Could it be that we are becoming flaccid, febrile, and feckless? Can you feel it?

From a newspaper ad in 1890...

"Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, and safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success."

From near the Canmore Nordic Centre, last Monday

There were 5000 responses to this ad placed by explorer Ernest Shackleton for the first Antarctic expedition. 5000 responses.

Between the very cold weather we experienced in Alberta earlier this week, and the foot of wet snow we returned to here on Vancouver Island, we have not run all week. After reading the above ad, which I had quoted in a paper a few years ago, I began to question our, um, "sense of adventure".

And then there are these words, written by Mark Jenkins in the July, 1999 edition of Outside Magazine:

"Two million years of running naked across the veld, hardwired us for life in the wilderness. Keep humans inside a cage, physical or psychological, and like every other creature on the good earth we become flaccid, febrile, and feckless."

Are we, indeed, spending too much time in "cages"? Indoors? Safe, content, warm, and secure? Tethered to our digital world? Are we losing our connections with the world "outside"? Are we losing our nerve? Are we losing our...selves?

Mark goes on to suggest...

"On the inside, whether you can still feel it or not, your soul is trying to claw its way out."

Can you feel it?

I know I can.

Duncan.