A Little "Refocusing" Before I Get Started

In her book Rowing To Latitude, Jill Fredston wrote of her adventures rowing in some of the most beautiful, challenging and isolated places in the world. She writes that she has received comments from well-wishers about how nice it must be to get out away from it all so she could "think". Fredston's reply? A shrug.


People who don't put themselves in the position to experience it simply can't understand. Going "off-grid" is not about thinking about anything in particular. It's about responding. Responding to weather, to conditions, and yes, even thoughts. But, those thoughts about the office and whether you left the iron on disappear quickly. What is left is a life minus the baggage, minus the background noise. You're left with what matters.

It mattered little to me late Sunday afternoon whether I had returned all phone calls at the office Friday. I had made a snap decision to leave Cypress Creek Campgrounds and return to the waters of Black Creek, and my worries were a little more pressing. Forty Five minutes of paddling and the trees were beginning to shade out the afternoon sun. My wife was behind me in a kayak, and between us were my two sons in a canoe. We were all loaded with gear for the weekend that had to be unloaded and assembled. I couldn't find a sandbar to make camp, and I was thinking, "STUPID! You had a bird in the hand and you were looking for the one in the bush."

It was the uncertainty that had to be dealt with that mattered most at that moment. Little lessons are everywhere when you are forced by necessity to learn them. We found a beautiful and secluded sandbar just in time to make camp. Just as the uncertainty was immediate, so was the joy of having come through it in time to set up camp before dark. Nothing can be more scary or more rewarding than immediate feedback from a decision. You can't put it off, and you can't pretend it's not there.

Earlier in the day it mattered not one bit that my boss may have come into the office over the weekend and saw that I had left a huge mess behind my desk while working on case files. As I, my wife and my two sons explored a shaded and quiet creek that fed into Black Creek, and I watched the wonder on my boys faces from their canoe I was thinking, "nothing else matters." Later, as I watched them laughing and joking with one another while splashing from a rope swing I was thinking, "my family is a gift from God."

Whatever mental filing or head-work needed to organize a persons hustle and bustle life, it has been my experience that out on the water is not the place to do it. I simply can't. There's too much else to think about. Being on the water strips things down to the bare, meaningful essentials. There is plenty of time for thought, plenty of time for discussion, plenty of time for prayer and meditation. But, no time for false worries, or self imposed problems. It's time for refocusing away from such things.

I begin a journey on July 10, 2010. It is a journey that I believe was God-given. It was inspired by one of the most influential people in my life. It is to honor her memory, her Faith, and her example. The idea came to me while on the water, while nature had me, and was refocusing me.

A years worth of paddling as many Mississippi waterways as I can get my boat in will take a toll on the false worries and the self imposed problems. Even though I hope my family will be there as often as possible, it will no doubt lead to tensions with them, too. But, I know it is the right thing to do.

"I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me" —Philippians 3:12

It was only fitting that I use the Independence Day Weekend to get my head right before starting the Alzheimer's project this week. With the press releases, the interviews, the marketing to sponsors, and the organizing, I needed to remember why I was doing it and what this is all about. Where exactly this will take me I don't know. But, I know where it's headed, and I know why.