great mission statement

I found this to be a great quote which I hold similar views. It's these views that brought me to New Zealand and kick-started my ideas for my motorcycle trip across NZ. This is a mission statement or decree for Scott Toepfer's photo essay book, "It's Better In The Wind".

“It must have been some time in the 1980s, when the archetype of a right of passage changed from following your favorite jam band across the country (with $20 and a spare t-shirt), to a perfectly manicured visit to Europe after college graduation. A trip where you would visit a dozen countries and experience nothing but jet lag and a language barrier.

Such has been the way of things for the majority of the youth on their fast track through life towards their retirement and eventual demise. We have been told stories from our parents: stories of seemingly outlandish and extreme adventure through this country. And all the while we, their children, are being pushed along a track through our youth that discourages any lack in haste at achieving a “gainful” employment.

Well, here we are. In our 20s, staring our 30s, and some choices are to be made. With mountains of debt and a perilous job market, we have come face to face with the end of the fast track to success. It is time to decide what is truly important in life, to focus on quality, and let the creative ingenuity of an educated generation take a right of passage into a future of its own creation.

This project is about just that, call it a “visionary journey.” There is something very visceral to the riding of a motorcycle for long distances. You are naked to the elements, forced to listen only to your own thoughts as the engine becomes white with the background. The road is beneath you and you are one with the world that surrounds you. The elements in your face remove you from your daily comforts, and you become alone within the group. The most important reflections in your life can happen here, and at the end of the day it is the group that will bring us to face the next.

We are setting out across the Western US, to re-imagine the stories of the previous generations, to experience the spaces between here and there, to see what becomes of us on the road, and to photograph the entire process.

No support vehicles, no production crew, no better time than now. Film in the same bag as the blanket. Some of us will change, for better or worse, under the power of our own will.”