I live in a city. Oakland. It’s probably one of the coolest towns on the planet. And I don’t mean cool like hanging with the hip kids. It’s real. Full of creative folks few of whom think just being in Oakland, or anywhere, makes you anything. Except a city dweller. And that I am.

This city, it boxes me in. I write computer code, it entangles my mind. It’s all good until someone gets hurt. But let’s not dwell on the affect (or effect) of such dwelling. Or of dwelling itself, unless that tangent breaches the imperative. In which case, this all will have become too big for it’s breaches and I’ll get to the subject.

Every morning I go for a walk at sunrise. I told a class full of summer school students this and they all groaned. I’m about to head out now.

The city is quiet at sunrise. The over-civilized population knows it shouldn’t get up now because ‘nothing’ is going on. And I would say to you, that’s exactly why you should get up. But that would be another post.

This post is a morning post, a picture from a Grand Canyon webcam of the National Park Service, and I thank them very much for this view I check out several times a day (it keeps me a little sane).

I’m writing this, dashing it off really, to start blurbing about this off grid thing. Mainly, I’m getting ready to head to the desert in March. Today, just a ‘mornin’ to ya. And you don’t really need to try to get up early. When you go off grid, you’ll see sunrises like this one. But the effect of the sun rising over the natural world is one beyond description, just as most full experiences are.

…in the next few pages of this section, I’m going to talk about the basics. The only things you need to bring on your journey down your path to nature.