselves in response to our environment. Each of our biological subsystems, like our brains and muscles and cardiovascular and reproductive systems, constantly tunes itself to its environment. Use it, and it stays strong and healthy. Stop using it, and we lose it. It's our body's way of keeping what's important, and "decluttering" things that aren't used.

This same "use it or lose it" principle can be applied to our possessions, too. There are plenty of web sites out there that will step us through the process of decluttering, and most of them embrace the idea of "use it or lose it". Have something in the garage that you haven't used in a year? Get rid of it!

Living in the woods in a canvas tent has given me a slightly different perspective on this decluttering approach. Turns out that if I don't use something in a year's time or so, then I end up losing it alright...to other creatures!...that are happy to use it for me!

I have a team of helpers for this. Mice are really good. They like the soft stuff that I tuck away under my bed. And they love it when I store things in rarely-opened drawers. Moths are good workers, too. They always find those pants and shirts that I think I'll wear "someday". But for outdoor help, nothing beats black ants. They're not as particular as mice and moths since they're not strictly focused on finding soft fabrics. Instead, they're happy to just set up their homes in places that I don't get into much, like my outdoor plastic container that holds my backpacking gear.

Some of my recent encounters with "use it or lose it" have caused me to look at other English phrases in a different way, too. Old idioms that go back to when we all lived a bit closer to nature. Like "pitch it out", which really means, "you've just discovered an ant nest in your favorite old leather bag that you never use, so grab that sucker and quickly throw it out into the woods". Or "spring cleaning" which means "hey, it's getting warm outside so go through all your stuff and check every nook and cranny for critters building nests".

The good side to all of this is that I'm forced to declutter even further. When I first moved into my small 12' x 14' tent, I had to be pretty brutal about decluttering. I just didn't have room for much. But I still tried to hang onto a few rarely-used items that I thought I might want down the road. And as I've slowly lost some of those items over time, it's given me cause to reconsider. Like even though it was sad to throw out my favorite leather bag, I didn't replace it. So it turns out I didn't really need it anyway. But when I grabbed my golf clubs for the first time in over a year and found it fully of bees, I "pitched out" the old bag, went out and bought a new bag, and proceeded to the driving range.

It's sort of annoying that my little helpers are so incessantly decluttering on my behalf, but I'm curious to see how things turn out. I guess I should thank them for forcing me to consider how important each and every one of my possessions truly are to me.

Missing My Place

It's already the end of June, and it occurs to me that I've spent very little time enjoying my place this month. It's just been one of those months. I've been busy as hell at work, putting in long hours and going straight to bed when I got home. There were a few nights when I didn't even light a candle. Just walked into the dark tent, turned on the flashlight to quickly check for critters, and hoped into bed. I also took 10 days off in June and spent the whole time sitting around the pool with my girlfriend and staying at her place, so I didn't see my place at all during those days (but hey, I'm not complaining!)

The past few days have gotten back to normal. My vacation is over, and work is tapering off. About a week ago I spent the better part of a day getting my place back in order. The weeds had taken over my path and the inside of my tent was in need of a good cleaning. But now things are getting back to normal, and I'm enjoying the tranquillity again.

It's getting hot, too. Not too bad so far, but Summer is certainly here. I'm enjoying the heat so far. It's still in the 70s at night so I'm sleeping fine. I usually leave the door open through the night. I'm enjoying the long evening light, too, but now that we're past the solstice...no, I'm not gonna think about that yet!

Food

I don't have a refrigerator at my place so leftovers are kind of tricky. In late Autumn and early Spring it's easier because I can sit my leftover dinner outside through the day and have the rest the next night. That works in Winter, too, so long as the food will tolerate freezing. And sometimes during Summer, when I have guests over, I put ice in the cooler and cook a bigger meal and again my leftovers will keep for a bit. But usually, I cook a single meal and consume it all.

I don't have much storage either, so I don't really stock up on food. I keep some canned goods on hand, and dry goods like rice and nuts and pasta. Things that tolerate Summer's heat and Winter's cold. In the colder months I keep eggs and cheese and butter and things like that on hand, but more delicate foods, like produce, have to be bought and eaten right away.

I don't make shopping lists anymore, since I buy one meal at a time. And I just make mental notes when I run low on other consumables like toilet paper and paper towels and...well that's about it for other consumables.

My lifestyle forces me to be very deliberate about buying and storing and consuming things, especially food which has to be dealt with immediately. There's no opening the refrigerator door to see what's inside. Instead, as I begin to get a little hungry, I begin lining up my next meal.

I rarely waste food these days. I like that. I like being more in tune with my consumption and not stocking up on things. I'm not sure why that's appealing to me, but I like it. It's sort of that way with everything at my place. I know what I have, and I don't have much so I can keep track of it all. And I know where everything is. It feels good for some reason.

Our Endless Desires

On my way to work this morning, I listened to a radio broadcast of a religious sermon. It was about greed and desire and money and property and its relationship to spirituality and I was very moved by it. I'm not particularly religious, but I'm fascinated by religion. I love talking with people about their religious beliefs, and observing how their beliefs impact their lives.

I always look for the common threads that run through religions, and there are many I think. There's always a deep connection to the culture in which the religion is rooted. And the telltale signs of cultural shifts that pushed and pulled the doctrine along the way, keeping it relevant. And of course, the promise of answers to our most difficult questions. Solid, authoritative answers that help quiet our minds and bring us comfort, when the religion is good.

My own beliefs are now a patchwork tapestry, woven from these common threads. The wonderful, colorful teachings of Hinduism with its ancient stories, and its practical teachings of Karma, and Yoga. The Christian teachings of love and compassion and forgiveness. The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism. The self-discipline of Islam. All good and helpful messages.

And perhaps not surprisingly, these common threads seem to align, like warp in a loom. They all seem to point in the same direction, toward spiritual growth. Toward a higher place that promises to make us better. Better for ourselves, and better for each other.

But it's a difficult direction to follow, so our religions try to guide us and help us along the way. They warn us of the pitfalls, like temptation and desire. They encourage us to be strong. They promise reward, and sometimes threaten punishment. All in the name of making us better.

This morning's sermon focused on greed and desire. Boring, right? We've heard it all before, "Greed is bad!" And so it went with this sermon. But then the speaker took an interesting turn. He started to paint a picture of an afterlife. A realm in which possessions could not enter. A place where we are separated from all those things that once made us happy and comfortable. Where not even our bodies are allowed. Where only our spirits may dwell. And that image struck me. Not because I necessarily believe in such an afterlife, but because of the symbolism that it has for this life.

We spend so much of our time struggling to acquire. Hedging ourselves against an uncertain future by accumulating as much as we can each day. We have too much fear, and not enough faith. Our religions warn us about this, but we're too weak or afraid to follow the advice. And so we continue, endlessly searching for pleasures in the niceties of the world, trying to find solace in the knowledge that we are like so many others. And so it goes, and we grow old.

There's a deeper level of satisfaction that we're missing I think. A greater potential that remains unrealized in each of us. And I can't help but see that it's our endless desires that are at the root of our struggles.