We Need to Travel

 

 

"We need to travel.  If we don't offer ourselves to the unknown, our senses dull.  Our world becomes small and we lose our sense of wonder.  Our eyes don't lift to the horizon, our ears don't hear the sounds around us.  The edge is off our experience and we pass out days in a routine that is both comfortable and limiting.  We wake up one day and find that we have lost our dreams in order to protect our days.  Don't let yourself become one of these people.  The fear of the unknown and the lure of the comfortable will conspire to keep you from taking the chances the traveler has to take.  But if you take them, you never regret your choice.  To be sure, there will be moments of doubt when you stand alone on an empty road in an icy rain, or when you are ill with fever in a rented bed.  But as the pains of the moment will come, so too will they fall away.  In the end, you will be so much stronger, so much clearer, so much happier, and so much better a person that all the risk and hardship will seem like nothing compared to the knowledge you have gained."  Kent Nerbum

 
I made a decision a few months ago that I wanted to share with you this evening.  I received John's ashes a few weeks after he passed away.  I had to travel to Crescent City, CA to get them.  For a while, he sat in our reading room on top of a book shelf gazing out at the mountains that surrounded our home.  I spent every evening sitting in that reading room with him, sometimes in conversation, sometimes in silence, sometimes simply reading.  I would place my hands on the box before I would head to work everyday and tell John how much I loved him.  I wasn't sure when I would open that box, and how long it would take me to spread him.  Everyday though, my heart felt heavy when leaving him there.  It just didn't seem right and really was not a reflection of how he lived.  "Idle" was not a part of John's vocabulary.
 
I don't know when it hit me, that is, the right thing to do for John.  I believe it was one evening while lying in bed gazing into the dark, restless as usual.  John was a traveler, an explorer, an adventurist.  In his 30 years here on earth, he spent more time adventuring into the mountains and rivers, and discovering beautiful places all over the country than most people do in a life time.  He loved nothing more than going into wilderness areas by foot, boat, bike, or motorcycle when we lived in Oregon and discovering the unknown.  I always admired this about him, his inability to stay idle, his constant need for discovery and adventure.  John was present.  He was in tune. 
 
So when it came to John's ashes, I thought, what better way to honor him than to ensure his adventure continues.  I gave part of John to about 25 of our closest friends and many of our family members.  I asked two things of them when giving each individual John's ashes.  I asked each person to take him to a place that is beautiful and that he loved, or adventure somewhere that he has never been and give him something new and beautiful to see.  Here is just a glimpse at what my husband now sees.

Sawtooth Mountains, Stanley Idaho (Lisa Byers)

 



 John's Creek Bank, Narrows VA (Rusty Wilburn)

 

Bonners Ferry, Idaho (Lisa Byers)

 

Reids Falls, Skagway Alaska, (Anna Johnson)

 

Cloudland Canyon, GA (Joren Dunnavant)

 

Bolt Mountain, Grants Pass, OR (Jared Sandeen)

 

To Yosemite for a backpacking trip, (Matt Brinckman)

 

Meneka Peak, Virginia (Herb Wilburn)

 

 

 

Big Horn Mountains, Wyoming, (Erin Wilburn)

 

Brookings, Oregon Coast (Erin Wilburn)

Smith River, California (Erin Wilburn)

 

This is just the beginning.  John has so many more places he will go.  He is meant to travel.  I am honored to have my family and dear friends that are partaking in releasing John with me, helping me to honor him and the incredible adventurist that he was.