Mathias Outdoors

Work

Last night I got a phone call from a good friend of mine

He called me to point fun of me at this video I recently posted about having lunch with my partner and son out in the woods. Lol

His comment was… it sure looked like a lot of “work” I had endured just to have lunch with my family in the bush.

We both has a chuckle over his comment.

First off I’m not writing this post to defend what I did and how much work it took just to have a bit of fun in the bush with my family, but it really made me think. It made me think that no matter what anyone does in life it takes work, and work comes in so many different forms.

(Now don’t get me wrong my friend was absolutely correct in noticing that the video was actually a lot of work and took lots of energy to make it, Infact at the end of the day I was sore, it took 2 days for my arms, & back to feel right again. Lol.

But it’s been pretty apparent that I have added a few extra pounds over the past few months after working so hard to loose weight just a couple years ago, so doing things like this sure beats going to the gym for some much needed exercise lol. Especially during this pandemic where the gyms have been closed much of the time and keeps we away from others as well.

Now, after giving my buddy’s comment some thought, I realized it actually took much more “work” than I originally even thought about myself. You see it wasn’t just the day out in the bush that was the “work” part of the video. I know it was what he was speaking about tho, you see the video was the result of the work I had already done prior to even stepping into the woods. It is being at this stage in my life that allows me to get out in the bush for an afternoon to enjoy with my family.

Yup that’s getting deep now . you see in order to do a video like this, one needs to be able to pay for all the equipment you take out with you for the day. and in order to pay for that equipment, you need to have a job, you probably have to work at that job to be able to pay for all your bills and then save enough after everything with a bit of safety net in the bank to then purchase a few, what I call “toys”. Then, and only then, should one be able to have some fun like I did the other day by having a bit of lunch in the woods with my family.

No this is not always the case and it’s only my opinion anyway.

People also find different things fun, and have a different perspective of what I may consider to be fun, or work for that matter. Fun may look like work to others and vise versa.

So what does “work” look like? Like I said, work has & does come in many forms.

Take a street person for example. These people are typically though of as jobless. Some would say that many of these people are unable to get a job due to all kinds of possible issues they may have, weather it’s mental, or maybe that they have made poor choices in life that do not allow them to get traditional “work like” jobs in our society, but what if we look at them in a different light? What if I said they have maybe the hardest job I could possibly imagine?

Let’s have a look at it. A so called homeless person (whatever term you want to use for these types of people, I’m just trying not to offend anyone with my terminology)

These people sit outdoors every day and pan handle. Or some may try squeegeeing your car window at a traffic light.

If you think panhandling is easy then I would suggest trying it for a day or 2. But try it on the coldest, & hottest days of the year and see if you could do it? I guarantee that this is absolutely considered “WORK” in my opinion and it’s something I know I would never want to do myself and hope I never have to.

I did come very close in my teen years to having no choice, but I lucked out with landing my first job on a fishing vessel the same day I would have been forced into this type of situation in Aberdeen Scotland. Since then In my life, I have worked tirelessly to make sure I will never be in that situation again, and so far I haven’t been, thank god.

Well let’s take a look at other Work related situations that most civilized (as we call it) communities may not consider to be “work”

The vast majority of “jungle tribes” in the world. An estimated 100 or more isolated tribes live in Brazil, but others can be found in Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and northern Paraguay (found this info on the internet)

Now these people don’t have traditional jobs either, where they need to make money in order to trade for goods and services. Yet everyone in those communities “work” extremely hard to make sure the entire community has what they need. I have no experience with this first hand “obviously” in this field, but I know that there would be people designated for each job required to survive in an environment like this.

There would be clothes makers, weapon makers, house/shelter builders, people to take care of and raise the children, and the elderly, people to make the food & hunters & gatherers ect… you get the idea. Well most of these societies have no need for money. And look at what they do for every day life! It is very similar to what I strive to do for fun right here in my own back yard. However obviously there is one major difference. I need money to and choose do it, and they have no money or choice, as it’s a means of survival.

Everyone has their own ideas of what “work” is. But the ironic part of this story is this.

My very good friend, and I’m not poking any fun here, after his comment to me about “it looked like a lot of work to have a bit of lunch in the bush with my family”.

Actually has taken the past several years himself, to acquire a property of his own in the woods in Alberta where he has to drive several hours on weekends just to get to , and then several hours back home again. He and his family spent well let’s just call it 10’s of thousands of $$$$ on acquiring the property, he spent lots more $$$ to get a bunkie/ cabin built, to put on the property, he spends countless hours improving he property each weekend he can when he’s not working, or if he doesn’t have other things going on in his life, and he does this just to be able to bring his wife and daughter to a quiet place in the bush (of their own) where he himself enjoys making fires, and has meals with his family.

Sound Familiar?

Well I’m not gonna lie, I wish I had a place like them and they have done very well indeed to be able to have this to enjoy whenever they get the chance. I’m proud of them to have “worked” so hard to have what they have to be honest. But I guess it all depends on perspective of how much “work” one does or puts in to having fun in the woods. Personally I think my friend has put a lot more “work” into doing what we both do for fun and to have similar experiences with our perspective families.

Here is the video he he made the comment about to me that inspired this write up.