
The Terror and Tedium of Living Like Thoreau - myth_drannon
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/09/the-terror-and-tedium-of-living-like-thoreau/402358/?single_page=true
======
grecy
I moved to the Yukon 4 years ago, and have spent many hundreds of nights in my
tent around the far reaches of the Yukon and Alaska. [1]

I don't live "in a cabin" during the week, though I have many friends that do
so, completely off grid.

The author of this story is searching for a wilderness experience, but not
embracing it. Checking wifi almost daily? looking for external stimulus?
Avoiding those things is the main reason to move to the North.

If you want to truly live the life, it involves getting your own firewood,
growing your own food, hunting your own moose, bison, caribou, catching your
own fish, building/working on your own shelter, making your own clothes, etc.
You will wuickly find that even 20 hour days are short.

Of course, it's absurd to "live in the North" without staying through a winter
- it's by far the most peaceful, beautiful time in the North, and the best
time for thinking and reflection. -50F is a magical thing.

[1] Stories and photos from my Northern adventures on
[http://theroadchoseme.com](http://theroadchoseme.com)

~~~
dopeboy
You know, there's a lot of praise given to entrepreneurs because they're doing
what most people are talking about. Well, you sir are doing what most people
are _dreaming_ about.

I'd love to hear about what drove you to the lifestyle you now have. Also,
what do you do to feed yourself? How do you derive an income and live off the
grid?

~~~
grecy
I'm passionate about living my dreams. When I have a dream, I work hard, and
make it happen. I drove Alaska->Argentina over 2 years, and am about to drive
around Africa in 2-3 years.

I don't really like "the world" right now. Consumerism, big cities, crowds,
iPhones and new cars. I wanted to get away from all of that stuff. I wanted to
test myself and learn new things. I wanted to cut my own wood, hunt my own
food and learn to survive by my own wits. I also wanted to see exceptionally
beautiful places.

On my way back from Alaska I passed through the Yukon and thought it was
beautiful. The people are friendly, and there are tons of activities to do. I
thought I'd give it a shot, so I did. It's very easy to meet people in the
North to teach you stuff like hunting, fishing, building a cabin etc. The
first couple of times you do it with people that have done it before, after
that you're good to go.

> _Also, what do you do to feed yourself? How do you derive an income and live
> off the grid?_

I personally have been working 5 days a week since moving up here, though only
because I wanted to save enough money to build my Jeep and drive around
Africa. Tons of people up here work 3/4 or 1/2 time (or less). If I wanted to,
I could easily earn enough money to "live" by only going to work for 2-3
months a year. The rest of my time would be for activities :)

Putting 1000lbs+ of wild, organic meat in your freezer does a lot to cut down
your grocery bill, as does all the salmon, halibut and growing your own
vegetables.

------
roymurdock
I found this to be a strangely disjointed, self-conscious piece that struck an
uncomfortable chord with me.

I think everyone has a wild savage living somewhere in the back of their head,
telling them that they don't belong in modern society, and that life would be
so much nicer out in the wilderness.

It's awesome that the author embraced this voice and actually acted on it. At
the same time, her writing provides no greater insight than that of a tourist
on vacation. She describes a couple cool events and the day-to-day
boredom/routine, but she never really commits to the lifestyle of the authors
she idolizes. It's as if she knows she's just doing this for a little while so
that she can write a meta piece about living in a cabin in Alaska.

Thoreau, Emerson, Whitman - they are literary giants because they truly
_lived_ an experience, to the point of cultivating and inscribing beautiful
insights about their experiences. Transcendentalism is about living in the
moment, being one with nature, feeling every gentle gust and hearing every
gurgle and lap of the stream. It's extremely self-conscious, but not in the
modern way of - oh shit, I need to think about all of this stuff and write it
in a way that other people will like. It is a celebration of the senses
without paying lip service to what others might think.

I respect the author for following Emerson's advice to "Trust thyself: every
heart vibrates to that iron string," I just wish she had delved a bit deeper.
Hope to see more pieces from her in the future.

~~~
q-base
It is quite "fun" how two people can read the exact same text and get totally
opposing views from it.

I actually think this is an absolutely awesome essay exactly BECAUSE she talks
about the mundane aspects. It's a fantastic take on peoples insatiable
appetite for "longing" or "searching". She chases a romantic picture of
solitude as a way to escape or re-shape her existence. And while the
experience as a whole might do this, the everyday living will still be filled
with mundane tasks.

Having travelled alone for 30 days with a backpack in Myanmar, this just rings
so true to me. The experience as a whole I would not be without - but there is
a lot of mundane living no matter how you choose to live your life. The only
constant is you.

~~~
roymurdock
Agreed - that's why I think it's so important to live/travel in solitude
occasionally, so that you can learn to live with yourself.

You might like this piece about hiking the Pacific Crest Trail - it expresses
a lot of the same themes:

[http://priceonomics.com/hiking-the-2650-mile-pacific-
crest-t...](http://priceonomics.com/hiking-the-2650-mile-pacific-crest-trail/)

~~~
q-base
Thanks a lot! Never heard of the Pacific Crest Trail - only heard about the
The Camino de Santiago. Very interesting...

------
acabal
Interesting read. Remember that Thoreau actually didn't write _Walden_ in a
deep isolated wilderness; rather, he lived in a cabin at the far edge of
Concord, MA. There's even an entire section in _Walden_ about receiving
visitors, and another one about the trips to town he takes a few times a week.
So living totally isolated 7 miles from the nearest town (which she makes
sound more like a "highway rest stop" than a "town") goes _beyond_ what
Thoreau did.

I point this out because there's solitude, and then there's _isolation_. In my
mind, there's only terror in one of those.

~~~
jameshart
Yup - I actually live in the woods near Concord where Thoreau used to wander
(Walden pond is round the corner). It's very nice. Good schools. You can get
pizza delivered.

People say "Oh, but surely it's changed a lot since Thoreau's day", but
honestly - we're talking about Concord. The town was founded in 1635, it was
already 200 years old when Thoreau moved into a hut on his buddy Emerson's
land. The Boston and Maine rail line past Walden Pond was already running when
Thoreau moved in, for goodness' sake.

~~~
zeddie
That area _would_ have changed a lot, if it weren't for a very active
preservation effort. The Walden Woods Project, founded by Don Henley (yes,
that Don Henley) prevented multiple large commercial development projects from
happening in the 1990s, and has allowed the character to be maintained.

------
jzwinck
Has the author read _Walden_? If she had, she might find it incongruous to use
cellular internet service and wi-fi during her adventure. She might also
recognize that Thoreau was not so short on things to do, partly because he did
things. He designed and built his cabin himself, rather than buying one ready-
made. Maybe it's the difference between then and now, but if the dream was to
live life raw, why not start with raw materials, and without a smartphone?
Days don't seem so long when you are struggling to survive rather than to fill
them with alarm clocks and books about people you want to emulate, but only
sort of.

~~~
Semiapies
He also had his mother bringing food by every day or so.

~~~
idlewords
And his sister! They brought him baked goods. Thoreau was no dummy.

------
willhinsa
> Much of the time, I slept through the three alarms I set each morning, then
> put a pot of hot water for oatmeal and coffee on the propane stove.

This sentence struck me as odd. I think that the author would do well to
connect with her needs as a human, because a regular sleep pattern would do
her wonders and is one of the most beautiful things about being able to set
your own schedule.

~~~
mikestew
Ever spent time in Alaska in the summer? Getting to sleep at a decent hour can
be a real trick unless you're sleeping in a cave. Hell, an entire movie was
made with this very problem being a major plot point.
[http://m.imdb.com/title/tt0278504/](http://m.imdb.com/title/tt0278504/)

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Just saw it last week! It was good - sort of. Very interesting to see Al
Pacino as the good guy - mostly. And Robin Williams as a really, really creepy
bad guy. I'd never seen him so convincing before.

------
fsiefken
At first thought there seems to be no substitute for these types of
experiences then to just go out there and live the life in the woods.

I once read the short story NatuLife by David Brin where a couple are each
their own preferred natural life in seperate VR worlds. Perhaps you could
simulate part of these existential experiences of being on your own
interfacing with nature and the transcendent with survival games like Stranded
Deep, Ark: Survival Evolved or Rust (alone on your own server) combined with
an Oculus or streaming Android Google Cardboard based setup right now. Or use
your imagination with games like Robinson Crusoe solo (board game) or
Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead.

I remember I once build my own OpenSim island and tried to meditate within the
landscape (I used a low-FOV Z800 hmd) so a certain kind of immersiveness is
possible.

------
hownottowrite
Another article by the same author "The Thoreau of the Suburbs" [February
2015]
[http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/02/the...](http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/02/the-
thoreau-of-the-suburbs/385128/)

------
jschwartzi
"Much of the time, that’s all there is: some movement, and some light, and we
call it a day."

------
q-base
This absolutely beautiful inspiring clip "Wanderers" comes to mind:
[https://vimeo.com/108650530](https://vimeo.com/108650530)

------
nether
> Finally, one learns that boredom is a disease of civilization. It seems to
> me that what boredom mostly is is that people have to keep themselves
> entertained or occupied, because if they aren't, then certain anxieties,
> frustrations, discontents, and so forth, start coming to the surface, and it
> makes them uncomfortable. Boredom is almost nonexistent once you've become
> adapted to life in the woods. If you don't have any work that needs to be
> done, you can sit for hours at a time just doing nothing, just listening to
> the birds or the wind or the silence, watching the shadows move as the sun
> travels, or simply looking at familiar objects. And you don't get bored.
> You're just at peace.

Ted Kaczynski

------
hugh4
Like, I'm sure, many other people, I occasionally think about going off to
live in a cabin in the wilderness for a while. It's nice that other people are
doing it and writing about it, so I don't have to.

~~~
detaro
So you don't have to? Does reading about it really satisfy that impulse (if
you have it)?

~~~
hugh4
Honestly, yes. It does enough to sweep away my romanticised image and replace
it with one containing a realistic share of insects and boredom.

~~~
grecy
After living in the Yukon for 4 years (see my post above), I have truly come
to respect and believe the saying "only boring people get bored".

I have never lived anywhere in my life with so many varied and exciting things
to do on any day. I often feel anxious trying to decide between all the
amazing options available to me in the Yukon&Alaska. It's such a common thing
people up here call it "FoMo" (Fear of Missing out).

Depending on the season, I could be hiking, camping, boating, mountain biking,
hunting, fishing, paddling around iceburgs, watching bears, watching whales,
hiking on glaciers, hiking up mountains, backcountry snowboarding,
snowshoeing, cross country skiing, snow mobiling hundreds of miles into the
wilderness chasing bison at -40, etc. Of course I might just decide to read a
book by the fire too.

In every one of those activities, it's exceedingly rare to see other people.
If we're out more than a couple of days, we don't even see _signs_ of people -
i.e. no fire rings, no roads, no nothing.

Move to the North, give it 12 months - if you love it, you'll never leave. If
you decide to leave, you won't have lost anything, and you'll have a head full
of unique memories.

~~~
pbowyer
> Depending on the season, I could be hiking, camping, boating, mountain
> biking, hunting, fishing, paddling around iceburgs, watching bears, watching
> whales, hiking on glaciers, hiking up mountains, backcountry snowboarding,
> snowshoeing, cross country skiing, snow mobiling hundreds of miles into the
> wilderness chasing bison at -40, etc. Of course I might just decide to read
> a book by the fire too.

Where does earning enough money to survive come into it?

~~~
p1esk
I think you missed the point. Money would be the last thing you needed to
survive there.

~~~
Avshalom
Snowboards, kayaks, boats, snowmobiles, guns, snowshoes... none of those are
cheap.

Here's what actually happens if you move north for 12 months: you go to work
at a job.

~~~
grecy
> _Snowboards, kayaks, boats, snowmobiles, guns, snowshoes... none of those
> are cheap._

I bought everything used, and I rent/borrow the snowmobiles and quads because
my $400 Subaru won't pull them, and they're too expensive for me. Also keep in
mind you only need one of each of those things, drop the plural, we're not
interested in consuming for the sake of it.

I would guess I spent around $5000 on gear for my "Northern Life", and I
actually just sold all of it for basically the same prices I paid.

> _Here 's what actually happens if you move north for 12 months: you go to
> work at a job._

If you want to keep consuming and living your "Southern" life, then yes,
you're right.

Or, you live the Northern way, as follows:

Borrow a chainsaw and trailer off a friend for a case of beer, and put in a
few hard weekends getting your own firewood. Cost of heating for the year =
$0.

Borrow, or buy ONE used rifle, spend a week hunting and get yourself 500lbs+
of local, organic meat. Cost of bought meat per year = $0.

For a few hundred bucks throw a couple of solar panels on your roof connected
to some old car batteries. Get rid of your TV, and pay almost nothing for
electricity for the year.

Get some fishing gear for $75 and hit Alaksa whenever the salmon are running
to put away tens of pounds of salmon.

Grow a bunch of vegetables yourself.

etc. etc.

You can rent a nice cabin up here for ~$500/mo, and (for example) registering
a car is $35/year, and my insurance is $325/year, so you save a ton of money
there. Drive something with good mileage, distances are big up here.

As you can see, pretty quickly your expenses are very, very low, meaning it's
quite possible to hardly go to work at all.

------
a3voices
So she swapped a good standard of living for a poor, isolated one and was
surprised it wasn't usually a good time?

~~~
douche
I think the problem was that it appears she was just drifting, with no real
purpose whatsoever. She didn't commit to the idea of making a life in the
wilderness for the long term - otherwise she'd be more than busy enough
splitting firewood and putting up food to get through the winter. Nor did she
have any real project to work at that would benefit from the solitude and
isolation, no novel to write, no trunk of great books to read deeply and
digest, no hard software problem to hack away at. It sounds like she was just
kind of _there_ , and then she went back. A brief, rather pointless interlude.

