Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da…

I don’t often talk about personal issues here at the blog, but I feel compelled to share a little information about why it has been relatively quiet here for so long. Almost a year ago now, my wife and I separated. That separation will be finalized this year. I don’t want to go into too much detail, though I will say that the cause wasn’t anything heavy like substance abuse, infidelity or anything like that. It essentially came down to us being two very different people who seemed to be on different paths in life. I will say that the thing that probably hurt me most was the breakup of our family, which I thought was very unfair to the Woodsboy and his emotional future, especially since we had always had such a happy and healthy home life. However, when two people don’t share the same general set of moral and ethical values about what is most important in life, eventually there will be problems. Our separation and divorce were very surprising to many people, including our relatives, co-workers etc., many of whom didn’t understand it (and I have to admit I still don’t understand it 100%).

In the grand scheme of things, though, this doesn’t matter. The fact is that life is going to give you what it gives you, whether you want it or not. There will be injuries. There will be job losses. There will be separations. These things are absolutely inevitable. The only thing we have control over is how we respond to the things that happen to us. You can either get angry and upset, which makes things worse, or you can turn the other cheek and transform it into something positive. You could say life had given me a truck-load of lemons last year. Fortunately for me, I like lemonade. 🙂

So life does, and has been, going on. I took a break from bushcraft, camping etc. for a while, instead focusing on my growth and development as a person, spending lots of fantastic quality time with the Woodsboy, forging new friendships and working on projects at the homestead. Speaking of the homestead, the contractor I hired to restore the cabin says the work should be complete by the end of May. This will be a significant development, not only for me, but for the blog as well. Once the structural restoration is complete and I have set up the interior (and get electricity, a water pump etc.), I will actually be able to live and work there for up to a week at a time thanks to the mobile nature of my job. This means instant access to the woods and the ability to work on homestead/gardening/cabin projects anytime I’m there, something that I have never had since starting this blog!

So thank you for being patient! You can expect the frequency of posts to pick up here over the next few weeks and months (starting with a trip report on an overnighter I took late last month). I will finish this post with advice to any of you who may be going through hard times right now: Stand firm. Be resolute. No obstruction, no hindrance, no injury or setback is so severe that you cannot get past it with God’s help. Life may not be the same afterwards, but you will be stronger for having gone through it. Time does heal all wounds, especially when you help it along by having a positive mindset.