The following is in response to a post from The Dirtbag Diaries facebook fan page:
Funny this topic should come up, because this was one of the dominant ruminations on my run yesterday. I began to trace back through my life and try to peg down a day or moment where I could say, “on that day, I truly became a Dirtbag”, although at that time the term wouldn’t have really meant anything to me. As I passed cold, quick running streams and observed the quaint German countryside around me, I continued to evaluate my life from a perceived subjective perspective. Then it slowly occurred to me, that there was no real moment, no defining day or trip that irrevocably changed my life for the Dirtbag. This is because I have always been outdoors. My Dad proudly tells me that my first camping outing when was I was 9 months old. However, a camping outing with my family wasn’t like an orthodox camping outing that might come to most people’s minds. My Dad was (and still is) an enthusiastic living history reenactor. Even to the world of the Dirtbag, this term problem means nothing to most of us. But for me growing up, I learned about using flint to start a fire, how to throw a knife, how to tie knots and what was being asked of me if requested to fetch “some kittlin’”. I did all this in clothing that hadn’t been dawned since the turn of the 19th century and loved every second of it. I built friendships with children whose parents also took them along on these camping rendezvous every summer. We swam in rivers, participated in hatchet throwing competitions and collected local snake specimen.
As I got older, my interest in living history camping waned, as it wasn’t deemed “cool” by my 20th century peers. I got more involved in soccer, girls and “conventional” teenage pastimes, but I would still sneak out to Fort Atkinson near Omaha, NE to visit my Dirtbag roots with my Dad. I enjoyed waking up with the sun and having a simple bowl of oatmeal sweetened with raw sugar and a cup of black Early Grey tea. Sometimes our days would be filled with teaching visitors about the intricate nature of daily solider drills at the peak of the Fort’s usage in 1820 and some days we’d just sit around and enjoy the long summer days. At night, we’d drink beer or gin, play guitar, mandolin, and fiddle and sing until the wee hours of the morning.
When I graduated high school in my hometown of Council Bluffs, IA, I headed straight for the mountains of Wyoming in pursuit of snowboarding, mountain biking and camping. 4 glorious years of dirtbagish lifestyle ensued, filled with days of working at the local ski resort as a snowboard instructor and long nights drinking pitchers of Sierra Nevada or Fat Tire beer with friends that I’ve sadly lost contact with over the years. In the summer, I flirted with climbing at one of the most prominent climbing areas in the region, Veduwoo. Although I never did much more than bouldering and free climbing, it still offered an escape from the drone of studying Monday-Friday.
In spring of 2005, I decided a trip abroad was in order and packed my bags and headed to Bavaria for a year. I willingly hiked trails in the heart of forests that our grandfathers trudged through in order to spurge Europe of fascism. I paddled down streams that snaked through valleys crowned with medieval castles. I met enthusiastic dirtbags from a different culture and loved every minute of it.
I met my wife during this experience and promptly (albeit it bit unexpectedly) set up a family and have spent most of the last 3 years in Germany. The run that I just concluded is part of training for a 13 km trail race in a week and in the beginning of June, I’m doing a 2-day 180 km bike ride through the local national park. As my children grow up, I look forward to giving them the same opportunities I had to enjoy and experience the outdoors. Now as I look around my apartment, the traces of dirtbag are sprinkled throughout a domestic existence. A mountain bike in the corner with a Camelback hanging from the handlebars. A pair of trail running shoes lazily thrown to the side in the hallway. A Macpac backpack that’s been my right arm throughout many outdoor and international excursions, sunglasses with interchangable lens, a few pieces of rope here and there. Of yeah, the dirtbag lifestyle is very much alive in me and doesn’t look to be going anywhere anytime soon. Regardless of the time period, environmental surroundings, and friends along the way, my life has been enriched every step of the way with an active, gritty lifestyle that I wouldn’t trade for every comfort of conventional domestic lifestyle.
It’s admittedly still early in the year, but I can’t help but be a bit discouraged by the last week and a half and the lack of training that I’ve had. As I updated my journal this evening, I realized I haven’t had more than a few serious runs in the last 10 days and that doesn’t bode well for the looming race next weekend. I guess I tried to justify it a bit this week by the amount of time I put in on my bike, but most of those miles where commuting miles and can’t really be considered part of my training. (Although another argument would be “any physically exertion is helpful”) At any rate, in exactly 9 days is my first organized race of the season in Erfurt and I’m quite anxious about how I’ll do. Indeed, this is a training race for me and a benchmark for the rest of the year, but another part of me wants to take it a bit more competitively than I lead on.
