Dddhgg's great escape plan

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So, here I am, 25 years old, and having seen a bit of the world and society, I've decided that I don't like either very much. The world, even this relatively wealthy and developed part of it, isn't a very nice place for someone with decidedly intellectual, countercultural tastes, unusual ways to view the universe and its workings, and who's crippled with both cerebral palsy and (probably) AS. I'm still young, of course, but I've had enough already. So instead of wasting another 50 or 60 years (if this be given me) trying to fit in, I'm already going to work on the end solution.

No, don't worry. I'm not going to commit suicide. Life may be pointless, but death is even more so.

I'm just going to do the great escape trick on society. This is how. (I'm still waiting to win the lottery, but chances are slim, aren't they? Besides, it wouldn't really change anything about my plan, except accelerating it a bit perhaps and making the income part redundant.) I've written this mainly as a note to myself (as to what my goals in life are), but if you care to comment, please do.

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THE GREAT ESCAPE IN NINE STEPS

(1) Finish my university education (with mathematics as a major) between now and one or two years. It's always good to have a fully rounded education, even if only as a backup plan.

(2) Simultaneously write a few novels or textbooks or essay bundles. They needn't be bestsellers, as long as they provide me with a modest stream of passive income (royalties). I'm good at writing, if I take the time to make it work.

(3) Invest my money wisely, in solid stocks and in government bonds mainly. I know my economics and "haute finance", so this shouldn't be too much of a problem.

(4) Maybe get a job as a salaried PhD research fellow (if I'm good enough to get such a job). Otherwise just continue with (2) full-time.

(5) All the while improve myself intellectually, not only regarding maths and physics, but also general knowledge, culture, philosophy etc. Writers need to know lots of stuff in order to write good books.

(6) Take up residence in a less crowded corner of Europe. Ireland would be my first choice, followed by Sweden. But Poland, France, or even Germany would do as well. I generally like cool climates, so Spain, Italy, etc. is not an option.

(7) Try to eek out a living as an independent scholar/writer there. It's going to be hard as hell, I know, but some people seem capable of doing it, so why not I? Also, I'm relatively good at written English and Dutch (if I may say so myself), so I might even take up translation as a profession.

(8 ) Get away from people as much as possible. A completely rural setting would be ideal.

(9) Grow old contently, with a few dogs, cats, and other pieces of livestock as company. And my books of course. And you all.

What do you think? Is this a feasible plan? I don't need to get rich or live in great luxury, Just a roof above my head, where I can store my books, animals and self dry and warm. A tolerable internet connection (television not even necessary). A meal for me and my companions. That's it really.

Thanks for reading!

Last edited by dddhgg on 14 Jan 2010, 6:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Sounds like a plan. Henry David Thoreau style. A little more upscale, but this is Now, that was Then. Best of luck to you.

Have you ever been to a non-Western country?

I was born in one - South Korea. No doubt my life would have been even shittier there than it is here. Mothers don't give up their children for adoption for nothing,

Last edited by dddhgg on 14 Jan 2010, 6:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Thank you! That's very kind of you. Thoreau and a few others with related ideas (like Thomas Merton) have been influencing my thought a lot lately.

I live a bit like this, but as an autodidact and without the PhD.
I do have to live in town in a regional area, but my life is nice, quiet, good.

I love the sound of your plan. I think it sounds just wonderful.
Good luck and I hope you reach your goals and live in peace and joy with yourself and everything around you.

You are an inspiration to me and i am sure, to others.

Not sure if you were there or in a third-world country as an adult...however suffice it to say that perhaps your life would be sh!ttier there, but your perspective of the world may become strikingly different from a visit as an adult.


I suppose so, but I wouldn't hold it against other non-Western countries for something like this.

It's not that I disagree with your great escape plan, it sounds fine to me... but I think that 25 is still young, and there's still plenty out there to see and discover and enjoy. If you're tired, then that's fair enough though.

Thanks! The same to you too!

good luck dddhgg!

Thanks for your reply! The last time I was in South-Korea I was a small child, so perhaps you're right, it would change my view of the world if I went there. But I simply don't see how a third-world country is going to be more accepting of me than this part of the world where not everything is centered on pure survival anymore. I feel like an intruder here, and I would feel even more so in such a country, where I'd just be another wealthy tourist who wouldn't even know how to survive there. (South-Korea isn't third-world anymore, by the way, but life can still be rough there if you're poor.)

I'm not saying, by the way, that Korea is a bad country, or that my biological mother was a bad woman for giving me up. Far from it. She probably did the only right thing available, from my point of view. So I'm very grateful to her, wherever she may be now.

As for seeing the world, I didn't say that I'm not going anywhere anymore. I just don't like concentrations of people so much, so it's perfectly rational, it seems to me, to avoid them. Finally, people like Thoreau and Emerson didn't even have the means to travel abroad much, in the first half of the 19th Century (except for a visit to England perhaps). Were they really so much worse off then we are? I think that all this talk of travel making you a "better" and "more complete and open-minded" person is romantic BS, to be completely honest. Just propaganda, in order to make people put their cash into the pockets of the airway corporations. Airplanes are huge CO2 spitting disasters-with-wings, despite all the talk of "green" air travel, and should only be used for stuff that's really necessary - like transporting mail or people visiting relatives they haven't seen for a long time, for instance. Not just for "fun".

We can live on opposite ends of the Icelandic interior

I would love that!

Well, one possible reason that it's different in a third-world country is that when most people are poor, there frankly isn't so much time for a lot of social BS with people putting on holier-than-thou airs or anything like that. Just more down-to-earth people, the kind of people I'm more comfortable with. Many AS folks find themselves more accepted in foreign countries, because the residents there don't have the same cultural expectations of the foreigner than they do of another native.


Ok, thanks for the clarification! I had gotten the impression that you were ready to plunk down somewhere far away from civilization and just stay there until you died.

The point of travel is simply to see and experience different things. If you or I or anybody else can achieve that without travelling, then more power to that person, but in this day and age it's a lot more difficult to do. You can't really compare the early 19th century to now, because travel was much more of a luxury back then, and the social and cultural landscapes are very different. I mean, when Thoreau and Emerson lived, there was still slavery in the South. They would not have to go as far to see just how gritty and real the world can be. These days, urban poverty in the US doesn't even nearly equate to rural life in a third-world country. Indeed I would have to agree with you: there is an aspect of travel that is romantic BS. But I think that the BS lies more in the misguided thought many affluent travellers have, to visit "exotic" high-class destinations like some finely-manicured beach resort, as though mai tais and luaus gave some semblance of the genuine culture. I personally travel to see the gritty stuff, because it's the real world I'm interested in, not BS. I also travel because I learn best by doing rather than by observing. These things, and the wisdom gained from it, are exceptionally hard to experience without any form of travel. Travel isn't just for fun; it's for education and experience and all the stuff you can't get from reading out of a book or watching TV.

Oh, as a sidenote: according to the TerraPass carbon footprint calculator (www.terrapass.com), on a per-person-per-mile basis, the CO2 emission from a plane is not much different from that from my car seating 4 people. My car is a midsize sedan.

Sound like a great plan. You have my support.

Perhaps, if you say so. Though I can't really escape the impression that a lot of these native people just go with the flow in the hope of gaining financially. I'm not saying that this is always the case, but a lot of foreign people I now often are poor and suspiciously friendly to me. Maybe I'm too skeptical, I don't know.




I agree, you can't really compare 1859 and 2009. I do think, however, that rich people (and I'm going to classify Emerson and Thoreau as rich for simplicity's sake, although they were only middle class) were generally not very sympathetic and open-minded then, as regards the poor and the slaves. Sure, there were enough abolitionists, which included them, but I think this is really more akin to the average American donating a few bucks to charity and, in the case of Emerson, writing a development aid leaflet, rather than the result of first-hand observation of slavery. And besides, they themselves employed underpaid and overworked servants - Emerson did at any rate. Just like any other upper middle class family of the time.

I know that the world is a wicked, horrid place, with war, pestilence, poverty, Anyone who isn't blind and completely ignorant can easily see that. But what's the added value of us, rich westerners, to go and see other people's misery? Every penny spent on travel to such places, isn't it better spent on development aid? I'm sorry, I respect your views, but I'm not much of a traveler and I don't really see the point of it. My grandfather never even left the village where he lived for the last 50 years of his life, and he was as complete a human being as anyone.

I made my great escape and, frankly, don't understand why more people don't do it.

You seem to have the monetary angle worked out, but if I "escaped" at 25 I would need to know that I wouldn't end up penniless at 45 or 50. I recommend that you try to put some money aside before taking the leap, so that you can live relatively worry-free from that point of view. Secondly, chose a location that you find as beautiful/picturesque as possible, and not one where you need to build a wall or fence around yourself in order to have privacy.

Good luck - many people in the agricultural sector do what you are proposing.