Almost no one talks about the admin work for a wilderness trip where you share what you're doing on the internet and also keep up with work.
My partner and I are currently on a road trip in California, camping out of a van. But this is no weekend road trip. After a month or so it feels like a way of life. We have a mattress, pillows, and blankets in the van so it’s a real bed rather than a camping pad. But sometimes it's tilted.
I am reading Bicycling with Butterflies by Sara Dykman, in which she "butterbikes" 10,201 miles with the monarch butterflies. The author talks about setting up her tent after a long day of bicycling then diving into several hours of answering emails and other admin tasks.
Dykman writes,
“[I had] unstuffed my sleeping bag, donned my headlamp, made a pillow out of spare clothes, piled miscellaneous stuff in its predetermined corners, eaten a haphazard sandwich, and written a quick summary of the day’s ride in my journal. … Then it was time for work.
“Unlike most people on bike tours, I occupied several hours most nights with office work. The blogs, videos, photos, handmade watercolor thank-you cards, route planning, itinerary logistics, and never-ending emails were all necessary to lend my voice to the monarchs’ cause.”
I felt so seen.
Check out Sara Dykman’s work to save the monarch butterfly migration »
Even my partner who is very in tune with me as we camp together, sometimes, doesn't quite understand that I need to keep up with messages and that it takes time to write all these blogs and newsletters. What are you writing on your phone, he wonders. Let me know when you need some time to work on stuff, he asks me, as if there isn't a constant stream. Perhaps that's not a fair description of his intent, which is to be helpful and give me the time needed to work.
It's hard for me to explain, though, exactly what I have to do at what times because I'm just trying to fit it in whenever possible. And, perhaps more critically and unpredictably, when my brain agrees to cooperate with this kind of task. I find it hard to call it in advance, sometimes, even though that would seem like a reasonable ask.
