10/06/2007 Entry: "bike ride?"

So... as most of you know already I was infected on my x-country bike ride with an apparently incurable wander lust. I control it mostly by reading several hitch-hiker blogs like that one and this one and several others. I also try to satiate it by RAGBRAI and other short biking trips, unicycling trips, and weekend trips. It, however, is not working.

In retrospect I suppose the RoadShow USA didn't cause this - there were symptoms of it from highschool even, when I was drawn to the Peace Corp and used to go on 6-8 hour road trip loops on weekend nights with Shawn, attempting to explore every corner of Iowa and make it home by curfew.

The fact of the matter is that a life on the road is not an option for me. Firstly, I've probably romanticized it, and if I did it for more than 3 months in a row I'd probably get sick of it. Secondly, it's incompatible with Qehndrah, who is much more important to me. Although she's a wonderful wandering companion as long as we are driving as opposed to biking, which is almost as good. I look forward to many shorter trips and exploring. We will hopefully be back-packing New Zealand in the next year or two, and that will be wonderful. There is also some talk of hiking the Oregon part of the Pacific Crest trail, but I think I'd probably have to do that without her because of her heart.

Anyways, to get to the point. Ariel and Karen from Team RoadShow might be going on a x-country bike ride this summer. If I don't have a real job by then I may go with them. It'd eat up much of what is left of my inheritance and things of that nature, so I'm not really sure. I give it 30% odds. My worry is that I know that I MUST do it again someday, and the older I get the less likely it becomes. Maybe I should become a teacher, then I'd get summers off.

There are people that live their entire lives off working for couple of months and then hitting the road. They hitch, bike, or hike and eat from dumpster diving and pan handling and what jobs they happen to get. Everything they own they carry with them. I like that lifestyle when I was on the roadshow. Every week felt like a month. That three month trip felt like an entire year. Now I blink and a week goes by. I worry that my life is going by to fast. I'm just not sure what do to about it.

editing: Since I know that if Qehn reads this she'll figure out some way to feel guilty, I should add that I am 100 times happier with her than I could ever be without her, even if I was on the road. She's not holding me back in any way.