Your merchants were the world’s important people.
By your magic spell all the nations were led astray.
– Revelations 18:23 (The Finality of Babylon’s Doom)
The Urban Man This person is at level zero. They love their chains. They will cooperate with technocrats and defend their tyranny as “science and safety for the common good” even if they have to line up daily for a Pfizer-Moderna-Nano-razorblade fusion drip and the permissioned QR code scan of obedience that follows. They will have their nasal cavity probed with all manner of pokers so they can feel a part of the disturbing cult that gives their life meaning. They will happily film themselves barking at others in public whose paper muzzles slip below their noses, using words like “problematic” and “harmful” to justify their performed outrage. Most of their behavior is guided by appearing virtuous to other Urban Mans than actually being virtuous.
They will never hesitate to participate in medical theater and all form of ritualistic absurdities the state demands of them. When the government is cruel to those who exercise autonomy over their bodies by firing them from their jobs, these people celebrate the cruelty as a victory for safety and “public health”. If they could have the government cuddle with them and their teddies at night they would immediately welcome it. They will still be fast asleep when the first oligarchs and western health technocrats are strung up for crimes against humanity. They will scream in horror and disbelief as the first necks are snapped with elegant Steinway piano wire, “O! M! G! Like, what did they do so wrong!?” They do not see the evil in forcefully injecting toxic substances into 5-year-olds so that Pfizer is shielded from liability with legal immunity. These people are perfectly splendid obedient vassals for any tyrant to mobilize. Do not bother with trying to wake them, you are only wasting your breath. Our nightmare is their joy and happiness.
The Mountain Man
You can’t take a holy man away from the top of a mountain, but you sure can scare a scoundrel the hell out of a middle manager’s cubicle. I did not know it at the time but for those six weeks I undertook the difficult and risky journey from Desert Man to Mountain Man.
There is something about trekking to the top of a mountain, no matter the size. The extravagant majestic reward of a 360-degree-view makes it worth every calorie expended. That first exhalation at the top as you tilt your gaze in all directions. The tiny elements in the distance you passed on your way up look like little toy Lego versions. You have already seen them up close, but now you can see their place in the vastness of everything. As you catch your breath you realize this is it, there is nowhere else to go from here, you’ve made it.
To the Urban Man out there, fuck you!
To the Desert Man, the Sea Farer, and those still bouncing from tree to tree inside the maze of the forest, strap on your boots and start climbing the nearest mountain. They are all around you, pick one and go, and do not stop until you reach the top.
You will see the whole picture from here, big and small, near and far. You will see your life, your history, your experiences that shade your perceptions of our tyrannical moment and the darker future it portends. You will see in the distance the Desert Man, the Sea Farers, those on their way up toward infinite clarity to join you from the forest. You will recognize yourself in them and recall finer details of the courageous journey you just made.
You will see through a clear lens of time that permeance is the illusion of every age and every age is blinded by the illusion. That false idols were never on your side, nor prosperous entrepreneurs or pundits who toe the line or leaders you invested time, emotion and capital to endorse, all whom have stabbed a knife so painfully deep inside your back you will need to find every ounce of restraint and forgiveness to temper your anger and wrath and thirst for vengeance.
You will see from up here that there are no free markets, no stable currencies, no guarantee of food on the shelves where you shop tomorrow. You will come to realize that if the last two years can be planned, engineered, and carried out with no consequences and such utter disdain for humanity, there is nothing they won’t do to terrorize or kill innocent people for their ends. You will see there are no sciences uncorrupted, no academics who can’t be bought, no doctors who wouldn’t mechanically suffocate your grandmother after destroying her kidneys for a chance to increase their salary and keep their license. No corporate entity or government agency that wouldn’t lie, cheat, steal, gaslight to keep the truth from you, and you from the truth. You will see that liberty is not an assumption, it cannot be assumed anywhere on earth if not fought for constantly, while its gates can never be unguarded ever again. You will see that if you want any semblance of liberty again you will have to depend only on yourself, and trust none of those you once trusted who have not made it to the mountain top yet, who cannot yet see all that you see with perfect fearless clarity. In this profound realization, you will feel alone, but you must know that you are not.
You will see there is no going back now to an old normal, because there is no old normal to go back to, and there can be no accepting their new normal. We will have to start from scratch, together. Decentralization is the order of the day, but be wary the new bosses of that order who are funded by the old bosses of the tyrannical order. Many occupy the same silicon valley venture capital boardrooms. There will be no place for them in any rebuilding process. Be suspicious the lack of privacy in blockchain and it’s engineered certainty, and its tirelessly loud and obnoxious advocates, all speculators with their eyes on their own digital wallets in cultish beams of laser red.
As paradigms continue to collapse and narratives can no longer be sustained and millions more awaken from their comas to begin their journeys to the mountain tops, there will be much to discuss about how we rebuild our destroyed world, and where we string up those responsible for its destruction, our final vital message and dire warning to anyone who dare again attempt atrocities we once considered unfathomable. Until then we must call out to the wanderers, the misguided, the deceived, the skeptics who have not yet begun their journeys to the mountain tops. Soon they will arrive by the tens of millions and we must prepare for their arrival. When there are enough of us up here to reach a critical mass, from atop a global ash heap of incinerated liberal democracies and all her once noble yet blindly worshipped institutions, then and only then can we begin to rebuild anew. . . .
I’ve always wanted to be a Mountain Man and even committed myself to that end once in my yoot. Now that I am old I live in the low mountains and don’t want to ever leave but I must confess that I also have deep urban tendrils. I imagine though, that at some point in the future if things keep on the trajectory they are that I will revert back to my yootful ideals and indeed strike out for the distant high country to spend the last of my days. I will never kneel or kow or surrender any part of my life, the only life I will ever own. Freedom is a mindset and I drag my earthly shell along for the ride.
DennyDecember 31, 2021, 9:32 AM
“You will see there is no going back now to an old normal, because there is no old normal to go back to, and there can be no accepting their new normal.”
Post Modernism – My Definition
1 Resentment
2 Intellectual and Scientific Arrogance
3 Deceitfulness
4 Technical and Biological witchcraft
5 Lawlessness
DonDecember 31, 2021, 3:42 PM
When the first 5-6 MEN stand up and start killing members of their local authoritarian LEFT, others will rise up.
KarenDecember 31, 2021, 4:48 PM
What does the FBI pay these days? Do they take part timers? I could use some extra income.
I get $5000 for each of 3 posts per month…its a living.
Winnie SCJanuary 1, 2022, 8:28 AM
You’re not nearly as important as you think you are, oh paranoid one.
John FisherDecember 31, 2021, 9:39 AM
Gerald,
Thanks for finding and sharing this. It is clarifying. And Happy New Year to you!
Bear Claw Chris LappDecember 31, 2021, 10:07 AM
My last climb was a flat top in Golden Colorado that separates it from Denver next to the Coors brewery. Wish I could still do that but reading this is just as fulfilling. May God Bless you all the days of you life Gerard. I still have a visit to the marker with your Grandfathers name on it in New York on my bucket list. Pray I get there some day because they have lost it up there currently.
soapweedJanuary 1, 2022, 3:51 PM
Mr Lapp…..I know that flat top, and the adjacent. A whole world apart. Traded that zip for the prairie with tall hills and a creek bottom and a long view . Will never leave. soapweed
KCKDecember 31, 2021, 11:23 AM
I did make a life in the mountains. I ended up as a mountain guide (Mt Rainier and the North Cascades) and I did it legally most of the time. This great article helps what I have to say about the current and upcoming debacle (I loathe the coming year, but will try my best to project optimism because it’s the only way to survive).
Mountaineering is the ultimate crucible. I love that Vince Lombardi quote, and also rely on the axiom told by bouldering climbers: “the ground tells no lies”.
Climbers are fit, sexy, strong, technically super savvy, total assholes personality-wise, independent, well traveled, intelligent. I feel that what I learned in the mountains enhanced the things I’ve learned in other walks of life, including the military. The military is notably stupid when in the mountains, but then again most people are. When I was a lead guide, the young veteran of the green beret climbing program who joined us was incredibly fit, but sub-standard in his technical knowledge. Mountains are a razor’s edge place to walk, and not for the unprepared or the weak. I was never a great climber, but I did rub elbows with many, many great ones. It’s not that big a community; I have a collection of autographs and I won’t name them all but this one I prize: Reinhold Messner.
I have a list of friends who died climbing. I’m just trying to communicate the depth of the experience. Anyway, all of this bloviating to say that if you do gain expertise in mountaineering, you look at other survivalists and shake your head. I know for sure that if the bug-in fails, the mountains are the next and the last phase.
I know I sound like an asshole in this post (as I often do in posts) but I did tell you that climbers are such. When you meet me, I am a little better behaved in person. My apologies.
Kathy LeicesterDecember 31, 2021, 1:44 PM
My Dad was an instructor and guide for BOEALPS, and I inherited his love for the mountains.
I’m trying to escape Western Washington, heading for North Idaho and Free America.
Old climbers are the most humble, wisest, most fun people on the planet. The young climbers are jerkoffs who are eager to kill themselves for pride.
You sound like someone I’d love to meet over a coffee.
Try to be optimistic about next year and the years beyond. American Exceptionalism is lighting a fire in a whole lot of patriots. And we do not deem to lose this fight against the communists.
R roskeDecember 31, 2021, 6:07 PM
Please Kathy, stay in western Washington and make that work. Idaho is barely ok and cannot tolerate more.
KCKDecember 31, 2021, 6:11 PM
I had the pleasure of meeting Dan Davis, of the BoAlps, and he was a noteworthy climber. Yes, we’d have fun at coffee but I insist that most of my stories will contain (climber’s) lies.
I never knew a young climber who was not also an asshole and a dare-devil dumbass. There are very few old climbers. Most fall to their deaths before old age or quit while ahead. Messner was—and is—the god of the mountains.
I came to hate climbing because of glacier travel—watch where you step buddy!—and the fact that I had to place my life in the hands of people I did not know. No thanks. I became a solo extreme backpacker, putting my faith in nothing save my gear, my experience and my God.
It must have worked, for I am still alive.
TimDecember 31, 2021, 5:47 PM
I think assholes are underrated. It’s part of our conditioning to go along and not question. The whole point of the post, and of Good Citizen, is to question everything. Up the Assholes! (We might need a better cheer.)
I’m on board! I think that everyone who has ever known me—and some who did not—has called ma an asshole. It’s my moniker, my calling, and I accept it with great humility.
AnonymousJanuary 1, 2022, 3:59 AM
been sittin here watchin my dog run away for the last 3 days
we’re called pricks up here
My last assent was Mt Mc Laughlin ,just shy of 10.000 summit, for many many years was an annual event. My last time up was a ways back. I hiked/ climbed with an old friend, we left early, got to tree line, I was terribly out of shape from horsing straight up this mountain. I’d shift to white water, not hiking climbing.
Anyway at tree line, Jeff had to squeeze one off. No worries rock spree large enough to hide a bus behind. I’ll never forget I heard a “ POP” an unusual sound, I’d not ever heard before. Jeff says a shit, I think my fake hip just broke!
I said your fake what? He explains he’s got a fake hip, a plastic piece where his hip once was. Ooooo shit, it’s along ways back to the trailhead. Was early enough, Jeff encouraged me to, summit, sign the summit book, I did took I’m guessing 1.5 hours to summit and return.
Now the real works begins, Jeff’s standing, he has a hand held high end radio,@ ham radio, he’s been trying to reach 911, request search and rescue. No dice.
No choice, Jeff’s walking out. This is gonna be a motherfucker getting him down this steep mountain. I take his pack, we find a solid wooden branch, so, jeff could keep the majority of his weight off the hip.
Worked for awhile, but the branch is heavy and bent, not ideal. Then I buddy support him, every step he takes, I can hear the broken stem scratching heavily into his hip. Tough mother fucker, the pain was overwhelming for jeff.
About 1/2 way down I slipped off of a rock landing hard on my tail bone, I’d recently shattered my tail bone being a retard on my white water rafts, trying to “ 1st assent the Klamath river” at flood stage.
I reshattered my tail bone. Now we’re both trashed, a brutal hike out, we made it after many hours. When we got to the trail head, my tail bone hurt really bad but I could move, my concern was jeff.
Jeff made it down the mountain on brutal will power.
I drove, taking him to the local hospital, ER. When he then explained what we just did, the nurse, then the DR, turned white as a sheep. Both said that was stupid why didn’t you call 911, haha.
I was ok, hurt to sit, unbearable, but you do what ya gotta do. Didn’t see Jeffery for a few months, one day, he’s back at work. While I didn’t see it, he had asked for the broken hip parts, no joy, so he provided his camera and had the OR crew take pics of the damaged hip. He described deep deep groove in is actual hip, the hip snapped at the stem, every step jeff took the floating metal stem would move with his leg movement. The pain had to be unimaginable.
I also worked at the Alpine Skills Institute above, Norden, Sugar Bowl Ski Resort, right as the old highway 20,,,,,drops Down to Donner lake, awesome summer drive. I was really a glorified goofer, did set some climb routes, set safety. Back then Petons? were left not recovered, on the way down.
Some of the finest granite rock in the world, glacier sliced in the Pleistocene era.
I did not realize how far gone we were until the wheels just recently started to come off. The new year is going to be interesting.
ghostsniperDecember 31, 2021, 2:49 PM
I learned how to “mountain walk” with the 75th Rander Bn in Bad Tolz, Germany. Use the bones, not the muscles. Takes a bit of practice. I do it automatically when climbing the steep hills around here.
I can emphasize with Dirks Jeff. The pelvis and femur are the biggest bones in the body. I broke both, in 7 places – 1 through the left hip joint, in a parachute fall. The pain is unbearable, that’s why they invented Darvon. 40+ years later it is still excruciating at times. Still, I can’t stay out of the steep forests.
John G CondonDecember 31, 2021, 2:55 PM
Once I stood at the foot of a great high mountain
That I wanted so much to climb
And on top of this mountain was a beautiful fountain
That flows with the water of life
I fell down on my knees at the foot of this mountain
I cried, “O Lord what must I do?
I want to climb this mountain, I want to drink from this fountain
That flows so clear in my view”
Then I heard a sweet voice from the top of this mountain
Saying, “Child put your hand in mine”
I started climbing slowly, “Watch your steps at the edges
And take one step at a time”
I started climbing upward taking one step at a time
The higher I got the harder I climbed
I’m still climbing upward and my journey’s almost ended
I’m nearing the top and you ought to see the view
Oh the water flows freely, there’s enough to make you free
So friend if you’re thirsty climb this mountain with me
~Jack White “Great High Mountain”
Been a while since I’ve been here, Gerard. Glad to see some familiar names here, too.
.
I presume the author is speaking of Mountain Men more as a state of being than actually climbing a mountain. Actual mountain men are dead by 45, mauled by a grizzly or incapacitated by lack of food after a sudden snowfall.
Exactly correct, Archie. The geographic scenarios he is alluding to are states of awareness. The essay has nothing to do with mountain climbing. Urban Man down in the city is oblivious to what’s been planned for humanity… by the Gollums who dwell “philosophically” in the bowels of Earth plotting to steal away the precious for themselves.
Life expectancy since Sumer was about what it is today once a child made it past the one year mark. It was the horrendous infant mortality until the 20th century or so that skewered the statistics. It was not unusual at all for life spans in Rome and Greece, for example, to reach into the 70s. Warfare and famine took their toll as well.
Some occupations—like Mountain Men—had other issues that significantly lowered their average lifespan, although the King of the Mountain Men—and a scout, guide, explorer and other macho shit—Kit Carson made it to 58.
Boat GuyJanuary 2, 2022, 6:10 AM
“state of being” aye. Metaphorically more than actually; the high mountains can be a tough place to live year round and a substantial obstacle to those needing to escape the urban/suburban hive in a hurry. Getting to our refuge requires transiting a significant range. Better to depart a day early than a minute late.
Mountain men went under from all manner of causes, none pleasant, yet they lived free till then -or the beaver hat went out of style.
Metaphorically, I was pleased to find that I and mine are forest/mountain people on the ascent; may God help us continue the journey “upward”.
The higher you climb, the better the view but the fewer the people. Eventually if you go high enough, you will get a magnificent view of “Life, the Universe and Everything”. But will be alone. Except for God.
CDvilleDecember 31, 2021, 4:14 PM
For who is God but the Lord? or who is God but our God?
God who hath girt me with strength; and made my way blameless.
Who hath made my feet like the feet of harts: and who setteth me upon high places.
– Psalm 18
L KlineDecember 31, 2021, 5:20 PM
The shades of night were falling fast, as through an Alpine village passed a youth, who bore ‘mid snow and ice, a banner with a strange device, Excelsior…,God bless us all and guide us upwards, ever onwards. Happy New Years to one and all.
billrlaDecember 31, 2021, 5:42 PM
I was thinking about American Digest last night. I knew there was a reason to check in, today.
TerryDecember 31, 2021, 10:58 PM
Gerard you are the best ! Thank you for this link.
brinsterJanuary 1, 2022, 5:47 AM
Woke up late at 6:30 this A.M. Stayed overnight at the daughter’s/son-in-law’s, enjoying the antics of our grandson.
Made a cup of Folger’s Columbian through the Keurig, added French Vanilla and a pinch of sugar (call me a wimp if you must,I can take it). Went out on the back porch watching the thin traffic roll by on US 23. A couple of 18 wheelers went by, delivering who knows what to wherever.
Then I thought of Brandon playing with his dog on some beach, somewhere, while DeSantis is being raked over the coals for “not governing” during an increase in Kung flu cases, when he’s actually tending to his wife during her chemotherapy. Our “media” at work.
The two sides of America were eloquently illustrated to me by the trucker and DeSantis and a senile plagarist old fool on a beach.
I’m with the trucker and Ron.
PamJanuary 1, 2022, 7:11 AM
A figurative climber I am, birthed by a woman of fortitude with formidable presence but no credentials of education, as if that matters. Born to a brilliant father of sensitive, resolute and intractable belief in the inalienable rights of humans granted by birth. Bequeathed a Scotch-Irish foundation of autonomy and self-reliance, I now take my climb to rural acreage, ceding only real estate here in suburbs to those blinded to what their future here holds for them and their children. This climb will get harder and steeper and will challenge my commitment and strength of will. I look forward to this challenge. Thank you for these words and observations. I will carry these sentiments with me to review in the times of trouble which surely lay ahead.
I am one-quarter Scotch-Irish. It comes out when I need it to come out. As you wrote: autonomy, self-reliance. And I should add—descended from Andrew Jackson as I am—violence if required. That part scares me sometimes.
Right now I’m reading of the Scotch-Irish during the push in Texas toward the Western frontier (1865 – 1875) and their wars with the Comanches. Damn. No quarter was asked. None was given. Damn.
Boat GuyJanuary 2, 2022, 6:15 AM
I commend Jim Webb’s ” Born Fighting” to you, then.
No Irish in the bloodline that we know of but plenty of Scots, Welsh, Norge and other intractable folks our betters “deplore”
The climb from suburbia to wide open spaces is a stiff one but gratifying and satisfying.
Double XXJanuary 1, 2022, 7:56 AM
GVL as usual and brinster for the win. HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
DWEEZIL THE WEASELJanuary 1, 2022, 9:34 AM
At this stage of my life (74) I confine my expeditions to walking and mountain bike riding on fairly level ground, weather permitting. When I have the opportunity to work as a Sub, I point to the “Mountains” and tell the students how and where to climb. Have a safe and healthy 2022, my friends.
I’ve done a wee bit of climbing and nodded politely to Mt. McKinley or Mt. Denali, not sure which name it goes by today, but I found spelunking or diving, free or tanked, more interesting.
Unrelated parenthetical aside; (My savage teenage granddaughter decided yesterday she wants to go to summer camp. Said camp being sailing, scubaing in the Caribbean, pretty much halfway down and around the world from up here. Her parents are both on board with the plan.) Hey I said it wasn’t germane but, in my opinion, bragging on grandkids is acceptable anywhere any time! 😉
I noted in another posting that I’m delighted I’m up here atop the world , no neighbors visible from my place, etc. Ghost pointed out that there are still sweet spots, such as his, in the lower forty eight and, of course that’s true, but from up here they look like their few and far between. I’m glad that folks such as Ghost and Casey found such and other such as Mike and Gerald are close to such.
Good Citizen’s, urban, desert,-mountaintop, good read, excellent read but a cliff hanger.
Will our heroes unite atop the mountain, sweep down with force and fire, sweep away the debris and decay, or with the wicked masters in their urban towers and digital redoubts continue to flood the world, the mountaintops the universe with fiction, filth and trivia drowning each and all excepting they, the chosen ones? Tune in, read the next installment (publication date 1 January 2071) to find out!
I tell you James, sometimes after reading about your life way up there, I get the idea to store everything but my bike and camping stuff, load up the bike and tour the whole freakin USA, taking maybe a year or two. To live in a tent for a year sounds cool, and probably would do me good.
Sounds like fun Mike. It might be the 43 inches of snow in my yard and the -18° F. temperature right now, but coasts and wetlands come to mind; mangrove swamps and the glades in Florida, Okefenokee Swamp on the FL/GA line, Louisiana bayou country, Texas gulf coast…
Yesterday I headed out in 0 degrees for 16 miles on a bicycle. With all my hyper expensive gear I was as warm as toast. The only problem was that my water bottle froze. I should have filled it with vodka.
Real World Address for Donations, Mash Notes and Hate Mail
Gerard Van der Leun
1692 MANGROVE AVE
APT 379
Chico, Ca 95926
Green Pants Interior by Klahn
Who Am I? by Carl Sandburg
My head knocks against the stars.
My feet are on the hilltops.
My finger-tips are in the valleys and shores of universal life.
Down in the sounding foam of primal things I reach my hands and play with pebbles of destiny.
I have been to hell and back many times.
I know all about heaven, for I have talked with God.
I dabble in the blood and guts of the terrible.
I know the passionate seizure of beauty
And the marvelous rebellion of man at all signs reading “Keep Off.”
My name is Truth and I am the most elusive captive in the universe.
Duty, Beauty, Liberty, Country, Honor, Family, Faith — Plus a few simple easy to follow rules for guys
Men saw the stars at the edge of the sea
They thought great thoughts about liberty
Poets wrote down words that did fit
Writers wrote books
Thinkers thought about it
Take it where you find it
Can’t leave it alone
You will find a purpose
To carry it on
Mainly when you find it
Your heart will be strong
About it
Many’s the road I have walked upon
Many’s the hour between dusk and dawn
Many’s the time
Many’s the mile
I see it all now
Through the eyes of a child
Take it where you find it
Can’t leave it alone
You will find a purpose
To carry it on
Mainly when you find it
Your heart will be strong
About it
[Chorus]
Lost dreams and found dreams
In America
In America
In America
Lost dreams and found dreams
In America
In America
In America
And close your eyes
Leave it all for a while
Leave the world
And your worries behind
You will build on whatever is real
And wake up each day
To a new waking dream
Take it where you find it
Can’t leave it alone
You will find a purpose
To carry it on
Mainly when you find it
Your heart will be strong
About it
[Chorus]
Change, change come over
Change come over
Talkin’ about a change
Change, change
Change come over, now
Change, change, change come over
I’m gonna walk down the street
Until I see
My shining light
I’m gonna walk down the street
Until I see
My shining light
I’m gonna walk down the street
Until I see
My shining light
I’m gonna walk down the street
Until I see
My shining light
I see my light
See my light
See my shining light
I see my light
See my light
See my shining light
Excerpt from Everything Is Clear From Up Here – The Good Citizen
Gerard Van der Leun
Comments on this entry are closed.
I’ve always wanted to be a Mountain Man and even committed myself to that end once in my yoot. Now that I am old I live in the low mountains and don’t want to ever leave but I must confess that I also have deep urban tendrils. I imagine though, that at some point in the future if things keep on the trajectory they are that I will revert back to my yootful ideals and indeed strike out for the distant high country to spend the last of my days. I will never kneel or kow or surrender any part of my life, the only life I will ever own. Freedom is a mindset and I drag my earthly shell along for the ride.
“You will see there is no going back now to an old normal, because there is no old normal to go back to, and there can be no accepting their new normal.”
Post Modernism – My Definition
1 Resentment
2 Intellectual and Scientific Arrogance
3 Deceitfulness
4 Technical and Biological witchcraft
5 Lawlessness
When the first 5-6 MEN stand up and start killing members of their local authoritarian LEFT, others will rise up.
What does the FBI pay these days? Do they take part timers? I could use some extra income.
Sometimes they are obvious, yes?
I get $5000 for each of 3 posts per month…its a living.
You’re not nearly as important as you think you are, oh paranoid one.
Gerald,
Thanks for finding and sharing this. It is clarifying. And Happy New Year to you!
My last climb was a flat top in Golden Colorado that separates it from Denver next to the Coors brewery. Wish I could still do that but reading this is just as fulfilling. May God Bless you all the days of you life Gerard. I still have a visit to the marker with your Grandfathers name on it in New York on my bucket list. Pray I get there some day because they have lost it up there currently.
Mr Lapp…..I know that flat top, and the adjacent. A whole world apart. Traded that zip for the prairie with tall hills and a creek bottom and a long view . Will never leave. soapweed
I did make a life in the mountains. I ended up as a mountain guide (Mt Rainier and the North Cascades) and I did it legally most of the time. This great article helps what I have to say about the current and upcoming debacle (I loathe the coming year, but will try my best to project optimism because it’s the only way to survive).
Mountaineering is the ultimate crucible. I love that Vince Lombardi quote, and also rely on the axiom told by bouldering climbers: “the ground tells no lies”.
Climbers are fit, sexy, strong, technically super savvy, total assholes personality-wise, independent, well traveled, intelligent. I feel that what I learned in the mountains enhanced the things I’ve learned in other walks of life, including the military. The military is notably stupid when in the mountains, but then again most people are. When I was a lead guide, the young veteran of the green beret climbing program who joined us was incredibly fit, but sub-standard in his technical knowledge. Mountains are a razor’s edge place to walk, and not for the unprepared or the weak. I was never a great climber, but I did rub elbows with many, many great ones. It’s not that big a community; I have a collection of autographs and I won’t name them all but this one I prize: Reinhold Messner.
I have a list of friends who died climbing. I’m just trying to communicate the depth of the experience. Anyway, all of this bloviating to say that if you do gain expertise in mountaineering, you look at other survivalists and shake your head. I know for sure that if the bug-in fails, the mountains are the next and the last phase.
I know I sound like an asshole in this post (as I often do in posts) but I did tell you that climbers are such. When you meet me, I am a little better behaved in person. My apologies.
My Dad was an instructor and guide for BOEALPS, and I inherited his love for the mountains.
I’m trying to escape Western Washington, heading for North Idaho and Free America.
Old climbers are the most humble, wisest, most fun people on the planet. The young climbers are jerkoffs who are eager to kill themselves for pride.
You sound like someone I’d love to meet over a coffee.
Try to be optimistic about next year and the years beyond. American Exceptionalism is lighting a fire in a whole lot of patriots. And we do not deem to lose this fight against the communists.
Please Kathy, stay in western Washington and make that work. Idaho is barely ok and cannot tolerate more.
I had the pleasure of meeting Dan Davis, of the BoAlps, and he was a noteworthy climber. Yes, we’d have fun at coffee but I insist that most of my stories will contain (climber’s) lies.
I never knew a young climber who was not also an asshole and a dare-devil dumbass. There are very few old climbers. Most fall to their deaths before old age or quit while ahead. Messner was—and is—the god of the mountains.
I came to hate climbing because of glacier travel—watch where you step buddy!—and the fact that I had to place my life in the hands of people I did not know. No thanks. I became a solo extreme backpacker, putting my faith in nothing save my gear, my experience and my God.
It must have worked, for I am still alive.
I think assholes are underrated. It’s part of our conditioning to go along and not question. The whole point of the post, and of Good Citizen, is to question everything. Up the Assholes! (We might need a better cheer.)
UTA!
FJB!
I’m on board! I think that everyone who has ever known me—and some who did not—has called ma an asshole. It’s my moniker, my calling, and I accept it with great humility.
been sittin here watchin my dog run away for the last 3 days
we’re called pricks up here
My last assent was Mt Mc Laughlin ,just shy of 10.000 summit, for many many years was an annual event. My last time up was a ways back. I hiked/ climbed with an old friend, we left early, got to tree line, I was terribly out of shape from horsing straight up this mountain. I’d shift to white water, not hiking climbing.
Anyway at tree line, Jeff had to squeeze one off. No worries rock spree large enough to hide a bus behind. I’ll never forget I heard a “ POP” an unusual sound, I’d not ever heard before. Jeff says a shit, I think my fake hip just broke!
I said your fake what? He explains he’s got a fake hip, a plastic piece where his hip once was. Ooooo shit, it’s along ways back to the trailhead. Was early enough, Jeff encouraged me to, summit, sign the summit book, I did took I’m guessing 1.5 hours to summit and return.
Now the real works begins, Jeff’s standing, he has a hand held high end radio,@ ham radio, he’s been trying to reach 911, request search and rescue. No dice.
No choice, Jeff’s walking out. This is gonna be a motherfucker getting him down this steep mountain. I take his pack, we find a solid wooden branch, so, jeff could keep the majority of his weight off the hip.
Worked for awhile, but the branch is heavy and bent, not ideal. Then I buddy support him, every step he takes, I can hear the broken stem scratching heavily into his hip. Tough mother fucker, the pain was overwhelming for jeff.
About 1/2 way down I slipped off of a rock landing hard on my tail bone, I’d recently shattered my tail bone being a retard on my white water rafts, trying to “ 1st assent the Klamath river” at flood stage.
I reshattered my tail bone. Now we’re both trashed, a brutal hike out, we made it after many hours. When we got to the trail head, my tail bone hurt really bad but I could move, my concern was jeff.
Jeff made it down the mountain on brutal will power.
I drove, taking him to the local hospital, ER. When he then explained what we just did, the nurse, then the DR, turned white as a sheep. Both said that was stupid why didn’t you call 911, haha.
I was ok, hurt to sit, unbearable, but you do what ya gotta do. Didn’t see Jeffery for a few months, one day, he’s back at work. While I didn’t see it, he had asked for the broken hip parts, no joy, so he provided his camera and had the OR crew take pics of the damaged hip. He described deep deep groove in is actual hip, the hip snapped at the stem, every step jeff took the floating metal stem would move with his leg movement. The pain had to be unimaginable.
I also worked at the Alpine Skills Institute above, Norden, Sugar Bowl Ski Resort, right as the old highway 20,,,,,drops Down to Donner lake, awesome summer drive. I was really a glorified goofer, did set some climb routes, set safety. Back then Petons? were left not recovered, on the way down.
Some of the finest granite rock in the world, glacier sliced in the Pleistocene era.
VI
I felt your pain every step of the way. Been there. Done that.
http://mikeaustin.org/wounded_knee.htm
I can’t remember the pain though. A good thing.
Very clarifying.
I did not realize how far gone we were until the wheels just recently started to come off. The new year is going to be interesting.
I learned how to “mountain walk” with the 75th Rander Bn in Bad Tolz, Germany. Use the bones, not the muscles. Takes a bit of practice. I do it automatically when climbing the steep hills around here.
I can emphasize with Dirks Jeff. The pelvis and femur are the biggest bones in the body. I broke both, in 7 places – 1 through the left hip joint, in a parachute fall. The pain is unbearable, that’s why they invented Darvon. 40+ years later it is still excruciating at times. Still, I can’t stay out of the steep forests.
Once I stood at the foot of a great high mountain
That I wanted so much to climb
And on top of this mountain was a beautiful fountain
That flows with the water of life
I fell down on my knees at the foot of this mountain
I cried, “O Lord what must I do?
I want to climb this mountain, I want to drink from this fountain
That flows so clear in my view”
Then I heard a sweet voice from the top of this mountain
Saying, “Child put your hand in mine”
I started climbing slowly, “Watch your steps at the edges
And take one step at a time”
I started climbing upward taking one step at a time
The higher I got the harder I climbed
I’m still climbing upward and my journey’s almost ended
I’m nearing the top and you ought to see the view
Oh the water flows freely, there’s enough to make you free
So friend if you’re thirsty climb this mountain with me
~Jack White “Great High Mountain”
Been a while since I’ve been here, Gerard. Glad to see some familiar names here, too.
.
Glad your here. Hang around awhile.
Thank you, sir.
Lots of memories, here.
I presume the author is speaking of Mountain Men more as a state of being than actually climbing a mountain. Actual mountain men are dead by 45, mauled by a grizzly or incapacitated by lack of food after a sudden snowfall.
Exactly correct, Archie. The geographic scenarios he is alluding to are states of awareness. The essay has nothing to do with mountain climbing. Urban Man down in the city is oblivious to what’s been planned for humanity… by the Gollums who dwell “philosophically” in the bowels of Earth plotting to steal away the precious for themselves.
I was thinking more like 35.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8P8MgsFNZQ
Animals, accidents, disease, starvation, Indians: lots of ways to die along the US frontier in the 1840s. Lots of ways.
Actually the average lifespan from Roman times until last in the modern era, after you & I were born, was 40 years or less.
Mountain men died at what we consider a young age, but so did guttersnipes, miners, factory workers, shop keepers, sailors,……
Life expectancy since Sumer was about what it is today once a child made it past the one year mark. It was the horrendous infant mortality until the 20th century or so that skewered the statistics. It was not unusual at all for life spans in Rome and Greece, for example, to reach into the 70s. Warfare and famine took their toll as well.
Some occupations—like Mountain Men—had other issues that significantly lowered their average lifespan, although the King of the Mountain Men—and a scout, guide, explorer and other macho shit—Kit Carson made it to 58.
“state of being” aye. Metaphorically more than actually; the high mountains can be a tough place to live year round and a substantial obstacle to those needing to escape the urban/suburban hive in a hurry. Getting to our refuge requires transiting a significant range. Better to depart a day early than a minute late.
Mountain men went under from all manner of causes, none pleasant, yet they lived free till then -or the beaver hat went out of style.
Metaphorically, I was pleased to find that I and mine are forest/mountain people on the ascent; may God help us continue the journey “upward”.
The higher you climb, the better the view but the fewer the people. Eventually if you go high enough, you will get a magnificent view of “Life, the Universe and Everything”. But will be alone. Except for God.
For who is God but the Lord? or who is God but our God?
God who hath girt me with strength; and made my way blameless.
Who hath made my feet like the feet of harts: and who setteth me upon high places.
– Psalm 18
The shades of night were falling fast, as through an Alpine village passed a youth, who bore ‘mid snow and ice, a banner with a strange device, Excelsior…,God bless us all and guide us upwards, ever onwards. Happy New Years to one and all.
I was thinking about American Digest last night. I knew there was a reason to check in, today.
Gerard you are the best ! Thank you for this link.
Woke up late at 6:30 this A.M. Stayed overnight at the daughter’s/son-in-law’s, enjoying the antics of our grandson.
Made a cup of Folger’s Columbian through the Keurig, added French Vanilla and a pinch of sugar (call me a wimp if you must,I can take it). Went out on the back porch watching the thin traffic roll by on US 23. A couple of 18 wheelers went by, delivering who knows what to wherever.
Then I thought of Brandon playing with his dog on some beach, somewhere, while DeSantis is being raked over the coals for “not governing” during an increase in Kung flu cases, when he’s actually tending to his wife during her chemotherapy. Our “media” at work.
The two sides of America were eloquently illustrated to me by the trucker and DeSantis and a senile plagarist old fool on a beach.
I’m with the trucker and Ron.
A figurative climber I am, birthed by a woman of fortitude with formidable presence but no credentials of education, as if that matters. Born to a brilliant father of sensitive, resolute and intractable belief in the inalienable rights of humans granted by birth. Bequeathed a Scotch-Irish foundation of autonomy and self-reliance, I now take my climb to rural acreage, ceding only real estate here in suburbs to those blinded to what their future here holds for them and their children. This climb will get harder and steeper and will challenge my commitment and strength of will. I look forward to this challenge. Thank you for these words and observations. I will carry these sentiments with me to review in the times of trouble which surely lay ahead.
I am one-quarter Scotch-Irish. It comes out when I need it to come out. As you wrote: autonomy, self-reliance. And I should add—descended from Andrew Jackson as I am—violence if required. That part scares me sometimes.
Right now I’m reading of the Scotch-Irish during the push in Texas toward the Western frontier (1865 – 1875) and their wars with the Comanches. Damn. No quarter was asked. None was given. Damn.
I commend Jim Webb’s ” Born Fighting” to you, then.
No Irish in the bloodline that we know of but plenty of Scots, Welsh, Norge and other intractable folks our betters “deplore”
Good on yer Pam!
The climb from suburbia to wide open spaces is a stiff one but gratifying and satisfying.
GVL as usual and brinster for the win. HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
At this stage of my life (74) I confine my expeditions to walking and mountain bike riding on fairly level ground, weather permitting. When I have the opportunity to work as a Sub, I point to the “Mountains” and tell the students how and where to climb. Have a safe and healthy 2022, my friends.
I’ve done a wee bit of climbing and nodded politely to Mt. McKinley or Mt. Denali, not sure which name it goes by today, but I found spelunking or diving, free or tanked, more interesting.
Unrelated parenthetical aside; (My savage teenage granddaughter decided yesterday she wants to go to summer camp. Said camp being sailing, scubaing in the Caribbean, pretty much halfway down and around the world from up here. Her parents are both on board with the plan.) Hey I said it wasn’t germane but, in my opinion, bragging on grandkids is acceptable anywhere any time! 😉
I noted in another posting that I’m delighted I’m up here atop the world , no neighbors visible from my place, etc. Ghost pointed out that there are still sweet spots, such as his, in the lower forty eight and, of course that’s true, but from up here they look like their few and far between. I’m glad that folks such as Ghost and Casey found such and other such as Mike and Gerald are close to such.
Good Citizen’s, urban, desert,-mountaintop, good read, excellent read but a cliff hanger.
Will our heroes unite atop the mountain, sweep down with force and fire, sweep away the debris and decay, or with the wicked masters in their urban towers and digital redoubts continue to flood the world, the mountaintops the universe with fiction, filth and trivia drowning each and all excepting they, the chosen ones? Tune in, read the next installment (publication date 1 January 2071) to find out!
I tell you James, sometimes after reading about your life way up there, I get the idea to store everything but my bike and camping stuff, load up the bike and tour the whole freakin USA, taking maybe a year or two. To live in a tent for a year sounds cool, and probably would do me good.
Sounds like fun Mike. It might be the 43 inches of snow in my yard and the -18° F. temperature right now, but coasts and wetlands come to mind; mangrove swamps and the glades in Florida, Okefenokee Swamp on the FL/GA line, Louisiana bayou country, Texas gulf coast…
Yesterday I headed out in 0 degrees for 16 miles on a bicycle. With all my hyper expensive gear I was as warm as toast. The only problem was that my water bottle froze. I should have filled it with vodka.