How I Became a Vagabond

[INTJohn]

Somewhere around 8 May, '20.

The Shadberry trees are in full bloom. Their white flowers sprinkled thru the leafless forest really stand out like levitating cotton balls.
Made a new rifle range so I can now shoot a full hundred yards without sending a bullet across the trail toward the target. Was annoying having to watch out for vehicles tween shots.......

Sandhills Cranes are back & found the first robin nest of this spring. Been watchin the pair for several days and she's been flying back & forth over Kamp with mud on her beak. Thought she was headed to a large White pine by the trail but yesterday spotted that she's makin it in a large White Oak about 40 feet up and maybe 40 yards frum the kampfire.

Hummingbirds & Orioles have returned as well. Owls keep going at it, too. A few nights back I swear a Great Horned was in The Box with me when it cut loose around 1 am and didn't stfu for about half an hour.
My favorite rakoon had been rootin around for several days in the leaves for grubs, worms & snails but haven't seen it now for 3 days. Its not laying dead on the trail either & hope none of the effin turkey hunters shot it. Maybe its residing in a hollow tree below the hill in the cedar swamp with newborns?

Here's all thats left of the wood I sliced & stacked few weex back. After thats been turned into smoke & ash I'll start on the pile to the left and that should last till end of May which by then outta be warm enough where Jonny Boi will be hangin at Lake Michigan.
INTJohn

 

[INTJohn]

14 May, '20
Yesterday (13 May) I dropped the Superduty off at the nearest Ford Dealer for an 80,000 mile check-up & had 4 new tires put on it. 3 of those 4 tires were with the truck when I bought it new in July '15 & the 4th one is now the spare.

Monday gota call frum my dr's office cancelling what would've been todays appt. for my spring checkup. due to Covid they're pushing all physicals into Aug & Sept. I said well re-schedule it for Oct then as my "regular check up rotation" is May & Oct so I'll still remain on that current track.


And spent much of Mon & Tue of this week slicing & stacking the rest of the logs I had gathered. Looks so nice I almost don't wanna burn it. Haha

 

[INTJohn]

While on my lil exploratory walks/hikes around Kamp Koon, I almost always find/run into/discover something interesting and these pix are from this springs jaunts.


This cocoon hanging frum a sassafras tree that I think is frum a Prometheus Moth. (Moth pik frum internet)


An old cream top milk bottle from The Sanitary Dairy Co. of Muskegon Michigan. How it got where I found it I can only speculate. Its in decent condition; no cracks or chips & the writing is legible tho faded.


This stone used by ancient Native American for starting fires (coins for size comparison) held b y hand on top of rotating stick to produce a friction made ember for fire starting. I have found soooo many artifacts like this over the years and have a big box full of stone ax heads, knife & spear points, projectile points and various tools as well. The display to right is something I put together several years back of mostly projectile points I've found over the years.


Strollin along the cedar swamp edge few mornings back and stumbled into this deer shed, too. Spent some time searching for the other one as often you can find the other one within a couple hundred feet frum each other. I didn't find it tho. Over the years i have found many of these sheds and some of them are impressive. Where I'm at gets deer hunted heavily during November so its nice to see that one of the young bucks some how managed to avoid getting murdered.

And you thought I only did seashells. Haha
INTJohnny Luzsha

 

[INTJohn]

Mid May, cont.
Have discovered today I have new neighbors. Saw the young couple few days prior chekin out the spot to the immediate south of me and wasn't sure if they would be back or not. Hadn't seen them since, till this morning and they obviously are settling in as they've started to build a place with which to "kamp".......

........future momma robin has begun to build her nest in a 10" dia White Oak about 35 feet up and the tree is about 40 feet south of my kampfire location. Noticed the nest in the initial stages after waking up this am and it looks well on to completion at this late time of day. This is the 2nd robin nest I've spotted now and there's also an Oriole nest somewhere near, too. Obviously Kamp Koon must be a great place to raise a family.

Several days later:
Spring has finally sprung in this neck of the woods! Finally around normal temps for this time of year and that means "fix it" week. Was finally able to give The Box a good cleaning - in out top bottom.
Also, had to seal up where a piece of sheet metal siding had separated- reattached with sheet metal screws and sealed over with 3" piece of roof repair tape.

The 2 4inch deluges earlier this month that took out 2 dams here in Michigan also let me know of a crack in the skylight over the shower stall. Ordered a new one and got that installed. While i was on the roof cleaned the 4 roof vents & also had to put a new lip seal in the porta-potti I keep in the truck.

Broke my 4 pound hammer handle I use to split wood and fashioned a new one with saw knife & file frum some pieces of select dried hickory I keep for such occasions. And Cleaned the truck inside & out, too.
INTJohnny be so damn industrious.

 

[INTJohn]

......and my heavy gauge steel machine shop table I have outside under the awning was getting very rusty so took the wire brush to it and got in tune with my aesthetic side. Got some half empty spray paint cans of various colors from my freinds few miles away (I store The Box at their place over the winter), put some primer on it and had fun. Used the rimfire to create some nice pressure sprays as well.

My Jackson Pollock impression,baybee

Damn, INTJohnny feelin' the vibe..........

 

[INTJohn]

Around 20th of May.
I no longer see the 5 member deer herd anymore. Its down to just one solitary doe. the past week I've seen her on averag once a day. somedays none, others 2 or 3 times. Mid May to  1st week of June is when the does have their fawns but before they download, they stake out a fawning territory; generally around 10 to 15 acres and they chase everything away, especially any other deer.


Evidently this doe has decided this is a good area. It is, too. The Resident area alpha doe has always had fawns in the general area of Kamp Koon. Pik on left taken frum window of the box while I'm havin coffee. Pik on right taken from same window is Mom lying down center pik. Zoom in to see.

Kamp Koon Rocks!
INTJonny Luzsha

 

[INTJohn]

Then as it got warmer near end of May I went out on the kayak some. Put the propeller on it once too and have had some enjoyable times paddling & peddling in some nice places.

Left is a pic of my kayak with the propeller on it. Pix center & right show the kayak "cart" I made for pullin it to a launch. Less than 30$ and about an hour into making it.

My kayak is actually made to be a fishing kayak but I never use it for fishing. I just wanted a kayak that I sat up "on" not "in" and was very stable & comfortable. I've kayaked the Pacific & Atlantic Oceans, Gulf of Mexico, all the Great Lakes xcept Lake Ontario, Salton Sea, Lake of the Ozarks and numerous secondary & smaller water bodies..........
Approaching June, now so I'm almost caught up to date.
INTJohn

 

[INTJohn]

And then in June up to first week of July, jonnie boi was able to hit the beach and back to some BCH BUM livin.

thaz some gorgeously beautiful Lake Michigan scene, yes it is. What a great time to be alive! Enjoying Life at a beautiful beach or in the scenic wilderness at Kamp Koon. 

Man so much of Murahka is just so fukt up right now, hatin themselves, hatin each other, they lives suck as they burnin they own towns & houses; yep they lives jez plain suk; sux 2 b them.......

But its a damn beautiful day for me to be alive at the beach or Kamp Koon:
Damn good nights sleep.
Attitude chek grade is near 100.
Blood Pressure according to my Omron is 118 over 69
Birds are singin
Blue skies hangin over my head & its a great day to b alive.


INTJonny Luzsha baybee alway have alway will .
2 B Cont.

 

[INTJohn]

What is a "Nature lover"? that depends I'm thinkin on what ones definition of "nature" is and which parts of Nature one cares to choose to love vs those aspects of Nature one chooses not to love. Tornados, for example are part of Nature, a Force of Nature, would you as a nature lover love to be taken up to heaven in a whirlwind as The Bible purports what happened to Elijah? Hmmmm?
If such an event did occur I'm thinkin the dude was just to stupid to take cover from a tornado during a thunderstorm........... ( chuckle)

Evidently I'm one of the few people on Earth who thinks humanity is a part & product of Nature and that all that exists is Nature & Natural. That spirits & trancendental worlds that exist independent of human thought & existence; i.e. Heaven, nirvana,etc. are more a product of human invention, an attempt to explain the forces of Nature as well as Human Existence by people & cultures of long ago who had little else to go by in order to understand & make sense of their lives & environment. Some of us know better today.

Human Civilization and it's inventions; cities & towns & megapolis' to me are as much a part of Nature as any flower, waterfall, bird, mountain, desert, fish, animal, nebula or any distant galaxy...........

.........and that does then mean that humanity's inventions are also a part of Earth's Wilderenss tho there are many areas across the globe that remain relatively untouched by Human Civilizations. Many of these segregated areas are so-called human dedicated Natural Areas & Preserves, Parks, Wilderness, etc that Humanity reserves for itself as recreational places for "a vacation" or "escape" of sorts for a dedicated period of time are in fact the places that I have always worked & lived.

They are not "God's Country" to me....... Humanity's cities & towns; human population cultural centers its civilizations - that's "god's country" to me; as just like "God" these cities & towns are of Human Invention.

All being a part & product of our Natural Existence.
INTJohn

 

[INTJohn]

What then, or maybe one should ask Where? Are the origins of Human Civilization? Many like to think it lies in what is now present day Iraq, Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia - these places are often referred to as "The Cradle of Civilization". There are also areas known today in both India and China that some think might be possibilities as well. Even the definition , at least Archeologically, of "Civilization can be much debated tho, It usually includes some general gathering of a distinct population that has become at least somewhat sedentary as well as having become to some degree somewhat agricultural........

........and for obvious reasons occured contiguous with some body of a sustained source of fresh water. The Nile, Tigres & Euphrates rivers immediately come to mind. I'm thinking tho maybe farther back in time for some origin as well as lower in terms of geographical relief. I'm thinking Humanity will likely never find the origins of its first semblances of its civilizations because they occured at a time of the melting of the great glaciers of this last Ice Age. When sea levels were yet some 400 feet or more lower than what they are today. Somewhere out there on that submerged continental shelf now lying 400 feet below today's surface of the sea. Where ancient fresh water glacial rivers flowed into oceans - thats where human cvilization's origins lie. Its mud, wood & stone buildings long ago decayed, shifted & buried beneath vast amounts of sea sediment and glacial till; as well as that 400 feet of water.........

INTJohn

 

[INTJohn]

The first embracing of fire by ancient humans - its ancestors; must have been a frightening thing and a slow introductory learning process; a child trying to gain some confidence thru trial & error and without any guidance. Yet it was this very embracing that enabled Humanity to survive & thrive. One, however, can only imagine the burns & pains, wild fires across grass plains, brush lands, forests & villages torched and deaths that this species had to endure before it had some semblance of a discipline & control born through experience & knowledge. Along with an ability to retain it and pass it on because of an evolutionally developing brain as well as some form of language; no doubt both verbal and gesture perhaps even a rudimentary symbolism, which will never be known to us of today.

Today Humanity has the same fright & the same experience with nuclear fission & fusion as did those ancient ancestors but all power known to us today originates in some form, directly or indirectly as a form of nuclear power. Yes, it might kill us but it can also enable us to not only survive but to thrive........
IntJohn

 

[INTJohn]

I've got to write this down before I forget it. I never know when some shit is going to pop into my head and I need to find some toilet paper to wipe[write?] it on.........

(Side Bar: I sometimes view forum threads like a roll of toilet paper and each post a single perforated sheet - you know they start out clean & white but soon there is krap written all over it. Well we all need to go sometime. But unlike toilet paper, you know that is used once & discarded never to be used again; people return to this krap over & over again. Whats up with that? End side Bar)

Anyway on "Living Cheaply":
The cheapest & most inexpensive and also the most inoffensive way of living is that of The Vagabond who also leads the life of A Thinker; for the things he needs most are exactly those things which everyone else as a part of Culture & Society throw away. Then he is easily pleased and has no expensive pleasures - none at all. His work is not hard at all but very easily simple and his days & nights are not spoiled by his own conscience. He moves about, whenever & where ever, eats, drinks & sleeps in a proporation that makes his mind grow ever calmer, stronger and brighter. He rejoices in his body & life having no reason whatsoever to be afraid of it.

He has no need either of company, really, except once in a great great while and that only to remind himself of the edifying embrace he has with his own solitude: as a substitute for any living person, he has the dead, and even for friends he has for a substitute the very best of Humanity that has ever lived.

Consider whether or not it isn't the opposite desires and habits that make the life of people expensive and consequently much more arduous and eventually completely unsupportable. To be sure the life of The Vagabond as also The Thinker is a life that is truly the most expensive of all because nothing in Life whatsoever is Too Good for Him.

............and for him to deprive himself of the very Best of Life would in this case be the most unendurable deprivation.

INTJohn

 

[rvwandering]

I have deleted a couple of posts. Posts that denigrate any person or group of people for any reason will be deleted.

 

[winterwanderer]

Quite the life travel tale you've recounted...vagabonds truly come in all types, wholly unique, no two are alike except in their noncomformity with prevailing notions. Some given to thinking, some to doing, and yet others to simply being. Unlike you I didn't even think of doing my own thing until 19 years of life had passed in quiet desperation...seven years later, I am finally going all out to free my mind from the bondage of deeply ingrained habit. Yet where to turn, what path to pursue? The thoughtless hedonism of youth I find no more fulfilling than the bovine drudgery of the older generations. Whereas solitude breeds misanthropy toward the masses and glorifies the fiction of self as independent individual. The isolated consciousness of a social species, sinking into a profound delusion of happiness and wellbeing in order to survive. Hence its rejection of Truth, for Truth shatters the carefully constructed facade of our life and reveals what lies beneath, the subterranean foundation of our being.

 

[INTJohn]

Even the best of compliments delivered from on high; when viewed by those at ground level or even worse while wallowing in mud...........
.......... will appear and be interpreted as malice and an insult.

While many might see me as arrogant......... I remain unapologetic for being a strong and healthy animal. Another's inferiority complex is not my problem.
Who lives better than I do?????? I do!
INTJohn

 

[INTJohn]

Today I'm going to write about my being so solitary. Yes its by design and my own personal choice for me to live a very solitary existence; partly due to my extreme introversion but also because I just don't have much respect for most people, in general. Respect is something earned, right? And most just haven’t earned it/ not from me.
Now, keep in my mind that the Human Environment I've spent most of my life in and where I now reside in is the US of A and so my experiences & opinions are based predominately on Murahkan people & “culture.”

Let me get it out there that I'm very outgoing and am far from antisocial and in fact most persons who have had contact with me for any amount of time NEVER guess or suspect that I am in reality such a hardcore introvert. But I am. Shit I can party like a rock star anywhere and be “mr sociable” when I choose to but when the tank is getting near empty its time for me to go hide somewhere and nobody better **** with me. just sayin.

I've been at the point in my life now, for sometime, decades really, that I just don't want anyone around near me, etc whose existence I can't respect and I've just cut them out and that includes practically all of humanity. Friends, family, clients, etc EVERY!1 and it wasn't hard at all. Pretty damn easy for me to be honest. Vehicle life is sooo conducive too as if peeps show up where I’m at that I don’t wanna be around. Start engine, in gear, He GOWN! Bye.
My thought process:
Criteria #1: Does the person live a healthy lifestyle? Since 97% of all Murahkins do NOT! live a healthy lifestyle- don’t fit the clinical definition. Obesity, or very overweight; smoking anything, unhealthy drug usage etc; having proper diet, nutrition & exercize, etc. This single item alone eliminates 97% of Humanity that I maybe would want to have any contact with.

Criteria #2: philosophically (we all have a philosophy) & intellectually; Do these people deny their Natural Existence vs some trancendental belief? I.E have they convinced themselves that they are a part & product of an abstract Human Invention to the point where they believe that this abstract Human invention actually invented Humanity? This too pertains to far & away most of Humanity. Around 85 maybe 90%?

Criteria #3: Are you well educated and do you respect & embrace educational achievement as a way to help advance your personal condition as well as the Human Condition in general, or do you value education only as it relates to a “better job” making money$$? Sold your self to the Almighty $$$$? A monetary Murahkin phillsophy of seeking & using Money, for the sake of Money in order to make Money? I.e a philosophy of Monetary Materialism?

There are several other criteria I can throw up here but these 3 alone pretty much eliminate 99.99% of Murahkans that I care to have anything to do with on a personal level.

So who the **** is left? For me to hang around with?
Yep..........Me, Myself & I. I'm good with it too. I learned a long long time ago of the 7 billion people on this planet; I’m the absolute only one that I gotta live with and I do a damn good job of it too. I’ve built & live a great life!

INTJohn

 

[peteg59]

Interesting life you live INTJohn.

Not many get as philosophical in their life's views on a van living website, so it is entertaining to read the prose of someone with such "deep" thoughts.

In reviewing your thread for the first time today starting at the beginning, based on your recent entry above and all along the way, it doesn't appear you welcome any commentary!
Keep up the good work, and I might be compelled to offer further comment...

 

[bullfrog]

Where I like to live is where everyone has issues. In those remote corners where only “normal” people come for adventure and few can stay any length of time without developing problems. Makes being a hermit easy when everyone else that has to be here is hiding! Lol!!! Van life is a lot that way. Many end up in van life because they have issues but a several of those figure it out and survive even with their issues. A few of those end up like those very few that choose this life and work at it to expand their life experiences and gain a lot of knowledge about themselves and the world around them. Either way it is a crazy trip. Enjoying reading your thoughts.

 

[Morgana]

My criteria are: be reasonably civil most of the time, show a little curiosity occasionally, don't lie, don't hit, and preferably don't have all the same opinions as me, otherwise how am I going to learn anything.

Other than that, I'm flex. Occasionally there's a baby in the bathwater. Might be a baby skunk but hey life is short have fun if you can.

 

[deryk_the_gypsy]

It's true, this is a "fringe" group, and most of the people here are reasonably decent individuals on their own...but sometimes ya get the "fringe of the fringe groups"...I just smile and try to back away when I find them.