How Does it Feel?

How does it feel to be following one of my biggest dreams ever? It feels ferociously amazing.

Almost 4 years ago now I moved to Topeka to get away from the same daily drag of life. Living with my parents and mooching off of them and my friends... I just wasn't going anywhere with my life and decided that I needed to get away.

You see, I met a girl on MySpace and she was kinda cute, so we spent hours chatting and hours on the phone and after she came to visit me I decided she was the ticket. Not only was I getting the hell out of there, but there was a cute girl that wanted to date me in Topeka. So I sold off possessions, packed up my Corvair and moved to Topeka.

I only moved here with a few of my things and under 1000 dollars to live on. I had been hired for a job at a Jiffy Lube in Topeka... After my first day, I quit. The manager prided himself on what a "prick" he was (his words, not mine.) and after a hot hot 107 degree day (which is like being in hell for a Northern Minnesotan boy) I knew I couldn't hack it.

A few months later, I still had no job...and I was running out of money. I was eating crackers with jelly and peanut butter as MEALS. But I started reading. About Log building. I'm not even sure how I stumbled upon it as a possible career choice. I was going to the library a lot to use the computers and I must have been looking cabin building up because I missed my home... Minnesota..

I started to get deep. I was reading THICK books about how to do it. I went online and found the "Great Lakes School of Log Building" and I was into it. That is, until I found out it was going to cost me nearly three thousand dollars (it has more impact written out like that, doesn't it?)

So eventually I forgot about it and got a job at Wal-Mart. I still looked at my floor plan drawings from time to time...but essentially I had given up.

a Couple of years went by, and I had all but moved on with my life. I decided I should try to make cars, my hobby, a legitimate career. So I enrolled in school at Washburn Institute of Technology and went through the Collision repair program... iCar certifications, thousands of dollars in Snap-On tools...

But when I graduated (just last month) I just... didn't feel like going into shops. kissing ass to people I don't know to try and get a job I'm really not that crazy about. I just couldn't do it.

I started thinking about my life and had a complete mental breakdown. Complete with utterly stupefied bawling my eyes out like an idiot and everything. I had to think about what I wanted to do with my life yet again...and log building came back into my head. I pulled out my graph paper and looked at my old drawings...then looked up the school again.

I'm buying my chainsaw next week...I should have all the tools and the tuition by the end of summer, and this fall, I will be attending.

Sometimes you just have to follow your dreams no matter how strange they may sound to you or anyone else. Building log homes is HARD WORK. It's a lot of heavy lifting and a lot of intricate techniques that require precise measuring and cutting. You might not think it sounds like a dream job, and for many people it isn't...but I feel strangely drawn to it. It brings me closer to nature and closer to the survivalist human I know I can be. Creation by my hands...not button pushing for the money for some Chinese guy to put some cheap shit together that I don't need anyway and won't help the american people anyway...

So how does it feel? It feels damn good. I feel like just saving money is making progress. I can't wait to meet the other people attending the course. I can't wait to make it a reality. Draw-knifing that first log, Cutting the edge on that first notch...the smell of nature (and bar oil!)

-LP