The desire for sensory stimulation is always lingering within me. A photo of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado really got me thinking today. I am an adventure seeker. I love to expose myself to the world and experience new enthralling activities. I have climbed a fourteen thousand foot mountain, biked around lake superior, traversed a snow-covered peak, and I have fasted for three days while building and sleeping in a shelter in the woods. When I am not venturing through the wilderness or traveling the world, I am thinking about doing so, planning my next trip, wishing that I could be doing so.
Through the many trips that I have been on, I have learned enormous amounts. Each time I go on a trip that pushes my limits, everything else, every other trip starts to look weak in comparison.
My freshman and sophomore years of high school were not great but I adapted to the environment and developed a pattern. I have never really liked school. Junior year I went to a semester boarding school with an emphasis on the environment and the outdoors. Conserve helped me find who I am and I met many others with my same interests and passions. I fell in love with backpacking and exploring. I fell in love with the world in which I live. I fell in love with the people that I met there. Then I had to return to Washburn, the “normal” school that I had gone to previous to Conserve.
The second semester of my Junior year was quite dismal compared to my Conserve experience. Wake up, go to school, learn about the king of England in 1400, sit next to a bunch of dimwitted and boring high school students, run circles on a track, walk home, eat food, do homework, and go to bed. That was my day for half of a year. Nothing had changed at school in Washburn except for myself and the way that I look at things. I was always looking for a way to make things more interesting.
Then summer came. Over the summer I got the chance to travel all around the US and Canada, seeing things that I had never seen before, doing things that I had never done, fulfilling my desire for sensory stimulation. I got to meet up with many of my good friends from Conserve. Over the summer, I expanded on my Conserve base and my life became surreal.
Then the summer ended, and school started. The days have dragged on and that leads to where I am now. Deprived of sensory stimulation. Depressed as I sit here in this prison that they call a school. I sit here and wish that I could be visiting with my closest friends. I dream that I could be setting off with my friend Luke towards Patigonia. I wonder what school would be like if my peers actually cared about the things that I love, the earth, the mountains, the sea, adventure. I think, “why am I stuck in a high school English class learning about ancient authors of foreign lands.” I should be done with such repetitive and miserable schooling. I should be out in the world climbing mountains with my friends. I should be driving down the Pan-American Highway towards Patigonia and the Andes mountains. I am deprived of sensory stimulation.
The second semester of my Junior year was quite dismal compared to my Conserve experience. Wake up, go to school, learn about the king of England in 1400, sit next to a bunch of dimwitted and boring high school students, run circles on a track, walk home, eat food, do homework, and go to bed. That was my day for half of a year. Nothing had changed at school in Washburn except for myself and the way that I look at things. I was always looking for a way to make things more interesting.
Then summer came. Over the summer I got the chance to travel all around the US and Canada, seeing things that I had never seen before, doing things that I had never done, fulfilling my desire for sensory stimulation. I got to meet up with many of my good friends from Conserve. Over the summer, I expanded on my Conserve base and my life became surreal.
Then the summer ended, and school started. The days have dragged on and that leads to where I am now. Deprived of sensory stimulation. Depressed as I sit here in this prison that they call a school. I sit here and wish that I could be visiting with my closest friends. I dream that I could be setting off with my friend Luke towards Patigonia. I wonder what school would be like if my peers actually cared about the things that I love, the earth, the mountains, the sea, adventure. I think, “why am I stuck in a high school English class learning about ancient authors of foreign lands.” I should be done with such repetitive and miserable schooling. I should be out in the world climbing mountains with my friends. I should be driving down the Pan-American Highway towards Patigonia and the Andes mountains. I am deprived of sensory stimulation.