Why would anyone be a whaler? Sailing on the ship, Iron Age.

A rehearsal a few night back, one if the actors asked why anyone would enter the life of the Whaler. He could not comprehend the kind of person who would willingly join on of these crews. Men leaving home for 3-5 years at a time on a ship with few amenities. Why would someone pursue the dangers that populate the journey from the actual whaling to storms and the cold. Why would they forsake their families?
In a beautiful scene mid way through the play, Ahab and Starbuck muse about their families and we feel the potent pull of their children on their lives, or rather the children whose lives in which they are not participants. Of all of the reasons the play gives for Ahab to turn back from his obsessive mission, this is the one that rings in his ears and bends him to reconsider.
There was a great deal of discussion around the question of why people would enter this life. People mentioned poverty and financial need, the horrors of the class system, the desire to live on the edge, a need to run from someone or something. Throughout the discussion everyone seemed to see the act of being a whaler as alien and beyond our modern lives. Someone mentioned reality TV shows like “The Deadliest Catch” as example of this lifestyle today but still those characters seen as distant from our activities.
I think we theatre people, especially the people of the small, regional theaters, are much more in the wheelhouse of the whalers than we would realize.