How We Prepare for Adventures

We are home in Seward, Alaska, in our tiny home this week. It's our final week before going "under way" (a term I've picked up from our Coast Guard friends). The lead up to adventures has become a pattern for us, but one that we're still attempting to master. There are so many things to do before leaving our day-to-day world. So many details to take care of, and think about. For instance, in order to pay our health insurance premiums in a timely fashion, I needed to set up auto-payments online. This required me creating an account. The whole process took about an hour. All to save us having to think about this while we're out hiking and paddling through lands in a warmer climate. These are the details that people who want to get away from normal life need to attend to beforehand. The alternative is spending precious "on trail" time in towns, sorting out things that one forgot or chose not to deal with ahead of time. These are the not-glamorous things. With just one week leading up to being away for six weeks, we are working our final shifts, sorting our belongings and beginning to choose which items to bring along. This is the time for logistics.

Our home sits at the base of this trail, The Mount Marathon Jeep Trail. Views of Resurrection Bay all the way out to the Gulf of Alaska rewards folks who make the 400 foot climb via 7 switch backs. 

Tomorrow I'll work my final shift at my CNA job. On Sunday I'll host our final run group. On Monday, we'll attend our final City Council meeting. And in between these regular commitments, the very structure of our normal life, we will eat up the final foods in our fridge, empty our house of our personal belongings and put our life here in Seward on hold. Things don't ever stop when people are away, only our participation in them.

It's always a delight and a struggle for me to disentangle. There are two parts to me. These two parts are in constant tension. I want to build and foster strong relationships and ties to my home place. And I want to be on the road, and on the trail, moving, ever forward. Seward's culture and economy have allowed us to build a life that allows and supports both aspects of myself. For that I am grateful.