Find Adventure

The last year has been challenging for us all. It has been hard to feel normal and with so much contradicting information surrounding the pandemic and politics it can feel almost impossible to know where to look for truthful answers. I think this has left all of us depleted mentally and physically. Until now we used entertainment and social gatherings to help drown out the things in society that tend to get us down; however, now without those things to help us all cope we are left in a state of anomy. We don't know what the normal social order is anymore and for social creatures that is down-right scary. We can see it in how we are all pulling away from each other and loosening the cohesion of our social fabric by retreating further into our ideological camps created in the only social space still widely open; social media.

I think we all need to find something to stimulate our souls and help us feel like humans interacting with our environment again. Finding adventure can be simple and affordable, and a great way to feel free and alive again. Nothing needs to be expensive or extravagant to help put some excitement back into your life. In the video you'll see that my wife and I decided to take our grandson's old boogie board to the freshly fallen snow of Frazier Park, CA and have a secluded family day to alleviate the boredom from social distancing this pandemic has forced upon all of us. We loaded up our dogs and put a tank a gas in our truck and headed out to the mountains to see if we could find adventure.

I have years of experience sledding as I was born and raised in Wisconsin and my wife a resident of California her whole life can be seen in our sledding techniques when you watch the video. At first I questioned my wife's idea of using the cheap little boogie board as I'm more accustomed to implements specifically made for the snow; ones that at least have handles and room for an ass to fit. My wife was determined though to find a hill and sled down it. The brave man I am, I let her go first. She shrieked with excitement all the way down her first run with our dog, Chance, trying to protect her running next to her side; as he believed she was in trouble. I am horrible as capturing anything on an iPhone and thinking I was capturing the moment, I was in fact not capturing anything and never started the video. My wife had to make another run but we could never recreate Chance's interaction again. We missed his sincere rescue attempt on the first run.

My wife dared me now and challenged me to go even higher up the hill to which I did. My first run was met with almost catastrophe. A few seconds into my run and just as I was reaching the part of the hill where my wife was located and filming me, I had to bail, as I noticed a huge bile of dog crap right in my path. I put one leg down are veered hard right narrowly missing the poop. My wife didn't even know why I bailed, she thought I just wiped out from being out of control. I showed her I almost when through a fresh pile of crap our dogs had just laid in the wild. Through our hysterics we got the excrement off the path, and now the way was cleared for a second run.

I walked up even higher this time and was determined to show my wife how a Wisconsinite commands a sled, or boogie board in the snow in this instance. A boogie board has no handles like a conventional sled so I looped my finger in the leash like it was a miniature snow bull and I got into the perfect laid back angle with my 200 pound frame, picked by feet up and let 'er rip. Needless to say I made the 8 seconds easy. The initial criticism I had for my wife's boogie board idea turned into approval and it actually turned out to be a fun little moment in our inexpensive family adventure.

That is the whole point of this little story and video. It's practically free to get out and have simple impromptu adventures out in nature. Not only are they inexpensive but they are also social-distance safe, as your out away from large crowds of people. Slowly our lives and society will get back onto a more normal and socially interactive track but its great to get out into nature and readjust your social compass so when we all do come back together as a society maybe we can do it with more humanity and compassion for each other.