Archive for March 2009
Packing Disability
I understand that it doesn’t have to be this hard. I am so close. I just can’t seem to take it to the place that I would call, …finished. I think I am close to being within weight limitations, even though I am not confident I am accurately interpreting the specifics of when the restrictions will be enacted, and to which piece. At one place in our information packet, it points out that the Sherpa will carry two duffel bags plus their own load and we are asked to stay around 30 pounds. Another source describes the plane ride to Lukla having a strict limit of 30 pounds, as well. But here it sounds like 30 pounds total, not just the duffel. My trip comrade, Gary, pointed out that we’ll feel better, when it comes to trying to get that smaller plane off the ground on our way to Lukla, if we haven’t cheated the weight limitations. Point well taken.
The plan during the trekking is for each of us to wear a day-pack that contains anything we think we will want to have during that day… rain gear, sun screen, camera, snack, mole skin, water bottles. I am beginning to picture it as my kitchen junk drawer. If I need anything, I look in the junk drawer. The duffel will be riding ahead of us on the back of a Sherpa or Yak (not sure which, yet), unavailable to us, on the way to that evening’s camp location. It will contain the extra clothes, some cold weather gear for possible use on days at the highest elevations, comfy camp shoes, more reading material (than what is in my ‘junk drawer’), gifts for the schools higher up the trail… that sort of thing.
That seems like a simple delineation of purposes. However, there are a couple of variations that are muddying up my ability to close down the packing phase. Prior to reaching that fine routine of the two separate bags for two different purposes, I have to get all this gear through airports in multiple countries. One of the bags, my duffel, will be checked and thus allowed to contain some of the items forbidden within the passenger compartment. The other one, my day-pack, will be carry-on. The two bags probably won’t take the exact same route to Kathmandu, so I want to be prepared for the possibility of delay in reuniting with my duffel.
I intend to pack a little differently for the first phase of the trip than I will for the actual trekking. These things are such a quandary for a person of concrete, sequential mindset. It’s causing a slight delay in accomplishing the completion of this part of preparation. I WILL take care of this detail before the required hour and I expect to get on with visualizing a series of pleasing, on-time plane rides to kick off the big expedition.
If you are able to supress your snickering over the likelihood of these visualizations, it may improve my odds of success.
In Tribute To…
As much as I’d like to credit myself for having had the inspiration, resources, and abilities to undertake a trek to see Mt. Everest all on my own, credit deserves to be given to those who have helped me to make it happen.
To start, here’s to Jim Klobuchar, who published columns describing his annual bike trips around the state and then kept the trips going long after his retirement. The year I first began riding on his Jaunt-with-Jim bike trips, it was their 20th. This year will be the 35th. Jim also guides international trips through Jim Klobuchar’s Adventures travel club, including, “The Dominion of Everest,” the trek that I am participating in.
It was at the beginning of last year’s bike trip that I had dinner with Ed & Deanna Newman, who had gone on Jim’s Himalayan Trek the year before, and they sparked the first inspiration that this might be the trip for me. On that same bike ride I met Gary Larson. I don’t know that I am yet able to describe how special that is. Turns out, he was having inspirations of taking the trek to see Everest, as well. We now jokingly each boast that it is the other guy’s fault we are involved in this adventure.
Most of all, when I think of being on a mountain, I think of my mom, Elizabeth (Betty) Elliott Hays. She spent time in the mountains of Glacier National Park, Montana, as a lookout on a fire tower with my dad when they were first married. In my mind, just my being in the Himalayan Mountains will be in honor of her. At the time of her death, I was still only contemplating how I would achieve a trip such as this. She has provided me the financial ability to do this during uncertain economic times and I am proud to honor her life by dedicating this trek in memory of her.
I try not to pay too much attention to the fact that this year I am reaching the milestone of my 50th birthday, but my in-laws, Fred & Marie Friswold, have helped me to be sure and notice by gifting me early with additional financial support for this Himalayan Trek. In addition to that, their support goes well beyond this, in many other ways behind the scenes, back so far that I owe them credit for my freedom to have even ridden all those bike trips in the first place.
I also want to thank everyone at Source Engineering & Manufacturing, especially, Gary Engelhart, for their support and for allowing me to be away from the workplace for such an extended time. I’ll try not to make too many more jokes about not being certain whether or not I will come back from Nepal.
Lastly, it is by sad coincidence of timing that I will add Charlotte (Peterson) Enblom to my tribute list due to her recent passing from this Earth. As the mother of my life-long friend, Eric, and matriarch of a fantastic clan of individuals, she will be strong in my thoughts this week and I will bring her with me into the high elevations that naturally bring to mind, planes of existence beyond our reach…
Precious folks, every one. I am blessed to be traveling with their/(your) names on my heart and in my mind.
Departure, just days away now…
How I Process
Here’s a thought about how I process things. It’s probably not that uncommon. I mentally work through items on a list and then get distracted by the basketball game being broadcast and –wait, that wasn’t it… I go through the list of things to pack and identify the items I don’t have to worry about and then focus on the troublesome items. I spend plenty of mental energy on those problem items and then find I’ve gone and forgotten the items that I didn’t have to worry about! They fall right off the radar. Sure, I don’t need to worry about them, but I still need to actually do something about them and completely forgetting is problematic. So now I am working on addressing every detail as I come across it. If I can’t physically pack it right now, it gets noted on the to-do list. Everything else gets bagged and packed. I’m in reach of having this whole packing task at a level I’ll call “being managed” (smirk).
A precious friend reminded me of something I have heard before about how the brain processes what we see. Think about this. The brain receives electrochemical input. The transmissions created by visualizations we imagine, will be the same as the transmissions our brain receives from sight. We believe what we see and therefore it follows that we would believe what we imagine. If we live our life based on what we believe to be true, then those images and messages we’ve got going around in our heads have a lot of potential, don’t they?
My sister reminded me this week of lessons from The Secret (Rhonda Byrne), and how “like attracts like,” so if you want joy, be joyful to receive more joy! That fits with a testimony I heard one day from someone who described the cause for her being happy all the time was because she chose to smile. Smile first, and happiness arrives. I don’t know that I can describe how useless that sounds to a person suffering depression.
What fascinates me about this line of thinking, is how simple and obvious it can be to those who are ready and willing to receive the concepts, yet at the same time how silly and unbelievable it sounds to someone whose mind is not open to such possibility. I am lucky lately to rarely feel a need to fight against things I don’t understand, and generally am able to discount them as not making any sense to me. I have no need to claim that something is not possible, just because it doesn’t make sense to me. In fact, I have come to embrace the mystery. The more I come to know, the more I realize how much there is that I don’t know. I think this is a nice change from the period in which I thought I knew it all.
In my own best interest it behooves me to quit waffling about how I feel. I shall visualize my optimal health and summon the joy this trip promises to offer, to let mysteries I don’t yet understand, do what they do. I’ll be smiling all the while. Feel free to join me.
Trip Contemplations
I packed my first item! I placed the trekking poles into the duffel bag.
I’ve been thinking lately, about how this trip is really a combination of multiple adventures for me. First off, there is the small detail of flying across the Pacific Ocean and the long number of hours in an airplane that entails. Then, navigating airports, keeping track of my property, finding transportation, facing foreign languages, dealing with Customs regulations and culture differences, all pretty much adding up to more adventure than appeals to me. If you know me well, you may recognize that this is even more daunting because I won’t have my wife along, with her magic abilities providing guidance and protection; I chose this trip on my own. Next, I get to deal with Kathmandu, a city of about a million people and a fair amount of pollution and poverty. I intend to rise to the occasion and focus on the highlights offered by this ‘big city’ part of the adventure. Finally, we get to the Twin Otter flight to Lukla and begin our trekking. I’m hoping I’ll have been able to save some of my reserve for the subsequent challenge offered by the high altitude environs. At least the hiking in mountains part particularly suits my desires.
I am already sensing how the support and encouragement from friends and family combine and magnify, which boosts my intuitions about the invisible power of the collective. Being aware of how excited your friends are for you is energizing, but when it expands to include friends of family and friends, it becomes a sensation that transcends. I’m realizing that for the many times I’ll wish that one of you were with me to share the experience, there are a dramatic number of other people who are gleaning their own vicarious joy out of the adventure. That is empowering! Through the ability to publish my words here, you will all be going on this trek with me. I’m glad, and blessed, to have you along.
We aren’t the first ones to make this trip, but we are the ones doing it in April, 2009. The Nepali people providing services have seen a lot of tourists, but they’ve never met me before. There are many adventures awaiting and I look forward to being ‘in the moment’ for each and every one.
I have learned that an 8th trekker has signed on with our group and she is a doctor, adding a medical presence to our ensemble. That’s a comfort. I wonder how many pharmaceutical resources she carries with her when she travels.
“Doc, it hurts when I do this…”
“Don’t do that.”
Of course, my perennial wise crack is, “It only hurts when I breathe.”
Status Report
This new blog venture, Relative Something, is 10 days old now and beginning to become a bit more organized. I’ve yet to master all the settings and customizations available to me, but it is far enough along that I have begun to invite a wide range of people who I hope will appreciate discovering this place to read about the things they hear in passing of my various adventures and stories.
In update to some of the previous posts, I will report that my concern over medication side effects proved to be unnecessary and, in fact, that a fair amount may well have been psychosomatic. However, the cold appears to be the real deal. Maybe I’ll be lucky and build up antibodies right before my trip. And regarding one item I haven’t written about here yet, I continue to seek therapeutic sports massage to break up scar tissue in my calf muscles. It appears to be making gains, and if it weren’t for the pending trek, I would have returned to playing soccer a week or two ago already. Just playin’ it real safe right now.
Departure for the trek in the Himalayas is set for April 2nd. So, I have one weekend left before I go. I’m debating in my mind about the best way to use this last weekend. Part of me really wants to linger long in my bed and power-lounge the time away while I still can, but there is plenty to tend to and time should probably not be wasted in such a way.
Speaking of ‘time’, which appears to be on my mind lately –if you’ve read the previous posts– I am wondering about bringing a watch on the trek. For most of my adult life, I have worn a wrist watch. I’ve found myself re-examining some of my former habits and patterns, ever since my life was tossed into turmoil by a break-in to my car where my briefcase containing pretty much everything that you don’t want stolen, in terms of finance, personal identity, and iPods, was taken and fraudulently used and abused back in January of 2008. One of those patterns that has changed was the wrist watch. First, I practiced going without it during vacation time. Eventually, I quit wearing it altogether. However, I have had a cell phone to rely on if I really need to know the time. I will not be bringing my cell phone on the trek. I’m thinking I may tuck a watch into my pack somewhere, just to have the option.
And since this is a status report, I will take advantage of this venue to report that regarding the aforementioned criminal activity of which I was victim, one of the persons identified as attempting to use a stolen credit card of mine has been arrested, tried, and convicted of that crime, among many other related counts. He is serving time and is technically now working for me as one of the judgments passed was that he needed to pay his victims back from his prison wages. I’m not holding my breath (I can’t afford to be cavalier with my breath at this point) to see any payment; I am a ways down the list of his victims.
Let it Rain
Finally, we are being blessed by the first enchanting rumbles of thunder as spring rotates into place here in my homeland. I can’t wait to find out if we will enjoy any dramatic weather in Nepal in April. I am preparing for anything and everything. If I can muster the mysterious power of mental influence, I will see what I can bring about by dwelling on nothing too serious or uncomfortable. I’ve really been wondering lately about the power of influence of our minds.
Recently, the thought passed through my mind that I did not suffer a cold this winter. I let that thought slip by unspoken, admittedly due to a superstition that saying something–acknowledging it–would lead to, …well, …you know: getting a cold! Why, then, did I suddenly let the words fly when the thought came to me a second time in the car the other night? I had no conscious reason for these thoughts in the first place, nor any explanation for why I ended up saying it out loud.
I woke up Sunday morning with a sore throat that had me feeling just a bit off and by the evening was struggling with a tickle in my throat and stuffiness in my nose that really hassled my attempts to fall asleep. It continued to progress to an overall feeling of cruddiness with stinging eyes that have me just wanting to snuggle under the covers and sleep for days. So, which came first here, the chicken or the egg?
Is it possible that deep within my essence I sensed what was coming, long before my mind became fully aware? My body knew what was happening before my mind did? That would explain why the thoughts seemed so out of context to me. Or is the onset of illness simply a result of me thinking about it and my body following the path I was paving? If the mind can control the body, I’m sure not displaying the necessary discipline to redirect this now. All day I’ve been floundering back and forth with trying to talk myself, right-quick, back to optimal health and then whimpering that I want to just allow myself to feel all the yuck and stay in bed! My poor body seems to be following both messages equally well and it is no wonder I feel so crazy sometimes.
I’m using this as a reminder to be sure to pack as many little medicine cabinet comforts, the ones I rarely-if-ever turn to normally, in order to be prepared for anything that my mind conjures up while wandering around in the Himalayan wonderland of Nepal.
The duality within me truly believes in the power of the mind to influence the processes and functions of the body, while at the same time, doubts that my little mind is enlightened enough to wield such otherworldly power. Just the kind of thing worthy of pondering in long hours of trudging uphill on unpaved foot paths in the thin air of the world’s highest mountains, don’t you think?
Rain, or shine.
Preparation Update
The weekend plan to “test-pack” didn’t come to fruition, however, there were some steps made …literally. Got a couple walks in over the last two days. The second one, on Sunday, was shorter but it included wearing my day-pack and trying out some trekking poles that friends graciously lent me for the trip. The poles will work perfect. We looked online for videos showing take-offs and landings at the Lukla Airport that my trip-mate, Gary, mentioned he had watched. We also looked on Google Earth for the view of the region my trip will be visiting. A lot of people post pictures they’ve taken to that site. I decided that if I don’t get any good pictures of my own, I could just collect equivalent shots posted by others online. The images all look alike. I wonder if I will come up with anything unique in the way it all appears this April. If nothing else, I can employ ample use of the timer option and insert myself in the views. It was interesting to see some shots posted of the airport in the ’70s and ’80s. That did provide reference for how it has changed over time.
I re-read some of the trip information that the outfitter has provided and was reminded, among several noteworthy things, that I would be wise to have in my possession a spare photo of myself for the visa application. Apparently, they may or may not ask for one. Better safe than sorry. I came across details of the trip insurance I bought that included a sheet that has information cards to be cut out and would be ideal candidates for laminating. Yes, I already did all the laminating I thought I needed. Oops.
The sad truth is, as I uncover little details like this that I had forgotten about, and tend to them, instead of making me feel all the more prepared and dampening my ‘preparation anxiety’, it seems to unravel my confidence and cause me to wonder what else I might be overlooking.
What am I neglecting? …In this case, to break the chain of negative thinking! I’m plenty prepared. Mentally, I’m definitly ready to just get on with it.
untitled Writing
I wonder what a molecule of anticipation looks like.
What if it’s so big it doesn’t fit?
As if we could know where that raindrop has already been.
.
.
.
.
There is no reason
for the phrase to turn
beyond the lyrical desperation
of intuitive rhythm and rhyme
as if a blistering double overtime
suddenly is metaphor
for entire lives
while mountains slump
famished weep
muscles flex
and that little bit of crud
still lodged under nail
holds evidence despite
lack of crime
the world watches
flash neon blinks of time
and warnings warn
or grant a glimpse
while knitting knots the yarn
there is moment
and there is moment
sometimes there is even time
having the good sense
to sense the good
comes in handy
let the blessings
gently alight
untitled… originally composed June 2002.
Digging through old random writings turns up bits and pieces of things both remembered and forgotten. Some, like this one, offer glimpses of non-sensical, discordant focus that seems to turn up in my writing time and again. I haven’t put much attention toward reworking past creations like this one, even though, upon revisitting, I don’t particular care for parts of it. This was an off the cuff grasp at something in my head at the time. I won’t say that old random writings don’t stand a chance of being reworked someday, but I don’t currently have the editor driving a motivation to make it happen. If I were writing it today, it would turn out differently…
Relative Something 