If only...

It’s been an interesting first week and a half on the road. Feels like it’s been a lot longer than that...

Robin & I had some challenges to start out. I’d like to say that we handled them better than I thought we would, but I still have to give myself a failing grade.

In a process I began over two years ago, I’ve been letting go of “things”. It has really been a liberating experience, and I have progressively felt less and less distress. First it was luxuries like cable TV, followed by material objects. “Learn to let go of everything you fear to lose.” Once you lose them, you don’t fear losing them anymore. Dealing with the fear of loss is worse than the loss itself and the life that follows.

I think this is particularly difficult for Americans to understand. This fear of loss is almost celebrated in our culture. We’re so used to the fear that we don’t even realize it’s there.

Living once you’ve lost things is easy. The tricky part is learning to live without the fear of loss even when you still have “things”. Then, if (or when) you lose your things, your life doesn’t change - or it changes very little.

Once Robin & I were able to make that shift in our thinking (for material things), we were easily able to physically let go of 75% of our things when we moved to the studio in downtown Oshkosh. Followed by letting go of 50-75% of the remaining things when we left for our trip.

70% of our stuff is now in Keith and Patty’s basement. 30% is in our car. That’s still A LOT of stuff, but it’s much less than we thought we needed two years ago.

The funny thing about this whole process is that although I’ve learned to let go of some things, my nature causes me to value the things that remain even more.

There is something inside me - not just the American in me, but the human in me - that has to worry about things. (At the moment I’m worried about MY things.) Now that material objects have less value to me overall, the trip and the hike have taken over my consciousness. My concerns have moved elsewhere. This is why I could care less about the thousands of dollars we’ve put into the car in the last few months - but also why I was so distressed when it needed to have work done. I’ve given up most of my things and nearly all of my time from June to December 2012 to make this trip happen. What if the trip doesn’t happen because I have to put all the money into the car? If I could have let go of the sense of entitlement I have regarding this trip, I wouldn't have been so concerned about the work being done on the car.

My goal is to ultimately shift my concerns - at which point the term “concerns” may give way to “concentrations”. The less I care about MY things, the more stress-free I feel, and I can concentrate my energies on things that are more important.

I still have a long way to go. After several days in a row of good luck and great experiences, I’m happier than I’ve ever been, so it’s easy now. The next step is to extrapolate from what I’ve learned from losing material things, so I can “let go” of this trip and this hike in my mind. If the time comes when I have to really leave it behind, maybe then I can handle the loss with a passing grade.

If nothing else, I've let go of my hair...

Moving On

It's been over a week since the crash, and I'm feeling much better. Thank you to everybody for your concern and support. It's been a strange week and a half, but I think things are back on track.

Keith and Patty picked me up at the body shop in Tomahawk, and drove me back to their house. I stayed with them that Monday night and wrote the blog about the accident in the wee hours of the morning.

I woke up the next day sore, but not as bad as I'd feared. My neck was stiff, but I've had worse. As the week went on, I noticed more sore spots: the bump on my elbow got smaller, but is still tender to the touch. I have a nice bruise on the back of my arm that I didn't discover until Saturday. For some reason the side of my ribs hurt, I think something hit my right arm and jammed it into my side. My left wrist hurts some when I move it certain directions.

This is the worst of the visible injuries -
I still can't believe I wasn't badly hurt.

Also, I seem to have re-stretched the muscle in my side that I injured the day I was driving army trucks back in April.

It could have been much worse, and the aches and pains aren't really that noticeable. Sometimes when I turn to check my blind spot, I get a shot of pain in my neck, but it happens less and less.

So I think I'm going to be A-OK in the physical department. It may take more time to get back to 100% psychologically, though.

I didn't drive at all on Tuesday, despite clear roads. I did manage to drive the Vue back to Oshkosh on Wednesday, including a 10-minute stretch at low speeds on a back road that was all ice. The drive home was fine, though I was a little more cautious than usual. Friday I went to visit Ken (for a not-bad movie this time) and there was a light rain (?) at 25 degrees. I took it slow, maybe a little too slow, but I didn't hold up traffic and I didn't lose control of the Vue.

This week has been a different story. I've been more nervous, even when the roads are fine. It seems like other motorists come up quickly behind me at stops. I've always been cautious about driving in bad weather, and this week I was downright petrified to go anywhere.

The plan was to stay with Rachel this week, but there was snow and 32 degree weather in Oshkosh on Tuesday night. Dreams of Rachel's WiFi and entertainment haven (she has TV!) were shattered as I decided not to chance driving to Appleton that night. On Wednesday the weather was the same, and I started to lose it.

Part of me thought I must be too sensitive to the weather, but nobody questioned my desire not to drive - either because it was too dangerous or because they didn't want to push me after the accident. By Wednesday night the weather had not changed, and I had an irrational depression brought on by the constant change of plans. I was in a very bad mood, and it was fueled by the thought that I had no reason to be in a bad mood, so what right did I have to be depressed? I wrote a blog entry but decided not to post it, as those that don't know me might have thought I was suicidal.

Unfortunately, I couldn't help but get my emo on through facebook and probably ended up scaring and hurting a few people. So, I'm sorry for that. Especially to Robin, who had to deal with a hairy, human-shaped Blue October album for 36 hours.

Yesterday, we got the last bit cleared out of our apartment and I started feeling much better. I knew we were heading to Rachel's and the loose ends were starting to get tied up. It started feeling like Disco Pickle was starting, and I allowed myself to get a little excited.

Today, I feel great and we're getting ready for tonight's party at Oblio's. I'm a little overwhelmed by how many people are planning on going. Thanks so much, and I look forward to seeing all of you.

There's not much to update for the hike, as we've just been moving, and everybody knows what that's like. 

Truck Update:

The truck has been totaled, despite relatively little apparent damage. The guys that worked at the shop said that judging from the damage, I probably rolled the truck twice. I couldn't tell you one way or the other. Also, the housing for the dome light was completely busted, which may explain the scrape on the top of my head. I prefer to think it was the salsa.

If you see Keith and Patty, please be awesome to them. They have been great to me through this whole thing. They're in a bad spot because their truck has been totaled, and Keith is driving around an old beater until they can figure something out. He's been more concerned about me than his truck, and actually feels bad for ME because I'm in a weird spot, having crashed somebody else's truck. Not that I expected any different from them, that's just the way they are. So, just be awesome to them.

Also - thank you for all the offers to send us more oatmeal!

Current Books: (taking my I.Q. text towards the middle of March - after that I will be reading much more!)

Star Wars: Slave Ship

Christian: Mere Christianity

Non-fiction: Tom Browns Field Guide: Wilderness Survival

Fiction: Undecided - probably The Grapes of Wrath