Hitchhiking memoir - Part 1

Here is a little intro before we get into the story. I hitchhiked in the summer of 2005 from Edmonton - Prince Edward Island and back. For those of you that are not familiar with Canadian geography... that is just under 5000 km one way (3000 miles). This has been written and never published... until now. I plan on putting up a readable chunk every few days and hope to have a few people share in this story which is true and full of observation, wonderings, philosophy and my perspective on things. I hope that you enjoy... and if you do, please help a little minnow out by letting people know that this story exists. Thank you!

Hitchhiking Memoir - Part 1

There comes a point in the life of some, where the life of the many is no longer fulfilling. The blood that flows through the veins flows for adventure and the unknown. The heart threatens to stop pumping this blood if the wretched routine of monotony continues for another season. The mind observes its own degeneration. The soul is no longer satisfied with temporary escapes into dreamland where its only limitation is itself. Reality, where we thirst, hunger, and freeze, where we are limited by gravity, strength and our own species, where we are at a whim of so many external factors, asserts its dominance.
At this point, where the reality of everyday living is undeniably at the forefront of existence, we are presented with a choice. The choice is very simple. Are you along for the ride or are you a trial-blazer? There are things that we need to survive. Water, food, shelter, air and a myriad of others are obvious necessities. In order to get what you need to survive, certain steps must be taken. Society tells you to get a job. Walk through the maze of offices, callcenters, pizza kitchens, and construction sites. Climb the ladder of malcontent all of the way to the top of miseries mountain where you can retire a lonely being who gave his life to the company. There is time off. There are friends and family. There are obligations, but a smart person can make their money work for them and they can end up comfortable and taken care of. Advertisements on the sides of buses seem to always be recruiting you to be a passenger on the ride of life... Come along for the ride. Good starting wages, benefits, opportunities for advancement. What could be sweeter? Ummmmm.

My bias is showing, obviously, but I, falling into the category of trailblazer had a heart that threatened to stop pumping on me. I had no choice but to stop the ride and exit the amusement park. Say goodbye to the office mazes and the ladder of malcontent. Say adios to the obligations and the comfort. There is only one obligation for the trailblazer... to survive. This means going back to the amusement park when required to see what you can make off with, but, staying in the park will end up destroying the trailblazer. Their heart rejects its design. The way that everything is given to you for a small but valuable piece of your potential soul... thievery! Thinking in terms of costs and benefits. Weighing the time you have against the money you are given. Highly illogical, yet highly accepted. I hear in the lunchrooms at the amusement park when I am visiting people talking about mortgages, interest rates and truck payments. “Ohhhhh, $1500 down and $475 a month... for a 2006... That is a pretty sweet deal.” “I got in when the rates were 7.9% assumable and locked in at that, so I am pretty happy.” When one spends so much time in an amusement park, it is inevitable that some carnies, essentially being professional conmen, will get something out of you. It also follows that if you give a carnie enough money, you end up with a stuffed animal. Of course, it seems all people need to visit the amusement park and sometimes trucks and mortgages are required. There is a massive difference between a rat who is aware he is in a cage and a rat in the cage of obliviousness.

I am not writing to talk about mortgages or amusement parks, trucks or pizza delivery jobs. I am not writing to talk about callcenters, public transit, credit cards or construction. I am writing about leaving it all behind. Even if only for a day or a week or a month... into the unknown. Carried miles by old boots and the thirst for something more. Something experienced by some in times past and somehow erased from the minds of the unconscious hordes known popularly today as society... something called life.

Life is a very simple and very beautiful thing. Existence manifests itself in such a way that a harmonious balance can be maintained. There hangs such a dark cloud over this light and simple balance that it is essentially overshadowed and dominated. One seems to forget who they are and what they are a part of (an integral part of at that). A living being, has all things available to it for life in nature. When a peaceful coexistence is maintained it can draw what it needs without hesitation. It gives what it gives, naturally... and takes what it requires, naturally. A living being is so tied to this singularity that birth and death are mere instances in the larger function of existence itself. Man has somehow mimicked this. The state of nature is now a manmade jungle... economic... gargantuan... unfathomable... A living being in this state of nature is expected to take what he needs, needs most likely being wants, and is then expected to give something in exchange. Generally speaking, this trade off is time and/or labour for money and the money for you name it. Money is by no means a need, nor is what money is traded for-- in a state of nature. However, in this manmade jungle, it is the requirement. You either have or you do not. Those who have, end up being the hunters... those who have not: the hunted. Life and death are not accepted as would be in actual nature... but the exchange of capital is. Since most wealth belongs to a few of the hunters... this means most individuals would fall into, some more than others, the category of the hunted. These individuals, accept, much like a man in nature accepts death as a part of the function of the whole and embraces his part in that whole, that they must pay... for the good of the whole. To keep the machine working, one must pay... This in turn ensures that this jungle can promise you a few things such as food, shelter, health benefits, insurance against vultures, hyenas, scavengers, and untimely incidents when actual nature messes with the program.

It is this act of paying for these secure feelings, for these comforts, which shadows man from who he really is... and woman from who she really is. Dependency has been stripped away from nature and its singularity and put into the architects of the modern concrete jungle and economic fortresses. It need not be that way.

During one of my stints as a “productive member” of the new state of nature... I manufactured short wave radio communication towers. These towers were mostly used in the oilfield for communication which in turn would aid in resource extraction and ultimately produce wealth for certain parties, or shall I say produce more wealth for the party. Orwellian allusions aside, I worked hard for my $12 an hour wage as I am sure the oilfield workers worked hard for their wage. Ultimately, I saw myself as a gear in a turbine that turned against the flow of the rivers and opposite the rotation of the planet. This modernized mecca man made machine not only worked cross purposed to actual nature, but threatened and continues to threaten to....... erase it.

I was aware that I needed a job, and that I needed to get paid to survive with a roof over my head and food on my table. Certain monotonous tasks, working with certain monotonous people who were enthusiastic about the operation of the machine and pushed for its efficiency, among others, was necessary but grew tiring. Knowing the fact that the two states of nature clash perpetually, combined with the monotony of repetitive tasks had become unbearable to me. I could no longer work at this job.

It is no big surprise. I have quit my job often. I get bored of it. I get sick of being treated like a robot. I can’t stand certain aspects of it... whatever the reason, I have quit every paying job I have ever had. Beneath the surface, it is always the same reason I quit my job. Strings are being pulled. The desire for change, the desire for personal growth, the desire for something new and fresh, the desire for something better... desire. No matter what the “official” reason I quit my job, there are always those strings being pulled which ultimately cause me to move into unemployment.