Ever hear the song "Cabin By The Sea" by The Dirty Heads? It's pretty much the dream; a carefree life with your friends free of the rat race and monotonous responsibility of real life. Not only is it a great song to blare on a sunny day with the windows down while you drive along the strip in Panama City, but it's pretty much been life recently as well.
My last couple days have been pretty nice: I've been living out of my car by the river and working out of a temporary production office I've set up in my buddy's living room, while cruising on an alcohol, tobacco, and Mexican food-fueled life of kayaking waterfalls and surfing. Although working the media game is a bit of a fast-paced hustle, it's a far reach from the stresses of normal life, especially for those of us in the extreme sports industry. Hanging out with people who live out of vans and on couches and seemingly don't have a care in the world is a dream. No stress, no worries, and taking it day by day.
It's also somewhat ominous though, because I'm a day away from heading back to real life. The prospect of having to interact with (somewhat) normal people in a civilized society again is almost depressing. I've battled this on and off for years: travel for a few days, feel healthier, feel happier, and then BAM! it's time to move out of my car and back into my apartment. After a while, your way of dealing with it changes. the jokes and hypothetical scenarios start to become legitimate, and your life is full of "what if?"
The reality is simple: we're adults, and we can make our own decisions. No doubt there are consequences and a virtually unlimited amount of external factors at play, but maybe we should stop feeling like someone is holding a gun to our head. What if I didn't go home and instead drove out west? When adding in thoughts such as, "Everything I really care about is already in my car," your mind really does start to wander.
On the real though, life sucks. Not the idea of life, that is - but what we've made of it. Working a full week and spending your paycheck (well, the remnants after getting boned by social security taxes) going out to the bar and talking to some boring sorority girl whose life is as superficial and hollow as a Jersey Shore episode. One of my buddies once describe the end-game of following the crowd and living a socially acceptable life as, "Taking your kids to f-ing Disneyland twice a year on a credit card" in a rant about non-conformity and it's pretty on-point.
Why would anyone want to go back to routine? We kill ourselves with a combination of societal expectations and this idea of always looking at the future. Nothing good came to me in life until I abandoned all plans and just started winging it. This past week my plans largely consisted of, "I'm probably going boating tomorrow then hanging out. Just taking it day by day" and it never felt better. A structured, routine life is quite literally a downward spiral that ends in your death. Just like the term "death spiral" with flying an aircraft, it's not extreme: it's subtle, and often not even noticeable until moments before impact. Your sensory perception is off so you honestly think you are flying straight and level, but in reality, you are on a path to killing yourself.
I've learned from living in countless places and traveling constantly that there is a harsh reality: many people's lives are not interesting. Most people fall into these boring traps and get consumed by this devious, jacked-up joke that we call normal. That's not the life I want. I don't want to go back.
