A little bit more about everything affecting everything

Currently, I am on vacation. In fact, I have been on vacation for the past week. My older son, age 22, and my wife and I headed out to Utah and Arizona to hike some weird red-colored rocks in some deep and scary canyons (and a couple that were not as deep or scary too) for eight days.

Translated to non-hiker-ese, that means that each day for the past week we have been up early, out the door to the trailhead du jour, and then outside in the bright beautiful southwestern sunshine for many hours a day. Most of my day-to-day bullshit concerns are shoved in a box that is buried many miles underground, guarded by a troll (named Bob), who only says one thing -- "Fuck you" -- to said worries when they ask to come out to play.

In other words, I am really happy. I even am already aware of a looming crisis (OK, "crisis" is extreme.... we will go with "stressor") or two that I will have to deal with upon my return.

I am not worried about those for now.

Let's just go with: I am really happy... full of clean air and sunshine, and a mood so sparkling and generally non-cynical that, if you knew me well, you might ask this guy who looks like me for ID just to be sure it's not someone else.

Interestingly, what I have poured into my gaping maw during this time has included the following items that are most definitely *not* a part of my day-to-day diet:

-- a lot of grainfed beef
-- ice cream almost every day
-- a pint of Strongbow cider almost every day (who knew the Utah state liquor store in Kanab would stock one brand of cider and that it would be my very favorite?)
-- a slice of clearly non-sourdough "sourdough" toast (once) that almost certainly contained gluten
-- peanut butter, often quite a few tablespoons, each day
--breakfast (my most recent bulletproof-coffee morning fast was the day before we flew out here)

And I feel great. If I consumed any of that stuff on a regular basis at home, I would pay for it in zits, moodiness, disrupted sleep, etc. but here, amidst the amazing de-stressed outdoor living, I have been -- with the exception of that slice of toast making me really sluggish and tired for a couple hours -- feeling *better* than usual.

So, paleo is stupid, right?

No.

But, man, if I ever needed even more proof that both "everything affects everything" *and* that the holy triumvirate of sleep, then food, then exercise is only as good as one's stress management, here it is. Again, if I ate this way at home, I would be wrecked. In fact, it would (is going to?) catch up to me here if I kept it up, but isn't it nice to know that when stress is way down and sunshine is way up, you can, to quote Nick Flynn "just disappear... to step off the map and float" every now and again?

Yes, yes it is. For now, I am just going to leave you with the view off the upstairs balcony of the place we rented. Back to the grind soon enough, but for now.... Fuck yeah.




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