Does it really just come down to dumb luck?

"We were on the roof on Monday, young Lisiek and I and we saw the Herr Kommandant come out of the house on the patio right there below us and he drew his gun and shot a woman who was passing by. Just a woman with a bundle, just shot her through the throat. She was just a woman on her way somewhere, she was no faster or slower or fatter or thinner than anyone else and I couldn't guess what had she done. The more you see of the Herr Kommandant the more you see there are no set rules you can live by, you cannot say to yourself, 'If I follow these rules, I will be safe.'"

This quote, from one of the most powerful scenes in the movie 'Schindler's List', portrays the powerlessness of living in an environment without rhyme or reason. Whether one does what they are told or not, follows the advice of those in power or not, it makes no difference. Obviously we are not living in a concentration camp, but our society none-the-less increasingly resembles the same inescapable powerlessness, even if in a much more diluted and subtle form.

I recognize I've said many times before the universe is a place governed by randomness, though within the bounds of the laws of physics. Nature has no more regard for Planet Earth in general or human beings in particular than it does for other planets or species. But humans were randomly "selected" to "receive" a sense of justice. Our cultures are ultimately a collective recognition that only together can we maximize everyone's odds in the face of an indifferent world that is as likely to sooner or later deliver a natural disaster to our doorstep as it is a bumper crop at harvest time. In short, we understand the virtues of cooperation and fairness, even if often we fail to apply them.

So I feel a bit peeved (understatement) at our increasing failure to apply justice - to allow injustice to persist in our relations with each other even in the face of collective exposure to an uncaring universe. Most societies are content with the minimum amount of cooperation and mutual regard necessary to get by and still, hopefully, hold themselves together. A dangerous game as leaders of the Middle East are learning today and the recent riots in London foreshadow.

Given what's going on in my own life I take it all a bit personally. I've applied for countless jobs, am seeking housing in a world that increasingly demands proof of employment before they'll rent to you, and generally seems hell bent on making sure you don't get a fresh start. If society says it rewards hard work, education, and encourages risk taking in the interest of fostering innovation and both personal and collective advancement, then it should actually deliver. People in such a society, if the rhetoric is be believed, shouldn't lose their shirt if things don't go according to plan. Paying a price for taking a risk and failing is one thing. Losing everything is another.

Chris and I haven't done everything right. Who ever does? But we've done more right than wrong. Unfortunately, there is not enough work and what work there is fails to cover the bills. In the absence of steady income housing is harder to come by, leaving us without a place from which to sell some of our excess stuff as planned. Student loans don't come close to covering all the costs associated with getting an education, especially if you're an older non-traditional student, and most of the scholarships out there are small, tend to be random drawings or essay contests (both time consuming and highly competitive) often targeting young students fresh out of high school. Being in Canada, at least we don't have the added disadvantage of having to worry about healthcare through it all, but millions in the US are not nearly so fortunate.

So for us it comes down to dumb luck, and we're hardly alone. Once you've applied for jobs, taken advantage of every available government aid program, researched and applied for scholarships and still nothing happens, it ultimately comes down to dumb luck. Winning the lottery or having a good day at the local casino or finding a wad of bills someone accidentally dropped on the sidewalk on their way to the bank. Or maybe you just bump into some incredibly generous soul willing to pay a truly decent wage in exchange for some yard work or something. Whatever. But planning and effort really have nothing to do with it. The fact you've done everything you've been advised to do doesn't really matter. Attempting to improve your life, an act praised by politicians and preachers alike, it turns out has odds increasingly resembling those found at a slot machine in your local gambling establishment. It doesn't have to, of course, but collectively we've all put up with it so far so here we are.

So are we going to make it Canada? Probably not. We probably can't make it in the US either. In two wealthy societies with so much work that needs to be done - infrastructure maintenance and replacement backlogs now totaling in the trillions of dollars, research opportunities galore, environmental restoration work desperately needing to be done - we are actually expected to believe there is no work available and to accept funding cuts in the interest of "shared sacrifice". In a culture that praises education we force students to graduate under the burden of staggering debt and allow tuition and fees to grow significantly faster than inflation year after year. Meanwhile, our politicians run on themes of hope while embracing tax cuts for the wealthy and spending cuts for the rest of us. Or worse, they run away from science, label the educated "elite", and call any suggestion the wealthy pay a bit more "class warfare". These will be our choices as long as we continue to tolerate them.

So if we make it here or anywhere else it will be as much or more due to dumb luck than any effort we exert. We've exerted plenty, to the point of giving it all we can in every way imaginable. Like a growing list of millions in the industrialized world and billions elsewhere, it comes down to dumb luck as our leaders embrace what amounts to the modern equivalent of Social Darwinism. But as many dictators in North Africa and the Middle East are currently learning, luck is a double edged sword. Eventually, if rhetoric and reality continue to diverge, our leaders' luck will run out as well. If Chris and I and millions more in our shoes are lucky, that day will be soon.

It's a small world after all

Chris, Zeus and I traveled 9,812 kilometers this summer, at least if Google Maps is to be believed. If I was able to accurately add up all the side trips the total would no doubt approach or perhaps exceed 11,000 km.

Over the course of three days this past weekend I personally added more than 3,000 additional kilometers returning our rental car to Salt Lake and then flying back to Seattle before ultimately returning to Victoria via high speed ferry. In order to diversify the mix of transportation methods employed this summer I fit in a few hours on a sailboat on Bear Lake between the drive and the flight, though I have nothing to show for it beyond a bad sunburn, some fond memories, and the addition of some sailing terms like "jib" to my vocabulary.

The flight to Seattle retraced from 35,000 feet much of the highway I had driven at a far more leisurely pace heading in the opposite direction less than 48 hours prior. After reaching Boise, Idaho in just over 20 minutes I began to follow the flight information provided on the small screen mounted on the back of the seat in front of me more carefully. The planet seems small indeed when in a little more than two hours you've covered a distance that just 48 hours before took about 13 hours to cover, and not much more than a century prior would have taken weeks or even months. It is remarkable that in a little over three months Chris, Zeus and I crossed the Cascades, prairies, and Rocky Mountains twice (first in Canada and then again in the US) and a large portion of the Canadian Shield once. Is it any wonder the struggles of the pioneers or explorers like Lewis and Clark seem nearly as much ancient history as the Babylonians?

Even more remarkable is the fact Chris and I, to say nothing of our dog, are beings of incredibly modest means. In fact, modest means is overstating it. Yet here we are having just completed approximately 11,000 kilometers of travel including most of the readily available means of modern transportation at human disposal. Some would see this fact as an indication of human progress. Regardless, I'm certainly glad we had the ability to take the opportunity to set out across Canada.

Unfortunately, this smaller more accessible planet of ours has somehow reinforced the impression we live on a planet of nearly infinite resources instead of teaching us our place in the universe is even tinier and more inconsequential than our ancestors sailing the seas on small slow moving boats or crossing the New World via horse drawn wagon thought it was. A hundred or so years ago we thought the world had infinite wealth because it was so big. Now we take the speed and relative ease with which we can encircle it as an indication our ancestors were right. Flying through a warming atmosphere over all too visible clear cuts, strip mines, and ribbons of highway seems to have done little to change human attitudes toward the limits and fragility of this tiny blue ball.

Regardless, our personal travels are over for the time being. It will probably be a while before we set out across Canada again, let alone visit Europe, the Australian outback, or the Amazon rainforest. Like the planet we have only limited resources, and even the accessibility afforded by what is almost certainly the tail end of the modern industrial age takes more resources than we currently have at our disposal. If all goes well we'll be content to just take our time letting our roots sink into the soil of Vancouver Island for a while. Next summer will, at best, probably see only weekend excursions into the woods and followup blogs about large slugs, mushrooms, tall trees, wildlife, and the biodiversity found in the intertidal zone between forest and sea.

Getting some more practice going with the flow

We had hoped this week's post would include pictures of our new apartment. Perhaps next week's will. After numerous phone calls and an eternity driving from one housing prospect to another all we really have to show for it is sufficient knowledge of Victoria to qualify for a job with one of the local taxi companies.

The transition to our new life in Canada has never been what you'd call smooth. In spite of that, we still can't seriously consider for more than a moment or two giving up. We are, if nothing else, living more intentionally now than ever. The challenges, as frustrating as they are, also perversely feed the hope of a large pay off at the end of it all. At its basest most fundamental level it's the same emotional pull a gambler feels waiting for his slot machine to come up '777' or a surfer feels waiting to finally catch that truly giant wave. It's tempting to cast it all in a nobler more romantic light, but the exhilaration one feels after any notion of security or significant control is given up, even briefly, is the same for the poker player pushing all her chips into the centre of the table as it probably was for Charles Darwin stepping onto the Beagle to sail around the world or, in our case, two lovers chucking it all and trying to make a go of it in Canada. The consequences of the relative outcomes may be different, but at the individual level the emotions and motivations are essentially the same.

So we wait and redraw our plans a bit more as needed with each passing day. Unless someone calls tomorrow - and they might - it's into a motel with a cheap weekly rate while we expand our search to include apartments not available until September 1st, or perhaps even a bit beyond. Zeus will be glad to not be spending so much time in the back of the rental car next week at any rate. He'll be even happier if we can find him a place close to a park or the ocean, though he may have to settle for regular walks and the chance to just sit on his futon again while chewing a bone. After all, all of us can always use more practice just going with the flow.

What I learned on my summer vacation

It started out as an eventful summer travelling across Canada, and will likely end as one with our return. The hunt for an apartment, job, and preparations for another year in school will no doubt keep us very occupied for the next few weeks. In between these busy bookends however, the summer has been relatively uneventful leaving considerable time for reflection and growth as well as, unfortunately, too much time for dwelling on the past.

In the interest of brevity, I’ve bullet pointed my list of what I’ve learned this summer:

• Humility: None of us is an island and we just can’t make it alone no matter how much we like to think we can. And to prove just how humble I’ve become, I’ll state for the record I’m still far from perfect in the humility department.
• Gratitude: I’m more grateful than ever before for friends and loved ones, many of whom were willing to give us a helping hand when our resources - both emotional and physical - were about exhausted (see also humility above).
• Acceptance: I’m still working on this one, but however much I may struggle with it, it became painfully obvious this summer there is nothing I can do but take people as they are and do my best to love them regardless.
• Indifference: I haven’t mastered this one, but I’m convinced it’s the only way to go. Other people’s issues are just exhausting to deal with if I allow them to become mine, and I’ve got enough issues of my own I’m working on, thank you very much. Because they’re your issues there’s not a damn thing I can do about them, so I’m trying hard not to care about them - unless they involve some sort of suffering I can actually help relieve you of, and they hardly ever do.
• Patience: I haven't so much learned patience as a greater appreciation for it and the relative lack of it I possess. Here would be a good place to insert the tired old cliche about wanting more patience and wanting it now, but I'll exercise some self control. Maybe patience will come as I perfect being indifferent.
• Love: For my wife, primarily. There is no way I could have made it this far without her. For friends who didn’t give up on me. For my daughter whom I miss more than ever. And finally for a dear friend that was nearly lost, but with whom reconciliation seems suddenly and surprisingly possible. And of course Zeus, the best dog on Earth.

I also read three books by Bill Bryson this summer and learned, among other things, that not too long ago they discovered a tribe with no history of contact with the outside world growing sweet potatoes deep in the jungles of New Guinea. Sweet potatoes are native to the Americas so, as Mr. Bryson would say, we should all stop and think about that for a minute. Mr. Bryson also taught me the Appalachian Trail is no walk in the park and that the history of science is as fascinating for its discoveries as for the personalities of some of the scientists. Of course, as life lessons go what I learned from Bill Bryson wasn’t quite as personally transformative as my list, but he sure helped the summer pass a bit quicker.

That’s all until Victoria. My next blog post will be from our new apartment.

Mowing the lawn for the last time

For each of the last eight or nine weeks, usually on Saturday morning, I've mowed our host's lawn. The lot is approximately half an acre, so it takes about an hour to complete. It wasn't until I'd been doing it about three weeks I felt comfortable enough with the lay of this small - in the big scheme of things - patch of land to allow myself the luxury and potential distraction of my MP3 player. It took about three weeks more to settle into a regular approach involving mowing in three uninterrupted stages: the east side, north facing backyard, and finally the western strip between the neighbouring lot together with the much smaller front yard.

I came to look forward to this regular hour or so dedicated to a clear, straightforward goal requiring little thought with even less threat of serious complications. I sat down to program my playlist prior to launch, and pleasantly discovered that without any conscious effort on my part the project ended about the time the music did. The playlist always lasted about a song or two longer than the lawn. By the time I'd opened and downed about a quarter of the weekly can of ice tea that completed the ritual, the music was over and I was able to sit back on the patio and enjoy the smell of freshly cut grass for a while.

But today was the last day I will likely ever cut this lawn, and it will almost certainly be quite some time before I touch a lawn mower again. Next weekend we return to Victoria, probably to live in a small apartment somewhere in the city. Opportunities for regular weekend routines involving the same simple straightforward solitary project week after week are not what that lifestyle is known for. While I wouldn't give up returning to Victoria for the world, let alone the chance to mow a lawn every weekend, I'll miss the alternating sun and shade as I pass under the birch tree with each trip across the backyard.

Realizing this morning was the last time I'd be cutting grass for a while brought home the fact Chris and I are again about to embark on a new adventure alone together. Letting the handle go and hearing the engine die signalled yet another approaching milestone in what is going on 18 months of milestones and challenges. It also marked the end of the illusion I knew, more or less, what the next weekend would bring. Once again, there's no denying we don't know what next weekend has in store for us. Even tomorrow is a mystery. Adventure always had a high degree of appeal, but now I have a somewhat better understanding of the comforts of ritual as well.