I have lived my life quite differently from most people that I grew up with and lived around. I am not a rare breed, per se. There are millions like me...I just never met them where I am from. When I travel there are like individuals like me everywhere.
Call it a group of what nots....world travellers, idealists, free thinkers, left handers, surfers, odd balls. There is this type of group.....I like to refer to them as "like souls".
It only exists outside of ones own country, because....
It allows you to be able to truly see the World.....your culture laid in contrast to others. It's amazing....I can't get enough of it.
So.......I live a simple life. I work with the soil. The only control I feel I have is how I can control the growth habits of my roses and privet hedges. I make just enough money to get by, and I started travelling to Mexico to surf and live cheap during the Winters up North when there was no work. Driving 4000 miles each way by myself.
All my "friends" thought to themselves, "Wow, he gets to go on vacation 3 months a year."
I would tell them.....I live there for three months because it costs the same for me to live up North for the same time period.....exact same expenses including the travel, so its "living" not a vacation.......PLUS.....they didn' have to dig a hole to shit in first thing in the morning. They found it disgusting that I would try to shock them with such a statement.....hey, it was the truth. I lived on the beach for 4 years in a tent (3 months a year).....then I gravitated to hanging a hamaca on the roof of a bodega on a farm that was 1 mile from the closest house for the next 5 years. Eventually I started living in the pueblo for $5 a night.
Did anyone want that life?....NO.
A few years later:
The recession hit in the states....and it has never left the area where I live. I was 9 months from being homeless and I was forced into action.
So, all my friends think, "well, he has lived the life he wanted and has paid his penalty." No unemployment, no IRA, no pension, no 401k........
I have done "well" in the business venture that I was forced into.....I committed myself and every penny I had to this idea 3 years ago. Mind you...that is "well" by my standards.
All my years of, literally, being the poorest surfer on the beach has taught me how to live a simple lifestyle....one that my idol (henry david thoreau) would have greatly approved of.
I informed all my friends that my body has broken down and that archaeologists would study my bones and figure I built the pyramids or picked cotton my whole Life....which isn't far from the truth. I told people that I was going to sell everything I owned and move to a third World nation to live.
Now they hate me. Seriously.....were they really my friends, or was I just someone they could always feel they were always "better off than than". I didn't bother to tell them that I can only generate enough money to live on $10,000 a year.....why bother.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/19/2013 07:08PM by OffTheRadar.
