Hello, I Must Be Going
For the fifth summer in a row, I am about to pack the car with running and rowing kit, load up my dog Towhee and trek 3000 miles from Portland to Craftsbury. Figuring out what to take along for 3.5 months induces complicated feelings about possessions and stuff. Am I really the minimalist I think I am?
It’s not like I live in a large house packed with things. It’s plenty big for Towhee, Petey the cat and me. But after a summer of living in the Duck Blind which is one small room plus a postage stamp-sized screened porch, I come home to my 1906 Craftsman house and wander around it like a long-lost ghost. Do I need all these rooms, this furniture, these closets full of clothes? Do I really have this many Nike and Patagonia jackets? Why do I have so many bikes? What is the nature of my attachment to these things? It gives me pause.
The simplicity of my life in the Duck Blind is soothing. It feels like a privilege to live there all summer and have such clarity and lightness. I coach. I run. I row. I fall asleep at night watching the fireflies flit across the Cove. I get up the next day and do it all over again.The real trick is to understand the truth of it. I drive across the country with my 1x rowing shell and oars strapped on the roof. There’s nothing simple and pared down about transporting rowing equipment. I am lucky to have a friend who will live in my house and care for Petey. To need a friend to look after my things doesn’t fall into the Minimalist Category. At all.
The house, the bikes, the stuff at home doesn’t cease to exist. It’s in stasis. Waiting for me to come home and look at it, own it, be part of all of it again.
I guess the truth is I am comfortable with contradiction and nuance. I am ok with gray areas.
So I can live in the Duck Blind all summer long. I can coach the running camps and scull in sculling camp. I can wander up to the Dining Hall on a Sunday evening and revel in Thanksgiving Dinner (again!). I have my running shoes, my dog and my blue boat to row. I’m surrounded by friends and the beauty of Craftsbury.
The rest of it can wait.