So I decided to knock around Waterton International Peace Park in Canada, which abuts Glacier NP. So far its been … More

In about 5 days I will take an Amtrak from Chicago to East Glacier National Park and begin my journey … More

what passes for “normal” in 21st century America, is a bit of an anomaly, in the evolutionary scheme of things. Human beings have been around for a million years. During 99% of that time, we lived in small bands, as nomadic hunter gatherers, surrounded by wild nature. Its only been the last 10,000 years, since the dawn of agriculture, which started us all on a trajectory which has resulted in most humans living primarily in cities, punching a clock as wage slaves, surrounded by grids of concrete, steel and electrical wires, relying on domesticated plant and animal bi-products wrapped in plastic for sustenance. (actually this current extreme state of alienation from nature, is arguably less than 100 years, since the Industrial revolution)

Weedy species represent a new ecological trend. A return of the truly wild. Wild creatures don’t do as they are told, and live where they are told to live. I refer to an etymology of the word that predates animal planet: The wild as dangerous, frightening, mysterious, uncontrollable.

I came into this world as a throwback and a cultural bastard child. I had a deep yearning to connect with the other living things around me, yet no indigenous traditions to follow. I may never find an Indian Shaman to mentor me into ancient mysteries. Like a feral cat or an escaped hog, I need to let my instincts and ancestral wisdom come to of themselves as I enter the wild…