What is "Life on the Moon"?

We are all a little bit off, abnormal you might say.  That's what makes us unique and interesting.  Or screwed up depending on how you look at it.

Life on the moon really comes down to an abnormality that directs me in unique ways.  I have a deep seeded belief that people were not meant to sit in front of computers, drive cars all day or live in big fancy houses disconnected from the outside world.  We do these things but somewhere inside it goes against something deep in our core.  I don't know of anyone who comes away from a computer feeling the same way they do after a trip to the mountains.  We drive the electronic box because we must, but why?

Well, I'll admit that the box is a necessity.  I think you could only eliminate it entirely in a few rare cases but for the most part we all need to take some part in the electronic world.  So then the question becomes, how often?  This is where I start to diverge.

Our little worlds are driven by a series of choices that direct our time.  It comes down to three very simple steps - I want, I get, I pay.  The problem is that we have great difficulty digesting the real payment before the I get step.  For example; I want a house.  This is a wonderful dream and is beautiful in one's mind.  Then you get the house and it's time to pay.  Paying can make the dream seem very overrated.  The mortgage means being tied to job for a very long time - 40+ hours per week, 48 weeks a year for 30 years.  It's many many hours on the box not to mention endless hours of upkeep projects.  My time has just been reallocated.

What's worse is these choices compound - marriage, mortgage, kids & so on.  It doesn't take long to be locked into the cycle and feel like there is no free time left.

So your thinking, "Hey wait a minute, that's me!"  Or, "That's what I want!"  Well, remember, I'm not normal.  I'm very happy for you if that's what you want and I'm passing no judgement whatsoever.  I may want these things too someday but maybe not in the traditional way.

That brings me to the concept of the Megamoon.  Seven years ago I found myself on the path of marriage, house, kids, etc.  I knew that path would only lead me further from the outdoor places that are so important.  So a few years after our wedding we made the choice to break the normal cycle and hit the reset button.  We decided to step away from the electronic boxes of the world and reconnect with what we believe is fundamental.  Our hope was to regain perspective on what is truly important in life.

The reset button was a spin-off on a honeymoon.  Marriage is a major event and most people celebrate it with a vacation of sorts.  We took the normal 2 week holiday and stretched it out to 6 months in the hopes that that would be enough time to properly get to know one another and discover what life was really about.  Thus the term Megamoon.  

It's now been 7 years since our marriage and 5 since our first Megamoon.  The alignment of cosmic forces has once again prompted these feelings of abnormality and we have made the decision once again to step away from the world of humans and into the wild.

"Life on the Moon" is a collection of stories from our travels.