Opting In While Opting Out

Nature abhors a vaccum: If you are opting out of one thing, you need to be opting into something else. If you, for example, don’t feel at home in the “civilization” that you find yourself in you need to find another one…or create it. Anarchy or chaos in small amounts is healthy, getting lost in a strange city, having adventures and discoveries---anarchy or chaos in large doses is negative. That whole “circled A” deal is for people with a lot of maturing to do.

The theme of what I do is “Opting In While Opting Out.” This is a journey I’ve been on for close to ten years now and is covered in the three American Outback books. The original idea was to buy a rural piece of land here in the United States to live "off the grid" and sustainably. I developed this idea in the midst of a life that didn’t work for me: Life in a city. Career that left me feeling numb inside. Debt, too much debt. All this is covered in The American Outback: Disappearing is a Young Man’s Game. As much as nature abhors a vaccum, it will also correct your path if you stray onto the wrong one and are dumb or blind enough to keep plodding along it. In early 2020, nature absolutely kicked my ass: My marriage imploded, my career ended, and I lost my home. Those events were devastating initially but three years later I feel gratitude for them because that “course correction” was exactly what I needed. Did similar things happen to you during the pandemic? I think loads of us got our asses soundly kicked.

Luckily for me, I’d been studying how to live in a vehicle for several years. Of the course of two months I acquired a van, built it out, and equipped it. On May 17, 2020 we left Portland for the road and it changed my life, changed how I see the world. This story is at the center of The American Outback: No Signal. Having no luck finding work, I was able to travel 40,000 miles through eight states. There was no place to be, no schedule. I was camped in the wilderness be it a national forest or a desert. Everytime I returned to civilization it was jarring, everyone was rushing around in such a hurry—how had I been a part of that my entire adult life? Looking at our civilization from the outside for the first time it seemed so unhealthy, so toxic. The plan was the same as it had been for several years: Find land someone rural and have a little cabin and do something to keep the lights on (something that still eludes me!).

Nature abhors a vaccum: If you are opting out of one thing, you need to opt into something else. Humans are social creatures, we need other people for our mental health; even the most solitary and introverted among us….that became clear during my year on the road, the downside of solitude. You have this utopian ideal of a cabin in the woods and the next week you’re the Unabomber or simply someone who has lost the ability to interact with other people. I came to understand that if I was going to buy that remote piece of land I needed to do it with other people or not at all.

In May of 2021, I got my first gig as a camp host in central Oregon. I discovered it is one thing to live out of a van in some removed wilderness and another to do it in the middle of a crowded campground. All this is covered in The American Outback: Where the Fires Are. After that experience, I became burned out on vanlife. In November of that year I returned to the stick and brick world, acquiring a job in Sacramento and renting a room. It was great in some ways—having a kitchen and indoor plumbing—but challenging in others. Even renting a room in California was not sustainable; I was buying my groceries on a credit card. After four months I left, vowing never to put myself in such a precarious financial situation again.

The original plan was to transfer within the company I worked for to a shop in a smaller town where rent was cheaper. Attempt after attempt to get a transfer or find an apartment failed; nature was again trying to tell me something and again I wasn’t listening—at first. As a plan B I decided to give being a camp host a second chance; within few days of finally listening to nature I had a job lined up and was headed to Southern California where I have lived thirteen months now.

Solitude can be a negative thing but it can also be useful. Removed from my family and friends I have had loads of time to really look at things, the way things are in the United States, things I am not comfortable with. I’ve covered these issues in previous blogs. Like too much solitude, negativity is not a healthy thing; in fact, I would say it’s toxic. I don’t want to be one of those “Fuck the U.S.” people; the culture of the United States works for lots of people, it simply doesn’t work for me and maybe it doesn’t work for you as well. This brings us to today, the transition between The American Outback to The American Outlander. I will always be someone who was born in the U.S. and has lived there 55 plus years, I am sure when I travel I will recognize how “American” I really am as I struggle to adapt to various cultures and experience the differences between the United States and other countries. This will be the story at the center of my future non-fiction books.

I have no idea which direction nature will shove me in yet; I percieve the shoving has begun but it’s subtle at this moment. Will it be Portugal? Mexico? Vietnam? Someplace I hadn’t thought of. Will I have a homebase, a small apartment or house somewhere or will I just wander the earth, staying at most a few weeks at a time. I always see having some sort of home base, someplace to have loads of books and an office to write my own books. All I can do is keep myself open to whatever is out there and document it best I can. It should be an interesting journey, you should come along...