WildernessPunk: Limited

As most of the Bonemen head back into the wilds and wonders of New Mexico. A few things become obvious before we get more than barely started.

Air conditioning when driving through the desert is very useful especially when taking care of an elder and youngins. Oh well, I guess we must rough it old schoolish.
My boys, especially by older 6 foot 2 son is probably ready to have his own bed and not share one with his brother. The three of us together create a vortex of little, if no, sleep.
I am about to head out after packing, driving, and loading, for ten hours and then getting little sleep, into the warmest winter the Gila has suffered through in recorded history

…

Back and blasted.

Did four hours of switchbacks, hiked to the ruins, helped my youngest to learn to fish in the nuclear sun but I’m back and sitting in a room of my own. I’d prefer to read or write with a frosty, but I suppose I’ll need to gather the troops since none of us has had a real meal all day. I’m sorry but those centennial breakfasts don’t count.

Throughout it all I accepted a theme for the day.

Limited.

We all have limited time. Time for ourselves, times with our loved ones, hours spent with friends. The world has limited resources. But I was reaching beyond such obvious takes.

It started when I thought about the absence of Winter in the high country. At about 7000 feet in February, I shouldn’t be cursing myself for not wearing shorts. Is the environment running on borrowed years? Are the animals and nature I see here limited and will soon be forced to evolve, migrate, or perish.

But other things nagged at me as well. How much more time will my boys have with their grandfather, or me for that matter. How should we be spending our days before he flies back to greet the New England green spring?

I often gaze at my youngest. I still have a young child full of wonder who hasn’t dived into his sullen teenaged years. Am I getting the most out of my last chance to be a part of youth’s growth. This is the last year I’ll be picking a child up at an elementary school and see children dancing and laughing while I wait for him to run to the gate.

How should someone live their life? Should one focus on themselves for we all have just a short ride and if we don’t not many others will? Should we be striving to help those younger than ourselves, build memories, grow ideals and skills, and know they are loved?

I caught my father taking a picture of me teaching my youngest how to fish. Yeah, pretty cliché, but aren’t some of those cliches what people should be striving for? We all have a short window, a limited window, soon he may forget about such things and be flung into the world of teenager angst and drama, or worse yet, video games and social media.

Shit, I am being a downer.

I guess it comes back to what we should be doing with our limited time, resources, money, and everything else. What are the right answers? Ask ten people and you’ll get ten different replies. One person might think accumulating capital is the smartest thing he can do for his family while another thinks board game night was his best idea.

But what if you have no family? It could be the circles I run in, but the number of childless friends I have far outnumber people I know with families. In the end what are they fighting and striving for? With no one to hand their knowledge and property down to when they pass, I can’t help but thinking they are doing things like accumulating goods and sometimes property just to leave a big mess for their sister to sort through. I know striving to leave something for the next generation is a stereotype but if you aren’t doing it for that reason what other reason is there? In the end we all have limited time with limited resources and personally I would be sad to continue striving for no other reason than make a bigger mess for some friends or relatives to guiltily toss in their trunk or the dumpster.

So what is the answer? What should we be doing with our limited time? Fighting to make the world a better place for those who come after through politics or accumulating capital? Striving to teach the new generations humanity and a love for the life which remains on this planet? It certainly shouldn’t be to churn through the Earth in order to collect as many things as we can. For if that is the only reason to live we won’t have many more generations to pass things down to.

To live is to strive. We all travel our own road. Others can join us in our journey sometimes for a few hours there and here, sometimes for years and decades. Somehow we evolved into beings which can read these thoughts on a glowing rectangle miles away from where I sit looking out at a tree which will outlive me.

What are we competing for? To have the most stuff to fluff our ride. But if we are working too long we’ll enjoy less of that ride. Who is winning the guy relaxing, drinking tea while reading a used book on an old front porch or the man in a Tesla driving by him?

What are you going to do with the rest of your limited? Me I’m going to drive my father and my boys to the catwalk near Glenwood so they can take in more of the majesty of this world, but in three days from now who knows. Let’s all do what we can so families a hundred years from now still have a chance to live as well, and see the same plants and animals as we currently can. Maybe that should be everyone’s goal.