We each have our personal reasons for what it is we do in life. I
have mine, too. I've worked for 54 years, raised a family, cared for extended family members. Don't we all?
I trek because, in my view, trekking is as life itself, which
some also describe as a journey, or a road. In fact, one of my favorite books
about living is M. Scott Peck's "The Road Less Travelled." Dr. Peck
stated that "Life is Difficult" and the journey to spiritual growth
is a long one. I am not averse to discomfort or making difficult decisions. I suspect this is consistent with Dr. Peck's view.
For me, trekking is more than a portable lifestyle or simply about
travel, it is about discovery and relationships. These include relationships
with self, with others and even the planet and the creatures upon it, who are
our neighbors. It is about discovering history; our place in it and those who
preceded us. It is about opportunity, growth, awareness and personal
development. It is about sharing what we have and what we have discovered with
others, both near and far. It provides another opportunity for
responsible self expression.
In every campsite and RV resort I've had the opportunity to create or affirm a neighborhood; I like to emphasize the word "opportunity."
If my view of living life is about self-expression and co-existing
with our neighbors, then blogging and other forms of communication are a
natural extension of my view and an integral part of living my life, which is a
work in progress. My blogs will also provide a wonderful diary.
In life we acquire skills. Trekking does require skill, purpose
and resources. It can facilitate personal growth. We often hear those in the
entertainment industry speak about entertainers who are a "triple
threat;" these can sing, dance and act. In life, it's my opinion that
those we might describe as having or being a triple threat have three overriding
characteristics: passion, conviction and purpose. It is useful to be
"grounded" in the present, to have "heart" and to strive to
put this into whatever one does. In my opinion trekking presents an opportunity
to be a "triple threat" while living one's life. It is about living
with passion, conviction and purpose.
Over time, my trekking has changed. It's only recently that I have
had the opportunity to do the treks I have been posting here. Getting
everything together has itself been a long, 70 year journey and many things have come
together to make it happen. Nor did I get here alone; it happened with help and
with hindrance; at times I have been my own worst enemy. How I got to this
point in my life is a bit of a story and perhaps a miracle. I provide this as
an explanation and because my blogs may seem odd at times. But then, each of
our lives is different and in a large country which offers incredible personal
freedoms, it’s to be expected that blogs about the same subject might be very,
very different. For anyone who reads my blogs or sees my videos the following
may provide an explanation for the underlying perspective.
Now, some may think that all of this occurred naturally and with
no effort or decisions on my part. Quite the contrary; it took a lot of
lifestyle planning to get to this place in my life. It was trial and error, and
there were errors. I've learned a lot via my work, and I've been in the work
force since 1963. My work was difficult, and anyone who runs a small business
can say that they have experienced difficulties. My work has been mentally
challenging and frequently it has been physically demanding. However, I should
add that I work not entirely by choice but from necessity. However, I do choose
to work.
There have been some very difficult times. Recessions are not a
recent economic invention, and there are other financial disruptors. After a
major upheaval to my life I was beyond financial ruin for over a decade. It was
a long, slow process to recover. I did not take vacations. I spent about 20
years rebuilding my life. It was a slow, continuous process which required one
step at a time, one decision following another. There were missteps and there
were some really difficult choices, and I do recall telling myself "I'll
sleep tomorrow" as a means to get through more than a few days.
However, if life is a journey, then there are many roads to travel
and some detours. Some roads are easier than others. Choosing the difficult
path is sometimes the thing to do. Sometimes the easy path becomes a difficult
one. Continuing is always the thing to do, one step or day at a time. We can
run and we can walk, but one should never stop growing and developing. Using
what we have learned in our path in life, we can apply it to our journey, and
we should.
I learned to trek in the usual sense as an adult youth leader. But
I learned to enjoy the world as a child. As a child, my parents would, on
occasion, rent a cabin on a lake near Antioch, Illinois. That week was great
for all of us, including my sisters. What an adventure! Other youthful
adventures included frequent trips to the rocks on Chicago's Lake Michigan at
Montrose Harbor. There was a lot of perch fishing when I was a youth. That was
before air conditioning and we lived less than 2 miles from the lake, so on a
hot summer day we would sometimes take a quick drive and there we were, to cool
off and enjoy the lake breezes. As a bonus we could cook and eat the fish, and
we did; it was delicious. The water was usually cold, and so swimming gave us
blue lips. However, sitting on the rocks while the men were fishing for perch
was warming, and we could also play volleyball and badminton. Although I was a
boy I was given the opportunity to monitor my own fishing rig and using an old,
discarded electro-mechanical thermostat I constructed an electrical device to
respond to the pull of a perch on the trot line and light a flashlight bulb. It
was great for night fishing. My parents picked up on this and some of my other activities
and guided me to a technical high school, where in addition to math and
sciences I also took four years of drafting and three of shop. In fact, I went
to summer school to make space for these classes and worked nights and summer
to afford the bus fare. I also worked at night and through the summer.
Sitting on the “rocks” at Lake Michigan is where my interest in
sailing began, and that is one piece of the trek puzzle. I would watch the
sailboats go effortlessly by. I think the “effortless” part appealed to me; I did not discern the underlying skill. But
it was beautiful to watch. I'll never forget the night of a big harvest moon
coming up, and then a sailboat passed in front of it. I had a desire to be in,
or on the water, and not simply at the beach or on the rocks.
In fact, it was possible to bicycle to the lake, and on several
occasions, at about the age of 10, I did so with friends. I didn't have a suitable
bicycle so I went with friends who did, and we doubled up, one of us riding on
the handle bars while the other pedaled. When the one peddling grew tired, we
switched.
20 years later, I had the opportunity to sail and put a boat on Lake Michigan,
but that quickly ended when the children became older and had other interests,
including sports, band, camping and other outdoor activities. There is only so
much time in the day and one must have a budget as money is finite. Now, anyone
with children will say it's important to give them positive direction. There is
a place for sports, but learning and trying things is essential for career and
life planning. So when the children were young, a lot of my time was spent
coming up with instructive and constructive things for them to do. Like my
father did with me, they participated in all sorts of home building projects
and chores. In doing so, they developed motor skills and learned to use and respect
tools. Some of these projects were very elaborate and I taught the eldest
computer aided design so he could make the necessary drawings. They had pets,
and they learned to care for other creatures. They liked the outdoors and so
guiding them into camping, hiking and canoeing was an easy decision, on the
surface.
However, youth organizations require volunteers with skills. I was
willing to volunteer, but I had no outdoor skill, so I fumbled around as
treasurer. By the time my oldest son went on his first weekend (three day) Cub
Scout camping trip, I came along as one of several adult supervisors. I
discovered my sons were really interested in doing this and so I decided to
learn the necessary skills. I took various trainings and eventually became a
trainer, myself. Ultimately, I became able at backpacking, canoeing and even
winter camping. I also became a skilled youth leader. I attended or led about
50 campouts including several "high adventure" treks for youth. These
were not trivial things. Canoeing 90 miles through Quetico Provincial Park was
a real challenge. Participating in or leading backpacking treks was not a
trivial thing. These things were my first, early "treks." This also
required a deep, life altering commitment on my part.
For work, I traveled extensively and so I could say those too were
"treks" of a different type. In 1969 I drove alone from Chicago to
the Florida Everglades on an unusual assignment as a "field electrical
engineer" to participate in the construction of a very large grass-roots
industrial facility my employer had designed and was building. They was a
design-construction firm, and I normally worked on the design aspects. However,
I had expressed a serious interest in field work. So when the opportunity
occurred I accepted. I was low man on the totem pole, but circumstances aligned
and those ahead of me had declined. This trip was to be about 8 weeks, but
actually had a duration of 11 months. What a remarkable learning opportunity,
in all respects. When I wasn't working I explored Florida all the way to the
Keys. I learned to water ski on Biscayne Bay and to snorkel in the Keys. I
fished on drift boats when I had the time; it was cheap entertainment. I used
shrimp for bait that were larger than the ones I had eaten in Chicago. I loved the outdoors, the water, the
everglades, the wildlife, nature and the activity. I realized I was truly
alive, and I had choices to make. When one enjoys one's work, believe me, it
isn't work. I was like a sponge. I returned to the office and in 6 years I was
the firms Systems Engineer. In ten I began my own automation firm.
Over the years I drove about 500,000 miles, most of it work
related; they don't build large scale industrial facilities in cities. However,
there is a lot of steel and petrochemical production around Chicago. To get
from home to the production facilities I did a lot of night driving because the roads were
quiet and night time was "non-productive" work time while daylight
was "productive" work time. I also flew a lot; sometimes as
unofficial co-pilot on a small plane owned by a co-engineer. While travelling I
would look out the window and I would wonder about all of the people I was
passing by. At night, every home below, or on the hill I was passing
represented a family, a "life unit." I passed many families, many
towns and many sights. I decided I would someday see and connect with many of
the things I was passing. That decision gave me the power to continue. This
formed another piece of the trek puzzle.
Working in an engineering capacity for a design and build
industrial firm meant I spent anywhere from a couple of days to 11 months
somewhere else; most trips were a few weeks to one month. All the while I
maintained my apartment or home here. My longest work trips occurred prior to
my marriage and children. But I've taken frequent business trips each year
since 1966. These are currently less than a duration of one month. For most of
those trips I was as a ghost; I did not connect with others; I had a specific
purpose and once it was over, I was gone. So, on completion of the automation
and process control commissioning, engineering, planning, training of others or
whatever task, I then moved on and might never return. I was a transient and my
existence was somewhat ephemeral to those I interacted with in these
facilities,
I came to realize this on a return from a short trip to the
Cleveland area to which I had been sent to deal with some post construction
problems with the process controls. Upon my return to the office the construction
manager stopped by my desk and asked me "Who is the phantom?" I had
traveled to that production facility as instructed. On arrival I introduced
myself and was sent into the gypsum board plant to the area we had designed and
constructed and went to work getting the process controls to function properly.
After three days of work, I was complete. I stopped by the plant office, gave a
brief verbal report to the management there and departed, returning to Chicago.
During those three days I had worked alone at my task. Apparently the management had
discussed my success with company management after I had left and they had asked the
question. When Bill McAfee stopped at my desk and relayed their question I had
the realization that was exactly what I was; I was a ghost. In that instant I decided I needed
to make some changes and get more involved in my life. Yes, I really was a
phantom, but I had the power to change my life! And so I began. It has taken another
37 years to get to this point in the journey.
One of the things I did was to marry and have children; in that
too I experienced failure. Another was to participate in what was called
"the human potential movement" and expanded my awareness. Yet another
was to start one process control automation company, and then another. While to
the casual business observer it may have appeared that I spent time on the
leading edge, in fact, I also spent a lot of time "on the bleeding
edge." The work was hard. We were using untried or new technologies for
process control automation. A lot of things simply didn't work as advertised or
expected, yet It took responsibility to make them work as a system for a
specified cost. Industrial systems run 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Failures
are costly. We assembled subsets of many systems "on the bench" and
put them through their paces to determine if they could function properly in
the real world, prior to our putting these systems on the market and in
industrial plants. This was time consuming and costly. We were a small,
independent company with no financial backing; we were internally funded with
the exception of receivables. Margins were incredibly tight and we had little
financial room for error. As systems evolved I learned a variety of software
methods and operating systems. I learned to use computer aided design tools. I
wore several hats, including roles in business, marketing and sales, as well as
engineering and commissioning. What I learned I taught to others in the
company, and what others learned they taught to me. It was a team effort at
continuous improvement. Things evolved rapidly as microprocessor based
technology advanced. We designed and built "hybrid" and "solid
state" systems prior to the microprocessor systems. Some of this was so
new that we were close to being pioneers, and I took part in developing some of
the technologies in use today. Some of the systems I developed actually performed
useful work for 25 years, until it became a concern that the microprocessor
based technology could not be properly supported and maintained.
All of this trekking preparation did not occur in a week or a few
months. It has taken years to develop the necessary skill sets, try them and
improve them. It has required continuous learning, re-education and
improvement. Along the way I became an excellent draftsman and photographer.
35mm was a rewarding but unforgiving medium. It was costly to own the equipment
and costly to pay for developing and printing. One never knew if the results
were good, bad or spectacular until the slides or negatives were in. At the age
of 18 I learned how to develop my own film and spent a lot of time in the
darkroom doing so. I became skillful at black and white photography and learned
the tricks of burning and dodging. Compared to modern digital techniques, it
was very difficult. I considered movie equipment, but 8mm was too primitive for
me and I decided I really couldn't afford 16mm. So I honed my skills with still
photography. But this too has been useful in the digital age.
In my spare time prior to the age of 25 I taught myself
photography, oil painting, did some acrylics, and also did modeling and
sculpture in papier-mâché' and plastics. Later I did water colors. But I'm not
an artist, merely a dabbler. However, the skills acquired in the pre-digital
age have served me well.
I finally gave up on all non-digital photography in 2010 and
purchased a Kodak digital camera. By today's standards it too was primitive.
But it worked. I had been experimenting with and using a variety of digital
tools for about 15 years, including scanners, Photoshop and some sophisticated
digital painting software. It was relatively easy to make the transition to
digital. Everything I had learned in the previous 46 years about photography
was useful. This included composition, color, grayscale, software tools,
editing of slide shows and so on.
I replaced the Kodak with a Lumix DMC-TZ5 9MP camera because I was
really interested in its ability as a "stealth" movie camera, as well
as its 10x optical zoom with Leica lens. One of my old 35mm cameras had been a
Leica and I really liked the workmanship. Then prior to the Alaska cruise I
purchased a true digital movie camera.
My treks prior to 2010 were all taken with still medium, primarily
35mm photography. I finally had a digital camera and so I did begin to
experiment with digital movies. However, on a trek with my sons the Lumix was
dropped into a stream in Quetico Provincial Park. Oops. That ended its use until we returned home and I
had the opportunity to properly dry it out. It continues to work today and
remained my primary digital camera, but there is excessive "flare"
when scenes are backlit, and the zoom selector is failing. I finally replaced
it this year with a DMC-ZS40. My digital phone was a "flip" phone
which had replaced the "bag" phone and several cellular clunkers I
had earlier. I finally purchased a “smart” phone with camera in 2012, but I
continued to use my latest iteration of a flip phone as my workhorse. When that
became flaky (it had been dropped in water twice and survived) I retired my
flip phone and I now own a Samsung Galaxy S6. With it, I easily put together my
first animated GIF.
As part of my work, I developed and provided training programs and
I wrote a lot of technical manuals, some of which were books. This technical
writing was tedious and very dry. It needed to be absolutely understandable to
anyone with the proper background, accurate and stand alone; the manuals and
documentation required diagrams, etc. Fortunately, I could draw and I learned
to type in high school. After struggling with secretaries who initially typed
all of the requisitions, specifications and early manuals I really wanted the
ability for improved documentation. When I started my first business I immediately
leased a Xerox word processing system. At the time the personal computer had
not yet been invented. With the arrival of the PC we made the decision to
purchase PCs for the managers and several for staff. We made the decision to go
"all digital" using IBM PCs with dual floppies, 64K of RAM, Black
& White (green or orange) screens and DOS. We began with Lotus 123 for back
office, then Symphony. We also got software development tools including BASIC,
then Pascal, then C and so on. As the technology progressed, so did we. We
moved to PCs with a hard drive and better software, including accounting. I
purchased a Zenith Turbosport 286 portable with hard drive and grayscale screen
which I took with me on frequent business trips. It had a monster NiCad battery
and I could do most of my reports on the airplane. I was pretty popular as I
was the only guy on the flight to have a computer, which brought a lot of
interest. And I was travelling coach!
We progressed to better PCs, mini-computer CAD and better
technology to support our efforts. It was too early to use PC based CAD and
Xenix was not sufficiently stable. I began using Sun workstations and learned
Unix and C. With the better PCs came optical scanners, Windows GUI software and
I was able to purchase artistic and photo editing tools, too. After all,
our manuals needed photos and graphics. I wrote dozens of technical manuals
over a period of 20 years. My engineers had better tasks to do, and many
software people were notoriously lousy at technical writing, which they
abhorred doing. Perhaps things have improved today.
In the 1990s I developed a company BBS (bulletin board system)
which was accessed via direct dial phone lines, and when the internet came
along I learned HTML in my spare time. Eventually I put up several web sites.
Then people began to blog and what the heck, by 2008 I too was blogging. Today,
my blogs have about 1 million words and many diagrams and photos. All of that
writing, programming, diagramming, drawing, graphics, painting, photography and
filming, etc. had finally come together. So today I can document what I am
doing on these treks. In fact, I consider the documenting an integral part of
the trekking. That was my goal in blogging. To put together a body of work that
I could share with others. Now I have added a Google Plus account. However, I
remain somewhat skeptical of social media. But everything has a purpose.
Another piece was my experience of several physical disasters. I
nearly died as a youth, then I suffered a second, terrible, crippling physical injury.
This was reinforced again at the age of 23 when I had a physical accident. I
experience certain pain to this very day as a consequence. Pain is a reminder I
am alive and have a physical body that needs to be cared for. Not a bad thing
to learn at the age of 7 and then relearn via reminders thereafter. Those
injuries also presented physical challenges to overcome or to learn how to live
with. At two different times, but for the grace of God, I would today most
certainly be dead. A good associate was one of several people killed in a
serious industrial accident several days after I left a production facility;
it's likely I too would have been one of the casualties had I been present.
Other adventures included experiencing hurricane Hugo in Charleston (I
was working at a nearby industrial facility and staying on the outskirts of
Summerville, SC). Later, I left NOLA shortly prior to landfall by Katrina, and
returned to participate in the resurrection of a seriously damaged production
facility. From my experiences I have concluded that life can be difficult and
it can end, at any time. This reality is somewhat like the weather. It is
what it is, but we can modify ourselves to deal with what comes our way.
In 1978 I looked at a GMC motor home, but it was not to be.
However, I was intrigued by the advantages as compared to ground camping. In my
spare time for the next 35 years I researched different types of "motor
homes." Everything from truck campers to Class A's. But it was not to be.
No time and no money; a "motor home" was a luxury and at one point I
barely had a roof over my head. Yet, I continued to do my research and to look
at the possibilities, dream and plan. As my life progressed I avoided
unnecessary expenses, and lived modestly. I also, like the squirrels I am fond
of, buried nuts for the winter of my retirement. Finally in 2007 I declared to
my spouse that this was something I really wanted to do and I began enrolling
her in the possibilities. We took a driving trip to some of the national parks
in Utah and her love of the outdoors was re-invigorated. We began discussing
the real possibilities, and by 2012 we had made the decision. We decided to
rent a Class B Sprinter based camper van. We enjoyed that trip and I had the
bug.
I continued researching Class Bs and Class Cs. We decided the 19 foot Sprinter
was simply too small for our intended use, which could be for several weeks at
a time. Any such vehicle was going to be far too much of a financial investment
to use casually or infrequently. We came to the conclusion that this would be a
life altering decision. It would require trade-offs and adjustments. It would
also offer unprecedented opportunities.
Perusing the web I saw an ad for a new Roadtrek 210P. We
discovered it had been on the lot for nearly a year and the price was good, but
the ad said "make an offer." I contacted the sales manager and said
"What's the drive it to Illinois price?" He responded with a number
that was attractive. G and I had some soul searching discussions; we weren't
quite ready to make this financial commitment. After some intense planning
sessions we decided to "go for it" and made the leap in December
2013.
So, that's basically how I got to this place in time and why I trek.
It's about living my life with those I love. To conclude, one's life if about making a difference, no matter how small. It is also about experiencing life on our planet. We live in a remarkable time and on a wonderful continent.
(C) 2016 Norman Retzke, all rights reserved.
