The ostensible plan was to go “wwoofing”. It's an internet community where you get hooked up with organic farms. They give you a place to live (sometimes simply a choice spot to pitch your tent) and feed you and in exchange you put in an earnest day's work. During all of this one meets interesting people and learns about organic farming. While sitting in my tiny apartment in Dalian, China the idea of wwoofing occured to me. At the time the idea was to stay abroad which would have been sensible. Wwoofing in the phillipines or Taiwan would give me valuable insight into rural life in Asia and farming practices. This would be great on a resume for an INGO. But my mind works in a very specific way. Consciously I'm unaware of what I want. Yet unconsciously my mind rationalizes a way to it's true desire, which was coming home. Wwoofing in America, and then doing it abroad until applying for a masters program in Taiwan.
Well, what has occurred is that once again I am simply on a road trip. This time it is so apt. There's no destination. My wwoofing guy has dropped off the face of the earth. So I'm just kind of in Colorado, driving around on cheap vegetable oil living out of a tent. With the transmission fixed there's nothing tying me to any particular spot. For at least ten days I have no known contacts out here or reason to be here.
Thus I sit in my tent, during a Rocky Mountain thunderstorm pecking away at my keyboard. Maybe being out here will somehow bring me closer to the meaning of life. Or better yet, what the hell to do with mine. Maybe it will help me to overcome my biggest issues in life. Or maybe it won't do anything beyond simply being an experience. The complete absence of, direction or ties somehow seems like it's meant to do something to my persona. We'll see.
Either way, this is a hell of a change from Dalian. New York is called the city that never sleeps. Dalian catches her Zzzz's in a major way. At night it was quiet outside my apartment, almost earily quiet. But upon waking up I was in this sea of people and activity. Tomorrow I will wake up and there will be about ten people within shouting distance. Other than the couple of families camping and fishing out here, there's nobody for miles. Expanses of wilderness. Jagged rocks fighting their way from the center of the earth up into the sky, only mildly softened by eons of rain. Piles of boulders the size of schoolbuses that look carelessly lopped in place as though by a 200 foot toddler. Lush green as far as the eye can see, sliced into vast parcels by lazy creeks that turn out to be small whitewater rivers when punctuated by yet more rocks fighting their way up from the center of the earth and into the sky. Even tame privately owned pieces of land seem proud. How ironic that we “tamed” them by a thin strip of barbed wire which keep in a handful of grazing horses or cattle. The thunder here is not the “crack” of most places. It reverberates off of variety of peaks and valleys within however many miles. A good one is a bright flash, followed by the pitter patter of rain on my little tent. Then after sufficient pitter patter, there's suddenly a cacophony of crashes and rumbling from all different directions! It lasts nearly a full minute! It seems indicative of stronger weather to come. I feel like the sailor in the dinghy. God, your mountains are so mighty, and my tent is so small.
Well, what has occurred is that once again I am simply on a road trip. This time it is so apt. There's no destination. My wwoofing guy has dropped off the face of the earth. So I'm just kind of in Colorado, driving around on cheap vegetable oil living out of a tent. With the transmission fixed there's nothing tying me to any particular spot. For at least ten days I have no known contacts out here or reason to be here.
Thus I sit in my tent, during a Rocky Mountain thunderstorm pecking away at my keyboard. Maybe being out here will somehow bring me closer to the meaning of life. Or better yet, what the hell to do with mine. Maybe it will help me to overcome my biggest issues in life. Or maybe it won't do anything beyond simply being an experience. The complete absence of, direction or ties somehow seems like it's meant to do something to my persona. We'll see.
Either way, this is a hell of a change from Dalian. New York is called the city that never sleeps. Dalian catches her Zzzz's in a major way. At night it was quiet outside my apartment, almost earily quiet. But upon waking up I was in this sea of people and activity. Tomorrow I will wake up and there will be about ten people within shouting distance. Other than the couple of families camping and fishing out here, there's nobody for miles. Expanses of wilderness. Jagged rocks fighting their way from the center of the earth up into the sky, only mildly softened by eons of rain. Piles of boulders the size of schoolbuses that look carelessly lopped in place as though by a 200 foot toddler. Lush green as far as the eye can see, sliced into vast parcels by lazy creeks that turn out to be small whitewater rivers when punctuated by yet more rocks fighting their way up from the center of the earth and into the sky. Even tame privately owned pieces of land seem proud. How ironic that we “tamed” them by a thin strip of barbed wire which keep in a handful of grazing horses or cattle. The thunder here is not the “crack” of most places. It reverberates off of variety of peaks and valleys within however many miles. A good one is a bright flash, followed by the pitter patter of rain on my little tent. Then after sufficient pitter patter, there's suddenly a cacophony of crashes and rumbling from all different directions! It lasts nearly a full minute! It seems indicative of stronger weather to come. I feel like the sailor in the dinghy. God, your mountains are so mighty, and my tent is so small.
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