backyard climbing. DIY

2008. dion mitchells back yard, my newest climbing partner and long time riding partner and room mate is climbing a tree.literally.
  as always it started innocently enough, we spent the weekend in the pine pass snowboarding at powderking. I was sneaky and packed an extra bag of gear, saturday night in the chalet after a full day of epic powder and digging a snow cave to camp in that night i spring the trap.
 "want to go climbing dee?" is all it takes.
So dion got his first climb that night. On ice. At night. it was good and we went back and bribed alex the groomer operater for a ride to the top of the mountain and went to sleep in our cave. after a couple more beers of course.
  The next day was sunny and bright and we were both sore and a little slow so when we stopped for lunch i suggested we maybe go do dairy queen again in the daylight, dion was game till we got to the bottom of it. then he pinched a small fit!
"you made me climb that?"  "it's terrifying. And tall. And scary...." I got the impression he was impressed.
So i made him do it again, different in the light. At night you climb in a 6 foot bubble, just what your headlamp will reach.
  On the way home with the fear fading we started planning to do lots more. You know they build ice climbs in banff for competions?
  Boom idea is born! We should do that, with temperatures around 40 below for weeks on end it would be easy. It wasn't as easy as that but pretty dam close.the first year we hung pallets from the poplar trees in his back yard and made a very short climb. 20 feet maybe in total if you counted the top section the water never froze to.
  the second year we borrowed 3 tiers of scaffolding from Jarret, and set them up in the center of the backyard surrounded by snow covered bmx ramps and then leaned the shitty old ladder up against the structure on one side. wrapped a bunch of chicken wire the the top and stuffed old pizza boxes behind the wire. Dion for some reason collects pizza boxes, i think he intends to build a gaint out of them one day.
 armed with last years mistakes we laid pvc plumbing round the top edge and drilled holes in the bottom every couple inches. this spread the water evenly and allowed it to chill much faster. Presto! no melty streak for the first 3 feet, an actual wall of ice began to form almost instantly. within hours we could tell it was going to work.
  Getting the volume of water right was crucial and there were mistakes made, too much and it would still melt the top, not enough and the water would freeze in the line. more than several time we would check the ice wall only to discover crunchy hard line froze right back to the window it was run out of.
  One morning while enjoying my coffe i discovered the hose was froze, pulled on my boots and helmet grabbed my axes and started up the wall to untie the line.Our neighbor next door was out in the yard with his dog and didn't see me till i was halfway up, the climb had been up for over a week already but the sight of me in my houserobe and climbing gear was the straw that broke his poor back! Chuckles quickly turned to loud out of control laughter, i kept a straight face and finished my chore and im sure that just fanned the flames of outrageous humor.
  he had seen us ride the ramps with little bikes ride the trampoline with little bikes ride the ramps with little quads and motorcycles, combine the ramps and trampoline. fires and fireworks live music and ramps in the garage during winter months when the snow kept us of the outside ramps and never uttered a word.
Years of carefully concealed guffaws burst thru. I coiled the hose and carried it inside without letting my mask crack. "I think we finally got him Dion!" I said as i pulled my boots and cramps of in the entryway.
He turned and looked at me and cracked too.
 "The hose froze and you went and got it down like that?" not really a question more an accusation. "That calls for a lap on the wall" mock mad that i would do something so obviously needing punishment by being forced to climb. grab a hold in the hallway, traverse past the bathroom into the boulder cave and start doing laps until we fall.
indoors or out the mountains are in our blood.

Step out for a smoke. There’s an old guy outside smoking on the motel porch next door and I ask him if he’s here hunting. it’s a no brainer as he’s head to toe camo and he says “ya, a bit“.

The night air out here in the mountains is a crisp glass of water for the lungs and every diamond star has carved its own perfect hole in the night sky.
I ask him if hes got anything yet and he grins and shakes his, “hell no” with a chuckle “sure been nice though”
That’s a style right there. we laugh and small talk about the grandness of it all for a bit over a smoke and a beer then turn he turns and retires as I finish my butt. “Take care” is all he says as he leaves.

When I climb I climb for the top but ill be dammed if I’m going to let not getting there ruin my day. To try again is sublime. Another kick at a spectacular can that many never even consider to dream of.
It’s the same when I ride, anyone who’s ever walked by a skate park has seen the kid there flipping out and throwing his skate or bike and yelling obscenities because he didn’t land the trick. That’s not me, not ever. Win lose or draw ridings riding just like climbing or making out with a girl. Its all good.

Which brings us to style again. This style in particular. It’s not an easy one to master and its not for everyone, to be able to see thru this moments bullshit and keep a cool head. To appreciate. Truly, the beauty , the lesson, the magic behind every moment. So your down to your last 3 bucks with your head behind a dumpster high as fuck on crack and life sucks. What did you learn? That sucks don’t do it dummy! You just learned a lesson and if your smart you’ll be proud and move on and learn more lessons.

Then, when summit day turns into a tent climbing session you may just learn to make a truly excellent soupy pasta casserole with shredded beef jerky. File that one for later you just learned something new.
Super 8 motel desk girls are a notoriously soft touch if you really need a blanket tonight on the side of the road. But not always so keep that one when you get it.
And for gods sake now that you know you may need a blanket go buy yourself a good sleeping bag as soon as you can afford one. That’s part of the style, a little investment and or preparation go a long way.

Buy a pocket knife, it’s a million tools in one. And when the import beer you bought to impress the girl turns out to not twist off? Learn to pop it with your pocket knife.

Do you know what the big dipper looks like? The two stars that make up the side furthest from the handle point almost directly at the north star about 3 fists away from the top of the dipper. Presto your able to orient at night anywhere in the world.

Sometimes things may really seem to suck. I know I’ve been guilty of it, grumpy bitter mean and spiteful when things aren’t going exactly right. That’s where if you’ve been paying attention you will knuckle yourself on the head and remember the style. Fix what you can, accept what you can’t apologize to whoever you may have pissed off. Move on and learn or be doomed to repeat.

Ask directions. And don’t be shy about it. Even if you don’t think you need them you it cant hurt to check against what you think you know. Plus you just met someone.
Share. Food and drink. Money, your bed your life. No more than you can spare and don’t be shy about saying no. But if you can spare a dime do it. Sometimes it comes back and let me tell you it feels really good when it does. When a dude chases you down in the ferry terminal, gives you a twenty and says “this is for the fiver you gave me 3 years ago. Thanks man.”

Style

Wear it with pride



Learn to cook, everywhere and everything.

Chicks dig it.

another love story

I fell in love once. Or twice....
Ok, you got me. I fall in love at the drop of a hat, and this is a perfect example.
i was hitch hiking south one spring solo. at the time this wasn't really ordinary for me, i had hitch hiked south from dawson the year before with my tattoo apprentice and sawmilling and general all round buddy Andrew Treibel to go climbing in squamish. This year i was on my own, first long distance trip solo on the thumb.
Epic times really!
When me and andy went we got stuck in hundred mile house and caved in, bought bus tickets south and so missed getting out in cache creek to stretch our legs. Not me this time. I got out of a car in cache creek and a tumbleweed tumbled past in the scorching sun. Real lazy like...after coming from snow and ice all winter it kind of blew my mind and i gawked then pointed and said "tumbleweed!" to no one.
 Spences bridge was the next stop and my ride there was a  bald redneck guy who said he only gave me a ride cause i was bald and white. Couldnt be too bad with credentials like that by his reasoning.
He was driving that canyon road fast and cursing slow traffic and we were bullshitting bout who and what we were and from where till i asked if he burnt reefer.
 "Hell ya boy!" was the reply.
So we burnt one and he went polar opposite. slowed to 20 under the speed limit and began to curse and finger the drivers piling up behind us. Pretty damm funny i thought and then we turned of into spences bridge. right onto the bridge actually. and dropped me of o the far side of the river in old town on the main drag there. Pointed south and said the road ran right back to the highway just down there.
Turn, look south. High noon. Or thereabouts, shoulder your pack, rudiculously heavy with camping gear, clothes, rock rack, shoes and rope, water bottle and sundry stuffs.
 Take it in, a sunbaked dirt main street. Wooden side walks. False front stores and goddam tumbleweeds.
Crazy redneck in a blue chev pickup waving and cackling into the distance.
I settle my house on my back and take a couple steps.
Then it happens, a girl steps out of the saloon onto the board walk and turns my way.
Her hands are full with grocery bags and a small child is strapped to her side hanging over a shoulder.She has so may bags in both hands the muscles in her shoulders are clearly visible but she looks solid with the load and ready to travel. there is no denying she's beautiful. A classic look that never gets old. Tall and dark with long dark curls and dark brown eyes. wearing a simple slip of a dress and sandals and groceries and child.
She looks at me, up then down and up again.
Smiles and says "you look like your packing almost as heavy as me. you should come in for a meal."
Right now i should mention that im an idiot.
I had eaten A&W in cache creek just up the road. and filled my canteen. and was determined to push thru to squamish that night.
I told her id just eaten. she said "its hot out maybe you should come in for a drink?"
I told her my canteen was full and thanked her for the hospitality but i had miles to make.
I am an idiot.
It gets worse, as i walk past the swinging double doors to the place i see inside behind the counter, drying a glass her double. Twin sister or or mother or cousin or unrelated doppleganger whichever it may have been i walked past and kept on going.
They were beatiful and friendly and i kick myself every time i think of them.
Idiot
Made squamish that night, got of the bus at the climbers campsite, first campsite full of freaks the mohawk playing gituar jumps up and shouts at me. "hey JOE!! your moms in the site next to us! welcome home!"
Life carries on and that girl stayed with me. i told this story to a friend on an epic journey once and we stopped in spences bridge but the saloon was a cafe now and no girl was in sight so we crossed the bridge and fell in love with the red headed firecracker at the log cabin pub named shale.

shoo that little dutch boy with the finger away from the leak in my minds dyke
see the stream of ideas begin to spray out the hole, eating away at the wall
growing and gaining strenght with each passing moment
feel the winds of change gather at my back
filling sails stretched taut on the mast of my body my spars spread right to the fingertips
grasp the helm firm and point my bow towards the vast unknown
leap into the stream and let it carry me to the sea
run thru the fields and leap cross the ditches
chasing the jackrabbits of inspiration
take a compass bearing on the highest point of the horizon
and gain elevation with every step
till the world spreads its pearls of wisdom across the horizon
to do what with i know not

smart things stupid things and just things people said to me

ive had some pretty smart people say some pretty stupid things to me.
and some dumb motherfuckers say some pretty smart things too.
thats what lifes about i figure, seeing what there is in front of you and never mind the source.
sometimes things get said that bare repeating thats for sure, and im going to try and recall a couple
right now, for you.

morgan jean, the bmx machine. A simple man of simple wants and few words.
still a blonde hair blue eye farmboy of doom on wheels after a full decade of riding together. " want to know the meaning of life?"
"want what you do joey, and do what you want. you'll be fine"
Silence, for hours. he can do that like that.
MJ quit racing when he was 14 because it was getting in the way of his love of riding.
On pain, "Pain is how you can tell your alive." "right now im super alive!"
"Running out of pop joey." Pop is what makes a little bike go up. Running out means time to go for a soda. Put some pop back!
Morgan Jean firmly believes that a beer left untended is a beer unloved and so undeserved. his guideline is ten seconds roughly. he's so good at rescueing these unloved soldiers that his friends all call it morgan jeaning a beer. or mixed drink. or what have you.

Brian Starling. welder and fisherman. good man alround said "It all comes out in the wash"
meaning ill  buy beer today, i'll buy beer tommorow. your turn will come around and even if it doesnt it'll still come out in the wash and we'll still need beer.

J. berg boss cousin and climbing partner. "Roll it up motherfucker!"

Evil wop. pete maggoria. "old age and treachery will overcome youth and vigour every time."
obvious what that one means.
Also, "Too fat to fly-Too windy to pile rocks"  Meaning time to go for a soda. Or beer. Or whiskey.
Also: use this first. then that...and then....only then use those. pointing first at the head, then trigger finger and finally balls. Im pretty sure he meant think your way out before you shoot your way out. And only after those options are exhausted can you fuck it all up.

Boss. Norm Wicketts on fuck-ups at work. "Make it go away"
didn't care how just as long as when the sun came up whatever it is was, wasn't.

Ron Gallagher. Remembered and would tell stories of when norm was a wet behind the ears kid.
He taught me to call in feeling well if it was that nice out. Norman never forgave him for teaching me that before he died. Norman and i and the boys had a rip roaring time at rons wake right down to the fistfight outside with a sponging junkie relative just there to see what he could swipe.
His daughter shelly danced on the table with me and was the spitting image of her father when push came to shove with the unwelcome guest. made me feel right at home giving him the bums rush.
Every time i look sideways at a person and say "mischief?" with a question mark i swear its him getting his favorite word out through me.

Captain Dan from the movie Forest Gump. Lashed to the mast screaming at the storm "Is That All You Got?!?"  Jarrett tries to kick me every time i scream that one into the weather. It has bit us a couple times but its never been enough to wash the deck of us.

and last but not least. i forget who said this but its good
"Be the change you wish to see in the world"

chapter 2

an idea is only so good without action. actually its no good without action. ideas come and ideas go and if you dont act neither will an idea.
  So the cabin at the end of the road began as a pile of leftoer lumber and house parts. We discussed it and ideas were tossed round then out but the action would have to wait till spring. The trip where the idea was born was the last one for the summer and as we left storms and snow and ice descended on our little end of the road paradise.
 J. berg, the jarrett in charge with the piles of wood is a dynamo. one spring day while discussing the possibility of the road being open into the mountains declared he had all the parts piled up and was going to start cutting and labeling them if i felt like comeing by and helping. well holy shit thats a far sight further into it than i had figured, a couple nights of that and we had a car trailer full of parts and a plan just waiting to spring into action.
 When we sprang, it was not a graceful spring. We loaded the car trailer and the death star as full as we dared. 1 full lift of fiberboard sheeting for the roof and walls 2by12 for the floor system 16 inch fabricated wood i beams for the a frame roof sheeting for the floor, doors, windows, nails, glue, all in all we figured about 3000 pounds on that trip alone and no room for shingles.

 

goat

there is a faint tap in my head, a trip, trip, tripping of dainty cloven hooves echoeing one level above my conscious brain. the further west i get, the deeper into this trip the clearer he seems to ring.
 he comes and he goes, was gone for a while and like a goat sometimes wasnt welcome when he was here.
i imagine him roaming steel decks and void tank spaces in the barges and ferries where he was born bleating quitely just to here his goaty voice echo.
 The goat came to be suddenly, yanked from thin air into existance with one sentence. not even a sentence, an expletive. "Hey goat boy!" from across the shop floor a couple years into my shipbuilding career.
 I had done some steel work proven myself among the old men with scars and mustaches and dinge and stories. a few of them took real liking to me and amongst them my first friend and coworker in this tribe of shipbuilders was Brian Starling. he introduced me as the kid. "Hey this is the kid i been telling you about!" 
He wasn't around when Brent johnstone called me goat boy on my second morning as an aluminum fabricator for the provinces flop of a fast catamaran project. but enough people where there that it made it back to him. Hes still pissed 15 years later that he didn't get to nick name me. but he didn't. brent did. and would live to regret it almost instantly.
 I've never been really good at the snappy comeback thing and always kinda shy but it was obvious he was fishing and i had to say something or forever be trod upon. still it was a suprise to me even when i piped up with a question.
"Are you calling me goat boy because you know i'm from saltspring and your too chickenshit to call me a sheep fucker?" just 22 and not stupid, jaw drops and stuttering begins. Goat boy is born.
  It stuck like glue. i was goat boy for years, then the boy got dropped. bosses would introduce new guys to old guys they would be working with. you are with brian starling, you, pete maggoria. you go work with steve sharp. and you can get in the manbasket with the goat!
startled sideways looks, questioning voices. "umm....the goat?" which is where i would be expected to go baaahhhhh...
 Poor brent, he was a prick to everyone and he tried with me but i had him from then on. I really did feel sorry for him from time to time because he obviously never met goats before. I know goats.
 We had milk goats when i was a boy on saltspring. They are good people for the most part and pretty much anything they do to convince people otherwise is just in the nature of the beast.
 goats will survive on anything but they seem to actually relish the stuff others wouldnt know how to approach. roses. goats love to eat roses, and thistles! but roses never seem to get grown for food. so when the goat eats every last rose bush down to the mean spiky stem in the dirt someones gonna be mad.
 goats like to see around them and can climb very well, hooves on car roofs are never appreciated...
likewise eating clothes of the line, which brings us to another goaty point. getting mad at a goat is fine. if you like being mad. kicking a goat is a sure way to break your foot.
 So i lived a goaty existance it wasn't hard. the shipyards are a great spot for a goat. we worked hard and we played hard and sometimes the two would overlap to the point where living and working where the same and playing was something you did at both.
 The night i got my horns was like that.

steep as hell

We tiptoe in the shadows of giants


Steel claws bite the snows crust

Skirting headwall after headwall

On ever steeper slopes

The sun beating down and reflecting, searing flesh on the bone

...Snow blinding fear seeping through

Our armour of experience feels pitifully thin up here

Standing tall on front points, pretending everything is alright

With the glacial wall standing taller

Right in our faces, close enough to kiss

If the giant should cough

Shrug his cape of snow off in response to the suns caresses

These fleas who are we would disappear

Like a waking dream

In this steep as hell world


We face our dreams

And make love to our fears

sitting in a motel room with the ghost of tom waits
sunset outside thru the window and deepening fall colours
remembering the flavours of montreal next to this erie canal
flavours and aromas and textures and long shivering kisses
trucks lit up like christmas rumble past as my fish and chip dinner settles
another layer of my self peels back
landing softly on cat like feet and slinking into the night
and i decide i like whats been exposed
its got a whiskey and smoke flavour
a real patina, the blues practically seep from this place

ride your heart out

rode my heart out today


morgan jean the bmx machine

spiderbike and heatbag

my pal bateman was there

in the wall wall two feet below coping

...where his pappy laid his ashes

i kissed it with tires

and my body once or twice

josh was there too

little bikers in the sky

i live to love

and love to ride

i lived today

a little biker in the sky

when the dying day comes
i hope i go where i hoped all those before me went
not heaven with its sheets and white perfection
nor hell as much as the hedonists hope
more a valhalla for all
the riders who rode before me will have built ramps
gallager will be sipping whiskey from a fruit jar
and smirking
the giants will be stirring a mad winter storm
out one end of the great hall of the gods
tearing the sky and coating the land
with ice and snow
while out the other men race and climb in summer sun
just to feel the sting and sweat
women dance to music made by the ones we lost
and all manner of feast is heavy on the vine
this is where i hope to go when i die
and i hope you go to
so i can see you
on the other side

chaos in my mind like the colours of alpine glades in the spring
read to some people this weekend, another fear beat down
i can sit on a knife edge with thousands of feet under me and roll it up, burn it down, no sweat
put me on the spot i stutter and my face gets red
the things i fear make no sense
yet i face them and even when they do hurt me its not so bad
every hurt is a lesson learnt
every fear faced
opens a door

climbers prayer

oh lord


deliver us this dayfrom the mudane

protect me from rockfall

and my partner from manky gear

annointeth my clothes with woodsmoke

and my food with pine needles

i'll bend my neck to pray

not down but up

to the summits where you play

summertime

shin cracks n road rash


headwounds and heat stroke

drink drank drunk as fuck

hungover and getting stuck

loving life and healing fast

time to go and go again

this year is almost gone
it will pass and the next year shall too
same as all the years before and after
nothing really shall change
the sun rises and sets
you are still you and i am still me
times will be tough
things may seem wrong
from time to time
but as sure as the suns rising and setting
these years
were not wasted

a tornado of souls and ideals
i am a hurricane made entirely of trailers
nowhere to turn this maddening power but inward
tearing down just to rebuild and toss skyward again
the tides themselves couldn`t match this cycle
to attempt control evokes complete futility
watching as an outsider dispair swirls like mist
from the center i find peace
loose the reins and let the beast buck
gone on the wind
in my surrender i find the change

home on the range

I'm a cowboy and a pirate
I've been a drifter and a bum
A vagrant, a gypsy rose
I've got a million miles to make
And a heart so big
My chest might break
All roads lead to rome
Or so they say
Where this cowboy lays his head
Is home
My ship set sail a long time ago
I won't weigh anchor
Till i take my very last breath
I'm a biker like Jesus
A carpenter and a shipbuilder
Who will make this whole world
Home

my first adventure.

when i was very young my parents took my brother and me on a cross canada trip to visit friends back east. Hitchhiking. my memories of the trip are vague and not all wonderfull but it was for sure one of the bigest influences on the rest of my life.
 when we left from victoria i was 6 and chris was 4. we took a passenger train through the rockies to start. mountains and streams and wild colors, blue sky and the brightest greens with fields of yellow flowers and the clacking of wheels over the joints in the rails. i think it was 2 days travel that way and we were given booklets with information that never made it into our minds and these heavy paper cutout train models that did stay, in my mind anyways.
  In calgary we visited my dads brother uncle bob, he's a sculptor and gituarist whos been compared to eric clapton which meant nothing at the time. Uncle bob built a lot of the scenery at drumhellers dinosuar museum which did mean something, we got to see dinosaurs! years later my buddy cameron got his head stuck in the t-rex's mouth there and sent me a picture.
 Our next stop was edmonton to see grandma quin. I had my birthday there and bit a coin she wrapped in wax paper and baked in the cake, it was an old person suprise for kids kind of thing i think.
Dad caught the mumps there and got very sick so we stayed a couple days. i remember seeing my first lightning storm but mostly it was just very hot.
  from there we set out on thumb, sometimes walking if we got let of in a bad spot but mostly standing on shoulders of roads with our little thumbs held high. people were very nice to us and although it took us over a week to get to ontario but we never had to spend a night outdoors either we drove through the night or people would take us home with them. We caught one ride with a greyhound driver in an empty bus, he took us in and in the morning his wife made us sandwiches for the road. also dad brought his tattoo gear so quite often we he would work on the people who picked us up and make money for the road that way.
  In ontario at the time beer cans didnt have a tab just a blister with a line scored into  the aluminum you pushed into the can. it was a new thing and dad liked beer so we learned to open these novel new beers for him He left us on the side of the road with mom while he went to a nearby beer store and we got a ride just as he got back once. just as they pulled over christopher managed to grab one of his beer that had just jogged across a parking lot in the blazing sun and open it! look dad im being helpful! SPLOOSH!! beer foam all over everyone!
 Hi there my kids are helpfull, how far are you going?
mostly we met good people but there was a black van on the praries somewhere that pulled over a couple hundred yards further up the road then drove away when we ran up, also the blackflies at one campsite ate me and chris so bad we were streaming blood from our scalps. their bites didnt hurt but it sure upset mom.
 In ontario we saw shad flies hatch and blot out the sun with their numbers. such a simple bug they have no mouths and there entire cycle takes only a few days. the highway was slick with thier bodies.
 We visited dads good friend robert in ottowa he's a jeweler now but him and dad worked construction and ate acid as kids. rob and his wife peggy took us to the parliment buildings for canada day and we saw the biggest fireworks show ive ever seen. EVER! the concussions took my breath away sometimes and kept coming so fast it was like a strobe light with thunder.
 they also took us to a museum with lots of airplanes and science stuff. i dont know if it was actually the space capsule or just a replica but i got to sit in it and it was small even to me at the time.
 We saw fireflys, and partied with the big people then left for montreal. i dont remember who we saw there but i do remember that people there were very friendly and the sounds of partieing carried on well into the night. my parents commented that there was no broken glass in the morning, something that sticks out and makes me want to go back even today. I had my first criossant fresh from a bakery in the morning there too. Amazing!
 On the way home we bought a pup tent and i remember the 4 of us crammed into it trying to sleep through an intense ontario lightning storm. that was very scary and our stuff was damp for the rest of the next day.
 We made it back to edmonton in time for chris's 5 birthday and again grandma quin got me with the waxed paper wrapped coin trick.
 really the hardest part of the whole trip was being told not to tell tall tales in class when we had to explain what we did that summer back at school. me and chris both got sent to the office over this story. 

the pain of razor sharp bone shards hiding under the skin of my leg is a welcome relief from the snakes inside my head. striking wildly at my emotions and ideals the past present and future fangs sink deep with every bite.
 The past, drugs i once used in quantitys that should kill people. That i prayed would kill me and then resented for not, detested for their weakness, thier inability to perform such a simple task.
The present. this shallow work eat shit and sleep existance so far removed from the wild carefree wanderings of my past stings my convictions. my belief that i am capable of greatness seems so distant and remote from here.
the future. a question mark of fear in a vast darkness shining but not beautiful as i once believed it would be. the part of me i killed in the past that i never noticed die a little with every breath of poison.
dare i dip a pen in the venom now. these are not words of greatness and hope, the words i once aspired to write. no these are a mean spitefull lash to intended to hurt, not pretty but true nonetheless.
tired i put this hurt to bed once again.

Daisy Duke

Daisy's first ice climb.

Adventure all the way.
 I bought a jeep in the winter of 2009, been without a licence for 9 years and finally knuckled down and dealt with that. It didn't take long to want a vehicle to go with the shiny new licence and i'm not fussy so when this yellow 1990 jeep YJ came along i grabbed it. 1200 bucks. It fired up right away at 20- and then tried to kill me on the way home first drive. front caliper seized with rust and caused nast skidding on the ice and snow plus it really wanted to be stuck all the time. Luckily parts turned out to be cheap! 35 bucks a piece for new calipers 20 for the rear wheel cylinders and a 80 dollar master cylinder put new brakes under the daisy duke.
She had her name before i even saw her, my buddy james said tim doonans got a jeep for sale but its yellow, i said "daisy!" and it stuck.
  I dunno bout anyone else but i liked the dukes of hazzard when i was a kid, and daisy's truck was a jeep YJ a couple years older mind you but still...close enough allready.
  Some othe minor parts ( carbetooter, studded tires, jack, shovel and rope) and i was getting antsy to go do something with my new ride, dion had new axes, the weather was right, its a go! worked on her all week and the weather held. minus 15 to 20, no snow. building good solid ice for sure.
   saturday morning pick deedee up grab coffee and roll out of town in bright sunshine and a perfect -10 calm. made it 15 k out of town just across the bridge at the kiskatinaw river when flapping from the ragtop started to get worse. a roll of tucktape across the front above the window seemed to seal it up pretty good and as we went dion used more inside the vehicle to seal it up better. we knew the deal when we left both of us had our snowgear on like as if we were allready out sledding or boarding so with the heater and no major leaks it was actually quite comfortable inside. the thought of adventure lights dion up like a beacon. his teeth are only eclipsed by his gums when the adventure actually begins and this was no exception. the tucktape whisling in the wind every corner of the road out into the pass holds another story. remember that time? i could ask that all day long and never get the same answer.
   that time we had the snow cave at the top of powder king? no not that time. my first ice climb? the one where you left your crampons behind? no not that time. we are rolling past the base of mount lemoray at the CRS   (can't remove snow)  highway maintainance yard. just past it hidden in a ravine is an ice climb, a steep set of falls just off the road about 4 hundred yards. SNOW ANGELS!!  he finally guesses correctly, we had climbed it once together and it ended up beeing a bit taller than 30 metres. when we tried to get off it on a single rope, rappelling side by each down the wall we came to the ends of our ropes and were still 15 to 20 feet of the snowslope at the base of the icefall! well we had been tossing the idea for snow angels from altitude around for a bit anyways.
  stand flat on the wall parallel  to flat ground and take a couple steps sideways to put some room between us, arms out axes in hand still braking with the right but axe ready nonetheless. A glance, a nod. GO! let go step back into space, right arm out axe up. WHUMP!  WHUMP! twin splats in the waist deep snow.perfect snow angels in perfect snow for the job and a big laugh everytime it comes up in conversation. laughed all the way back to the truck as i recall, and our sides hurt the next day.
  traffic is decent and only a little bit of construction in the pass, roads are dry right untill the construction. When i got her the wipers didnt work and niether did the washers without both in the winter you are fucked if it snows at all. i had ripped the motor out to expose the problem of motor running but not working. missing bolts from rattling away for the last 20 years. reef that linkage bar out of the dash and bend it over and i had a wiper system but the washers were still not working. as we got out of the construction at the top of the pass a semi splatted my windshield with mud and the wipers didnt clear it but spread it so it froze instantly. windows down heads out the side "can i pull over more?"dion saying how much room i have in feet then inches as i slow us down to clean the window and our shorts. a couple raised eyebrow looks back and forth luckily we are just about there anyways.
  we havent actually ever been into this climb before so we decide to go ask a local, in this case whoever is working at the azuzetta lake lodge down the road from the powder king ski area. as  we walk into the the store a picture of someone climbing ice and various large mountain photos greet us on the front wall inside. the cashier is tall bearded with long hair and a lot of sun on his face we ask and he tells us not only directions to the bottom clearly but also that the pictures are his and the ice climb picture is of him leading that climb we are looking for. he writes directions on a napkin and sends us on our way with red bull and chocolate bars.
   That went well!back to where we had to pull over to clean the window, its right where we wanted to be. pull up onto the snowbank on the side of the road turn the daisy off and start gearing up. suddenly serious.
   Boots and snowshoes, harness and cramps and ropes and icescrews all in our packs, axes hung within reach. over the snowbank we go with adventure so close we can taste it. closer actually than either of us suspect. the snow is an inch of light fluffy on top of a 3 inch crust and then several feet deep under that. the first part of our approach is down into a valley a couple hundred yards. not super steep but steep enough to worry us with the crust. we discuss removing our snow shoes but instead opt for getting our axes handy so if we get out of control we can self arrest with them. important mountain skill that it is neither of us have practiced so this seems like a good time. as i step onto the slope all hell breaks loose and the adventure is underway.
 my feet come out from under me and nothing i do will make the snowshoes dig in. i grab my axe with one hand over the head and roll onto it pick down in textbook self arrest position. and watch in horror as it cuts a perfect 5 inch deep gash in the ice crust for 20 feet before i give up on that plan. to make matters even better dion is hurtling along 10 feet behind me at the same ever increasing speed. my only hope is a small willow tree in the last third of the slope just before a good sized droppoff into a couple of good sized poplar. bum skiing is and art form and i put everything i have into aiming for that tree and just manage to get an arm around it. it whips me sideways into the air and around the trunk to the low side just in time for dion to smash into the poor thing. Holy shit! that happened fast! the droppoff is only about 10 feet but the trees at the base would have wrecked us pretty badly. snowshoes are not your friend on steep stuff. lesson learned. also self arrest doesnt work unless its on real ice. nother lesson learned. what else will we learn the hard way today?
 a moment taken to shake the fear of after negotiating the last  15-20 feet of slope and away we go guessing wildly as we have left our napkin with the beta, the down low, the treasure map with an x marking the spot , in daisy. Up there. Booo.....we head upstream on ice covered in snow our shoes barely touching the heavy crust under its skiff of fresh. laughter. nervous at first and then we play remember that time? with a whole new story!
past a small open pool of water at the bottom of a litttle gully out for a walk in the winter wonderland fresh snow floating in the air on every little twig and branch. our breath plumes like locamotive smoke from another time. then around a corner to a steeper larger gully and there it is rising up one side to the top of a rock bluff. its beautiful. fat and blue white turning to clear water ice at the top with 3 scary steep sections linked by the slightest of bulges the longest vertical section looks to be about 20 feet but im sure will feel a mile long once im on it. there is no doubt ill be leading it. it looks serious and dions a strong serious climber, but i have many more years experience and this is steeper than anything i've ever been on. Rock or ice. ever. "Woops. i just barfed in my mouth i think. a little." deedee pipes up.
 I hold up a fist as if to play paper rock scissors. Dijon just shakes his head, "you know this is all yours man"
He's had one climb on early season ice without me. thousands of frost white icicles to smash of and climb through beautiful stuff. he showed me pictures and i was a little jeleous. this is later season ice the icicles have flowed together and sheets of solid ice and then melt water chandeliers have woven together making magical scultures that look lovely but scream hard to protect. getting the feeling now. mouth is dry hearts racing gotta pee bad before my harness goes on. you know. FEAR. the real thing, you could get hurt out here. bad.
its better than 30 meters tall but we brought 2 ropes. i am going to lead it then make an anchor as i see fit and bring dion and the second rope to me so we can rappel off together . judging by the ice at the bottom i wont be able to trust the top enough to drill a v-thread anchor in the ice, but i see trees at the edge and I allways carry a cordalette. just a piece of rope about10 metres long tied in a loop. It makes a sling long enough to reach 3 or more pieces of questionable gear and make one solid anchor that you can trust. it's the mark of a mountaineer ive been told and i carried one well before i knew i was one of those, it just made sense.
we reach the base and dicover its a curtain, there is a couple feet behind the wall of ice under a rock overhang. awsome! a cave to distract us fromthe fear and we kill some time climbing around in behind the fallsbut eventually we are forced to return to plan A.

Gear up and go climb this brute....ok? couch sitting seems much more reasonable but we drove all this way and there just aren't any good couches to sit. dion mentions needlepoint. Possibly? just a suggestion, or gut growing?
crampons and axes, screws and quikdraws. some slings and miscelanious other things that make the impossible possible.  step onto the bulge and sink an axe. thuk! im on but not on belay. the first steep is right there in my face and i reach up high sink another axe. carpentry and fear combine to make my axe placements fastand solid, many onesticks and never more then a couple taps at the others. feet not so sure but kick kick kick till they stick is the way finally up enough to be afraid of falling i hang of a high axe placement and reach for my first screw. the bulge i place above seems solid but an air bubble halfway shows in the slush coming out of my screw so i pull it and move again. the ice to my right is a honeycomb of clear fresh running water ice that i wouldnt even dare sink an axe into but next to iti find some solid. first piece in and clipped.  "on belay" dion seems as happy to say it as i am to hear it. Commited now. climbing in silence i make the top of the first bulge. placements seem harder to find, the ice is not solid, rather a layer on layer type of flowing pockety stuff. i move into the next steep with more fear than ever before climbing on anything. ive never fallen on an ice screw and this stuff doesnt make me want to at all. arms are getting tired already and my next piece i am shaking at the thought of stopping long enough to get it in. reach high sink a pick. hang and go to work. shaking. feet feel insecure like they could blow out at any moment. elvis is in the house and as wade told me years ago and moments before my first lead fall of seriousness when your legs go that hard you have about 10 seconds till the fall. last piece 10 feet under me. a 20 foot whipper onto dubious gear? i dont fucking think so. re rack the screw reach up with the other arm and sink a second axe. deep. really deep. get my feet under me and pull my leash of the left hand, find a long draw and clip my harness then tiptoe high enough to get the other end clipped to my buried axe. god yes. safe. pull both hands of thier axes and let my arms drop limp. shake em out get the blood flowing again. then place in safety. relative safety. if  i lean out hard on that axe it could still blow out. not till the screw is set and clipped do i finaly relax. a woop from dion lets me know the fear is just as real for him. "Good stuff man your looking strong!" i love it when he lies to me!! "feeling strong man" i lie back. reach up and reclaim my axes from the wall hang on my placement a moment longer.
"Climbing!" the call.
"Climb on!" the call back. a routine for the nonroutine. we do these checks at every step of the game. Cameron drills nonstop when we climb together and the habit sticks. dion is learning fast and our checklist includes new things all the time. loading the truck we go through the gear list then into nonessentials. rolling papers? check. lighter? check. he doesnt even smoke! thats a good partner. and these things make the unexpected so much easier to deal with when its serious
The final steep section is thin enough i can see rock through the ice in spots. but its also clear and strong finally. i trust the stubby screw i place under the final bulge more than the first 3 long ones i put in down low. so close now i waste no time resting.
"Placing!"  the game of screw fumble and start. run it in once the threads bite. a steady flow of ice crystals out the end indicating solid ice no pockets.
"Clipping." he feeds enough rope for me to reach the draw and clip in.
"Clipped!" Feel the rope come tight as he takes it in.
"Climbing." and the answer from below, "Climb on!" he'll take as i climb up to the piece and then star paying out as i climb above it. The hard moves of clearing a bulge are all thats left. set axes just under the top and move my feet up as high as possible. Then stand up axes below my chest pull one out and reach way over the top. snow here cant see the ice but i am going to trust its there. one swing stick through 6 inches of snow and a satisfying sound. i trust that and pull the other axe. lean way over the bulgeand plunge the handle into the snow. one foot pops and i am still to low to get it over the edge onto the top off the bulge. Style be dammed i want up. stuff my knee into the snow and grovel over the edgeface full of snow both feet clear now. get them under me and im there. a quick search of the top and i sling a tree with my cordalette anchor building made easy! then a thought. did i turn daisy's headlights off? fuckit, of with my soaked lite gloves. pack off find my down puffy for when the fear sweats start to dry
"Secure!" i yell over the edge.
"Off belay!" the distant answer.
Pull rope till i hear "thats me" set up my belay system and holler "On belay." Routine.
"Climbing!" him. "climb on!" Me.
then silence for a long time. out with the heavy mitts a gift from wade years ago. they were his dad and he gave them to me when he died winter camping the first year we climbed together. ten years ago at least now. gotta love gear like that.
 When dion finally clears the edge i can smell the fear. "Good lead man. you fucking killed it!" his eyes are wide and his smile is forced, no gums now just teeth. im still vibrating but the rush is finally dying. i tell him about the daisy lights and we decide to simurap off and book for the truck instead of top roping this thing in safety now. it would have been good for our technique to put some laps on it without the fear but getting home seems smartest now. rigged for the rap we step over the edge side by side. "wait a sec. "i grab my little flip video cam that looks a hundred years old from the fire it fell in last summer out at the cabin. "cool he says and we start down the wall. it looks super steep from here and when i get to the bottom i dont put my feet under me but just rap into the snow on my back.
"can i untie now?" "ya man your down" he replies, we pack not in a rush but still with purpose. time to go couch sitting or gut growing or something.
The slog out is slow we thought the crust would be strong enough to do without our snowshoes and when it proves to be not we dont bother just posthole onward. our axes in the willows help on the final slope out. the one that tried to kill us coming in.
daisy is sitting on her snowbank with headlights on. i reach for the key and she fires right up. LOVE! we both love you so much right now little jeep.

the ride home is uneventfull except for the game of remember that time. Untill about 25 k away from dawson when the whistling from our tuck tape job dissapears to be replaced by a lot of wind and flapping. dion reaches up just in time to grab the rag and clamp it to the window frame with his hands. he spends the next 15 minutes hanging on for dear life. its 25 below outside and in, i ask if hed rather i slow down a bit but the grin answers for him. go man go lets go home!

motion in poetry

guts in a knot
at the top of of the arc
the feeling isn't fear
wieghtless and free
it tells you to act
when it feels right
 your path is not chosen
but placed where the wheels roll

tension and traction
slow calm balance
steadily upward
towards the skys near shore
to slip and fly and be caught
gravitys lessons taught
with stone
and rope
and something like fear

feet searching
body twisting
arms in the air
dancing and thrashing
underbrush pulls and mud slopes push
the pack on your back
means home will be
where feet stop walking
and there will be
no fear there

dogs.


i know ive mentioned dogs before, and how im dog people, grew up with them lots of them. they are for the most part better people than most people and i know i miss the ones who are gone just as much as the people who are gone certainly cried over as many dead dogs as people
 when we were just puppies my brother and i would curl up with a rotwieler bitch named brita and scratch her behind the ear so she would scratch our backs. her and a lab sheperd mutt named snert and a pitbull named piglet were our pack then on johnstreet where dad tattooed and mom sold pot and people wore sandals and played frisbee.
 piglet ended up bitting me when i was 6 and getting shot in the bathroom after being beaten half to death and chased home by dad. half naked. i was lucky and unhurt.
 brita gave birth to a litter of mutts through another dog incident with a neighbors sheperd that bit dad and died for it. of the litter only 2 survived past 2 months the others were sickly and one by one left us.katie was sold to a close friend of te family who i would eventually end up welding for when i first left college.
 we kept gaffer and grew through our teens with him. his mom and my mom didnt like each other though. brita bit mom one day in the garden and mom bit her back/ she never bit anyone ever again. brita stole strawberries just before they were ripe
 we sold her and got a little pitbull named daisy who was a sweetheart and had her bred with a papered male and of the first litter kept the two largest males bowser and bethoven.
 this was a funny time as we had moved to saltspring by now and had several other animals 2 or 3 goats a cat a couple snakes sometimes the morning walk to the bus stop was a lot like a petting zoo with even the peacocks following.
 bowser and bethoven where brothers like oil and water bowser was black and smart and bethoven was blond and dumb. baby liked to scrap dogs and was not really good at it. bowser didnt but was. bowser was a people reader and every person he didnt like turned out to be not likable...mostly dads idiot friends too which was funny. all three liked beer bowser would nip an unopened can and lick till it stopped foaming then nip it again, beathoven would bit the can then shake and bite till it quite moving and gaffer would knock over open cans sneaky like while he was sober then openly when hed had a few as well as get growly and stumbly.
 when he was a puppie he ate a gram of hash and slept for three days and would eat roaches steadily. he got really drunk on whisky at a party when he was getting older and quit drinking for many years but still ate pot bowser died on a hot summer day while we were at the lake he choked on a rock he had been chewing on which was strange because he was usually the smart one he was my dog and the first one i really really missed.
 i saw him bite a beer bottle once carefully and put 2 perfect holes in the sideof it. his brother became our best friend along with gaffer who had been with us since we where small
 of course he was getting old looked like he may die soon but mom switched his diet to oatmeal and eggs and veggies and weed and he was walking and better within 6 months and ended up living many years more he died while i was away at school and his sister katie also died that year when i left and went to work for her people in sidney i think they were around 15 years old then.
 tears where shed by many people friends and family who had grown up with him cameron gave mom a beautiful black and white photo he took once on a visit blown up and framed and it still hangs in her cabin. daisy was gone and beeathoven had sired pups who we kept two of. oggie my doggy and moe, moewas brindle and og was blonde and big like his dad and just like his dad grew the first couple weeks in my shirt front pocket till he didnt fit anymore he lived in vic with me and michelle and then was sold by dad when i moved to dawson creek after we split up
 i think hes still alive in cobble hill somewhere and if i see him i know he'll know me still.
 moe was moms dog and she ended up getting a celtic knot of dogs round her wrist one brindle and one blonde. we also had a staffordshire terrier like margo named spot that we got right after bowser left. spot had been abused and was very headshy but also very loving and attention seeking it made him barky if he was on his line and knew there was someone home hes the one that i shot up on the hill over the pond and cried for years sfter over.
 when i came up here i went with chris and elaina to pick up snoop doggy dog a mastiff that elaina still has hes old and tired now and cant play as hard as abby but he still knows who he grew up with and i guess thats where im going with this story they are all people we have know and loved we teach them and they teach us. if/when we should get a dog id like to cast my vote for a terrier like margo and spot they are a smart tough energetic breed. and super good people to be around. like people when they are gone its important to remember the times they made you smile and the things they taught you that way they can live forever.

this was really really hard to write and i cried a couple times like right now especially but i wanted you to know youve got dog people who know whats up and feel the same way.

smooshie sends his love

   It all started in the mountains.

   Me and Jarret both love being off the beaten path. Summer 08 he says to me "Hey, you want to go climb bulley?"
   I guess its a mountain right away but have to ask for details. Turns out its the  highest peak in our local maintain ranges and not that far away.
    Sitting at 8800 feet and about a 100 km. south of Tumbler ridge on the also south and east of Monkman park, a provincial park that was the site of my first good adventure with jarrett sometime round 1996. An area I can relate to for sure.
  "Of course!" is the only smart answer so i say just that. And the planning begins, we research routes, find a book on the local mountaineering by a local, and start making gear lists.
   We cut a bunch of pitons out of one of our old sawblades from jarretts sawmill, started looking at the available mountaineering hammers and decided to buy roofing hatchets instead. then carve them down to the right profile.
  All the stuff that needs doing and then some without actually even knowing what form our adventure will take
   Finally in the fall our plans are finalized the truck is packed and we both cut our hair and headed out. his mohawk suits him but the twin hawk i cut just feels ridiculous on me, to distract i tie a canadian flag cape on and start rolling.
   Our approach takes us to tumbler an hour away to the west. about 100 kms. the next 70 to the south on bulley creek forest service road takes 2 full hours and carries us steadily uphill.  By the time we reach the end of the road, or at least where the logging road was deactivated we are within 40km. of the great divide, or high point where the watersheds change dirrection. our side flows north and east to hudsons bay and the north atlantic while the other flows west to the pacific. 
   A boulder marks the end of the road and on the other side a creek with no bridge any more, thats what deactivated means i guess. Every culvert and bridge pulled and erosion bars dug into steep hillsides, Bulley peak rising in front of us to the south, and cloads gathering. we shoulder our packs, grin, burn one. and head out.
   The first 10 kms. are on this dead logging road weaving thru replanted leases carving up the sides of the valley, we pass piles of waste wood with trees in them 60 feet long looking for all the world like jumbled piles of straws.
Enough wood to keep or mill cutting for weeks.
   The gathering cloads bring some rain and we can hear lightning booming down the valley behind us. with bulley looming over head and a stream crossing the road at a high point on the valley side we decide to set up camp and call it an early night.
   camp consists of a tarp and our bag setups so it takes no time and once we have fire and food in us the storm hits in earnest. Darkness falls early and we retire to our sacks under our tarp inbetween 2 logs pulling ourselves p topside to watch the lightning and burn one we hoot and holler into the storm till one bolt hits close enough to blind and deafen us. humility and the safety of our tarp call us to bed.
   the next day we push to the end of the logging site round the southeast side of the mountain then we turn west and follow the creek up the valley behind the mountain. eventually after much heanous bushwacking we reach the head of the valley.
  Glacial moraine and thin stunted trees, a massive headwall cut with an equally masive waterfall up the middle and a thin trickle just left of it has us talking about future ice climbs  out here while the lack of fuel forces us to follow the stream back down the valley till we can gather enough wood to cook with.
   Round a corner into a sheltered mini valley that looks suprisingly homey for the middle of nowhere, A massive grizzly doing his thing on the other side of the creek! We thought of this of course but the whistles we bought just seem to get him curious. "Jarret find the dam bear banger man." hes fumbling and saying how hes trying dammit.

   "Fooosh. BANG!" and griz is tails and gone. That was suuper scary and the signs all point to this being his home not ours. rocks over turned claw marks way up in trees. Poop all over. Eek! we had been roaring and joking about being bears mainly because of the local radio station that claims to be a bear but now.... not so funny. ROOOOAR! im not a bear at all.
  So thats where we set up! made a big fire and shot of a couple more bangers then started looking at the walls. We came to climb and right now it seems safer up there. tommorow we go up there! excited much and kinda nervous we make camp again and begin seriously looking for our line. a walk up to the falls after a dinner of spaghetti with jarrets homemade sauce that he dehydrated for the trip and we begin to form a plan.
We intend to climb between the glacier and the mountain peak through the saddle and from there decide which summit to go for or if neither we can beeline up the valley on the other side of bulley.

   Dawn in the mountains is capable of the most amazing light show and we roll out just in time for a doozy. breakfast of goatmeal and instant coffee. we decide to pack up and pull out completly. we plan to climb up to the right of the glacier on a steep crackline  that cuts the headwall. it looks from the bottom to be about a 100 metres of climbing maybe 3 or 4 pitches. then traverse further right and come up from there round the side of the glacier.
   The aproach is steep as hell, 65 maybe 70 degrees of heavily vegged talus and takes over an hour by the time we get under our line we are beginning to doubt our sanity. i win the rock paper scissor off and take first lead. Pack off harness and rack on away i go. as soon as i step around the corner into the cleft i remember that adventure can have a dirty side. mossy and dirty. my new hammer comes in handy right away as i use it to scrape away the moss and dig out the crack enough to find that its way to thin to put a clean piece in.
   bing bing BINGBING, PING ping ping higher and higher pitched the ring of cold steel into the rock as i pound my first piton with my first hammer in real fear. "dude, your only 20 feet in?" jarret is around a corner from me and seriously questioning my sanity. "you'll see" i mutter "clipping. and climbing."  not so bad now that ive got a piece pounded that i could drop a truck on under me and the crack opens up enough to get fingers and clean protection into.
  Even though jarrettt is only 10 feet away beside me round the corner its a long way down under me allready and a fall that far two days walk from the truck....2 days for healthy not crippled people...Its a serious game we play but as i climb it seems to get easier. cleaner for sure, i finally hear the half rope call and build my anchor. silence for the next half hour at least after except for the wind and occasional hawks wierd whistling scream. when he finally makes it to me i see he has his pack on and is sweating and shaky. now i have to go back for my pack. so he gets to relax and belay me for a bit.
   Jarrett lowers me to my pack and tie it onto the rope instead of me, i have to help it around the corner but after that its a straight haul up the face, steep as hell! i can tell jarrett is impressed with my lead by the lack of talk. serious times indeed.
his lead next and it looks like itèll be to the top thankfully, we rerack and take a minute to asess our surroundings. we can see across to the glacier and falls under it and the little lake just above where we spent the night in mr. bears house is as bright as the blue of the sky from the glacial mineral water. amazing, and surreal.  however times a wasting and we want of the wall and onto higher ground.
i get lots of time to sightsee as jarrett climbs and finaly after an eterity of paying rope out then nothing for even longer i hear him call secure. but then another call? lower me off is the call, and i dont understand. he comes down and explains how bad a position we have put ourselves in. after a hundred feet of rock the top is a 45 degree scree slope. unprotectable and hard to walk on with 60 lb. packs. Skunked.... still somewhat of a victory we have onsighted a semi serious short climb requiring some serious mountain skills.
  back to bear camp. food and sleep and a new plan. we will retreat down the valley to under the lowest part of the saddle. there is big timber reaching all the way to the saddle their and we can climb it for sure. from there we will decide whether to keep going up or traverse round the mountain back to the trail out.
  with 3 days food eaten out of our packs and some practice moving through the bush we know to avoid low ground and dense willow and make decent time then as we start into the steep ground we discover that blueberries on steep grow at face height. this slows us a little, ok a lot. grazing and moving we remember that bears are pretty smart and finally feel comfortable with our roaar we're a bear joke again. the saddle is reached and the alpine meadows prove much easier going than down in the valley. soon we are high enough to see both sides and the terrain grows more and more barren. as we start to descend the north end of the saddle has snow pack in it still and we feel like explorers again. its july and we are walking on snow!
then we come to the end! the valley ahead ends at the truck at least 15 k away but still! exciting, then we see rising above the spot where the truck must be! a pancake of flat grey rock sticking of the mountainside. not visible from the parking spot or anywhere down in the valley but plain as day from up here. solid climable rock! no scree slope under it to indicate rotten and plainly not vertical but just as plainly steep enough to bother looking into!
 on the side of the saddle to our west between us and the glacier is a black rotten miserable looking serrated knife edge ridge. to the east, the flank of bulley itself, steep scree and scary with our heavy packs. also no water up there. home it is, or the truck at least then maybe go looking for this new crag!
 we slog out to the road just before dark and startle an elk at the creek crossing. the full moon is rising so we decide to keep moving as the road is so much easier going than the bush and manage to make the truck just after midnight. a frantic munchy session and of to bed on the back deck of the death star.
day 5 and we have food for 3 more yet so we feast that morning and then set out without packs for the new crag. Across a logging cut block we see it rising as soon as the first hill is topped. it looks to be a kilometer long and very nearly half that tall.
3 hours later we are at the base of a slab of rotten sun baked mud looking slab. its the right color but theres something not jiving. we decide to keep climbing and at the top of this shit wall as we dub it is a drop into a little valley. across that our slab rises before us and our perseverance is rewarded. not shit! yay!

 kicking ourselves for not bringing gear we decide to explore a bit then try and find a quicker way back to the truck. all the way climbers left we reach the end and easy climbing through big blocks the higher we get the better the view of bulley and soon the glacier rising behind that. trly spectacular! this is worth the blisters is the decision, a trail in will be built and we will climb here! somewhere around here is where the story gets good. on the way out jarrett has an idea. more a brainfart really.
"you know what would be cool?" he asks. "A cabin out here, its so far out it wouldnt get found and we like the area. there are a lot of cool things to see and do and climb, and we would use it in the winter for a snowmobile destination too!" Wow jarrett, thats a pretty cool plan! We toss ideas around all the way back to the truck and in the morning we set out again with our racks and ropes and flagging tape determined to reduce our approach time and touch stone with our dirty, tired, calloused hands.
I honestly dont remember much from that day its all become a blur now i do know i took pictures of his shiny new ropes and slashed my ankle good on a stick. he fell of a log in the worst way possible. feet both ways!
we climbed 4 pitches made the top of the crag and ate there. saw the glacier and mountain under a perfect sky as well as both valleys we had travelled. our plans were growing at every belay and rest and it all looked and sounded doable.

jarrett had been hoarding building materials from jobs and by the time we were in the truck rolling home a dream had been dreamt out loud by both of us. The Cabin At The End Of  The Road was born that day.

  

Pheonix

My cousin just got back from Costa Rica and loved it. Loved it so much that he wants to buy a lot there and build a house. Seeing as we are in the house building business it just makes sense, his kids loved it, his wife loved it, and it wouldnt take us any time. So it's in the works we are going for it but my brother needs a passport, in fact  his wife and her 4 year old daughter need passports too. I just got mine and it is a kind of daunting process so i went and picked up their applications the other day and brought them home and gave them to chris.
   Chris has been telling pheonix about this plan and she was allready super excited so when the three envelopes showed up on the table she was a little interested. He explained that uncle joe had picked them up so they could get started on the paperwork that would let them... Us all leave the country to build houses and play in the tropics!
   And then the questions began. Answering any question a 4 year old has will result in 3 more questions before the first answer has a chance to settle in. "Joe got us these?""
   "Yes" from chris.
   "So we can go to the place with the beaches?" He has been showing her internet pics of beaches and jungle and adventure.
  "look, you should ask joe about it he knows way more than i do"Chris is as patient as always.
   So i get the hot seat, and have to explain that i didnt buy themi just picked them up. They have to go in the mail still. They need to be filled out. the two green ones are for adults and the pink one is for children. yes the pink one is for you, no i didnt have to buy them i just picked them up. yes you can go anywhere in the world with one.  Then one i didnt see coming. "Did you forget one? Theres only three. Wheres yours joe?"
   " I allready have mine sweety, and you need someone with one to vouch. So i can do that for all three of you." I say to her. Up till now its been serious questioning Pheonix, answer me Pheonix with her razor sharp powers of observation. The smile of a lifetime hits her face she puts the envelopes down and rushes my leg grabbing and hugging as tight as a 40 lb. child can. " I LOVE YOU JOE" all in capitals and as true a statement as anyone could ever hope to hear.
   Chris smiled and shook his head, as did i. "I love you to Pheonix" It was the only possible reply and life carried on. Dinner. Bed. Wake. Work.

   Then next morning we are plotting for the future, in Costa rica andi have to tell Jarrett about last night with pheonix. Its just as good telling it as living it and i can tell by his eyes and mouth that he can see the whole moment clear as fresh waterfall ice. "Thats a good one man." he says " Thats the kind of moment you remember forever"
   He's right and i'm pretty sure we will.

jennifer

pebbles on the window... i had forgotten


it started with a kiss

stolen on your porch just under that window

climbing that porch

so many nights to steal more

this is an old story, a lot has changed. I've traveled, i lost Marla forever to another man after an epic squamish adventure together, I've been sober, I've been drunk.
I still fight with the old demons, sometimes i win sometimes i lose.
to stop would be wrong, and if nothing else i want to do the right thing.
for better or for worse here i am.

First.

Marla


I met marla on my birthday, i think maybe my 30th birthday even. I like to go riding on my birthday, alone or with people it doesn't matter. hopefully allways will, this one i was with people not just people but great people. jai Balaam and Dave Turcotte to be precise we started early and covered a lot of ground before hitting the oak bay liqour store for cold beers at cheep prices (it's a secret, don't tell) our route took us past my lesbo tattoo freak friend brandi's place and she was on the porch drinking beer with some people so we stopped. Her girlfriend Jennie, Miranda, and Marla. stopped for a beer at rest instead of in the saddle...all great people in the sun on a porch. Happy birthday to me! Marla's laugh still sticks out in my mind. Loud and unafraid a lot like my niece abbygails. a wonderfull thing for sure, we laughed and had a great time and when Marla was up one time gone to the fridge for beer Brandi took me aside to whisper "i think she likes you" wink and grin. "I think i like her" i had to mock whisper back.
We didn't ride any more that day drank with brandi and company instead then got invited to a party elsewhere in fernwood drug them all with and me and Marla ended up dancing the night away at a party where no one else was dancing.
we hung out for the next couple weeks but i learned that she was leaving soon on an adventure. her and her friend chelsea wanted to ride thier mountain bikes to argentina and they planned on being gone several months. There was no sense in taking this seriously it was just a fling...but what a fling it was, every time i turned around something else. we went swimming at the sooke potholes and the jeep she picked me up in had ditch kisses up one side. i asked and she said it fell over out tree plantng but luckily there where enough peple to put it back up. i got in and noticed no carpet and the floor bungs popped out. Yes its been in some water she said. Eventually it ended and when she left south i left north moved to dawson creek again to go climbing and riding and house building.. we kept in touch for a little but then forgot. i visited the coast several times and often wondered but Brandi said "marlas with someone and happy i dont think you should try and talk to her."It hurt but it was true so i didn't
Then in the winter of 0 i was on an adventure of sorts that put me in victoria again. Walking down a street with my head in the clouds i heard "Joe? is that you?" turned and there she was...again. later she said she saw me and wasn't going to stop but then did, curiousity overcoming caution. do you want to get together and catch up? of course! maybe a ride to the beach and talk? hell yes! we set a date and went for a lovely ride to the beach and caught up on the last couple years and then said our goodbyes. after exchanging numbers.
The very next day i got a phone call. "that was lovely but im a little dissapointed i didn't get a hug from you"
i was trying to be a gentleman i said. would you like to get together again? "yes, i could show you pictures of my trip to mexico" they had run out of money and had to get jobs to pay for their tickets home. Also awsome! Sooo... we ended up spending mor time together...And again...."look this can't get serious i'm leaving for korea on a year long teaching trip." I really need a passport so i can go do cool shit like that i said. well get one and maybe we can do it together? was the reply. so obvious.


One year.

   This story begins almost 1 year ago exactly. Its Friday, March 26 2010. Sometime around this time last year I was sitting in a restaraunt in Hope B.C. thinking about life. Now im sitting in my brothers living room still thinking about life. A lot has stayed the same, life is still here. I still love mountains and bikes and food and all the other things I loved before. A lot has changed, I have a licence and a jeep, and a passport and money in the bank for the future. All things i hadnt thought of having for a long time. 9 years with no licence. A lot longer with no bank account. This is the story of this year, starting then and ending now. Or as ended as a story based on a life can end assuming that life goes on. Its been an amazing year and i hope this tale does it justice.



Saturday, November 21, 2009 thats when i wrote this story about that day in march. I wrote it on a little computer that i had with me on that trip, bought it just before an atttempted mugging by some local youths that left me and my brother pretty badly beat up. I got a broken hand out of the deal that was no good for carpentering with so i went travelling to kill the time while i healed. actually thats how i ended up in victoria and meeting Marla....again.

i was hitchhiking north this winter from victoria, stopped in hope after dark. hungry, decided on a chinese place by the bus station/ laundromat/dinner. it was decent, had a couple beers lots on my mind. Marlas leaving on the first of april two weeks away try and get this trip to ymir over fast and come back? see her again for maybe a day at most. or move east after kelowna then the koots, heading north from there through the park see friend in banff? always good for a party and lottsa inkwork.go home through edmonton, see dad. anyway you get the drift. high plains drifter at heart resigned to not seeing this beautiful creature for at least another year...again? or give one more run at romance and hope.well the cheque and a fortune cookie showed up as i finished my bottle of lucky. life is either an exciting adventure, or nothing. thought on that for a bit and used it for a bookmark in a mark jenkins book i really enjoyed. it made it home with me and every time i saw it it made me smile. really suits me how did they know?when i sent marla her package (a painting, some pictures of me in the mountains happy, a feather from the first grouse i got with my bow and a book on solo climbing adventures) that fortune was in the book and it makes me happy to know its on an exciting adventure

   So i carried on to Ymir B.C. by way of Kelowna Tattooing the whole way and hitchhiking. Then returned to the coast to meet with this girl Marla. We met in van one day at the korean consulate where she had to finalize some paperwork had lunch and hung out then tried to get together another time but got our timing messed up and blew it. The last time i saw here was the day before she left. i bussed out to tswassen and wandered all over the place and had just about given up when i reached her at her parents. We met and hung out and had a good visit despite my being half in a bottle of fireball that id bought for the bus ride. When i got on the bus back into vancouver i was sauced and emotional, 12 hours later i was at rock bottom, camping under an overpass high as fuck on freebase cocaine. Spent every cent in my pockets and had no luck selling my computer for more so i decided to spend my last minutes in that day writing. The truth and nothing but same as what i still write today. i wrote Marla a letter to tell her what she was dealing with and what i was thinking. i couldnèt find the letter i sent her but it boils down to an admission of guilt. I was guilty of being a cocaine adict from the time i was eighteen on. Of being incapable of telling the truth about that and therefore so many other things in my life. Of the hurt that so many other girls who had gotten close to me had suffered.
   I wrote it and in the morning i hitchhiked home. it took 2 days and i was penniless and hungry by the time i got home. But i got home to work and a home and life went on. I wrestled with that letter in my computer for the whole trip home and when i got there i sent it. I went to work and checked my mail and within the week i got a reply. The gist of it was that she knew allready but to hear it like that hurt. A lot. That she wasnt going to talk to me until she could read that letter without crying. Other things as well lost now in cyberlimbo.
   Still she wrote me though. And I wrote back, we talked of me getting my passport and coming to visit her in korea. She sent my letter to a friend who warned her as well of the dangers of falling for an addict, but she told me all of it and sent the letter from her friend to me. She was my friend and cared. A lot.
  Marla told me about a program called skype, free videocalls world wide. We talked, face to face, about all sorts of things and we stopped thinking as friends, or just friends anyways. We had been lovers before and the attraction was undeniable.
   I began saving money and spending on things i had long neglected that i would need to get a passport. B.C.I.D. My birth certificate. Also things i personally wanted and needed, my licence back first. We fell in love. Again

chapter 2.
   During this time i also had many fine adventures. The year before my cousin Jarrett and i had spent a week in the mountains south of tumbler ridge trying to summit the highest peak in the area! Bulley glacier peak, 8800 feet, we were skunked after completing a circuit of the neighboring peak Bulleye Mt. peak.  On the way out we spottted a pancake of rock sticking out of a mountain side above where the road ended and our truck was parked. it turned out to be about a kilometer long and maybe up to 500 metres tall in spots. Prime untouched solid rock to climb and develop. The idea of a cabin out there was tossed around then tabled over the winter.
   When i got home the first test of whether i was healed enough for work was a snowmobile ride out to that range. I took pictures and sent them to Marla, told her of our plans. Then when the road was clear to drive in we went back and climbed and cut a trail into the climbing and explored. More pictures and stories for Marla.
   Next thing i knew, Jarrett had a pile of materials and we were dragging them out into the woods by hand. Clearing and building and living the lives that stories are made of. We built our cabin and climbed and always i sent pictures and wrote storys for my lover in another land. We spoke often and it seemed perfect. People noticed a change in me, i wasnt running around drunk all the time with random floozies and i had to explain. I met a girl, I met her before and fucked it up once, I have a second chance and dont want to fuck it up.
   There was shock, disbelief and belief, relief and many other reactions to this statement. My brother laughed and said ya until you lose interest and move on. many others supported the move, friends and ex-lovers pleased that someone had finally gotten to me.
   The cabin at the end of the road. Thats what we called it and it stuck, we brought the first load of materials out on a trailer behind Jarretts one ton truck that we nicknamed the death star. White like a storm trooper and shiny new then, it was piled high with house parts and the trailer was heaped as well. In fact it was so overloaded that it took us close to 4 hours to get it into the end of the road. from dawson creek its about 100 km. to tumbler ridge or a one hour drive, from tumbler to the end of the bulley creek forest service road is only 70 km. even unloaded it takes 2 hours to drive in the rest of the way, and this time we had close to 3000 pounds of material on board. Jarrett and Dion and samurai ( dions boxer) and me packed all the beams for the roof system, the floor joists, the sheeting and nails and tools in the first day. By mid afternoon my leg and the titanium pins holding it together where screaming fire and hurt so i had to stop packing and began clearing the site and building a floor system. We decided on a spot about 300 yards from the road at the top of a rock bluff. the creek runs about 40 yards away and on previous trips we had cleared a camp site and dug a firepit down to mineral soil and lined it with river rocks. we slept that night around our fire next to our dreams all piled in the woods and it felt so good.
   We woke to reinforcements Tyler Purnell (T bone or bonezy) and his jack russel named wizard. ate up the day packing more and building got the floor system built and leveled and went climbing!

chapter 3
June. My birthday came and went, Marla sent me socks and pens and some funny stationary and we talked lots. My brother and i built a plywood ramp next to the ditch in front of his houseand my riding buddies dion and morgan jean came out all the time to ride the ditch on the little bikes. Not just bmx either a honda 50 and child sized quads all got ridden in that ditch and some good bruises and raspberrys showed up as well from falls. Marla would laugh and call us fools when i told her of our shenanigans.
   Then something imperfect happened. An event know as bushstock, outdoor music and swimming and camping by the river. i was riding into town and ran into my friend alex the groomer operator from powder king sleeping in his truck on the side of the road. He said im here for bushstock man gonna meet morgan jean and party! so we did, for 2 days living by the river on hotdogs and beer. woke the first day by the side of the river with a sixpack for a pillow,the second day i woke in a strange womans van to the sound of my boss whispering joeeeeey. his kids had seen my boots and i had forgotten my climbing date for sunday.
   up like a flash gone climbing was my first words. and out of the van i went. Jarrett laughed i blushed and we went out to the cabin with the kids. they loved the tyrolean traverse we put up to cross the creek and it was so hot we all stuck our heads in the water on our way back from the rock even though that water is as glacier cold as the ice pack it flows out of 20 km. away.
   when i got home though i wasnt so happy, i had fucked up and was dreading talking to Marla. it wasnt long before she popped up in cyberland and said the phrase that all relationships dread for some reason
We Need To Talk. then she proceeded to tell me how she had gotten drunk and made out with some random dude at a party. Oh my god! i was never quite so relieved, i told her i did the same thing but the dude i made out with was a woman. she asked me what this meant, and i asked her if she still wanted me. Of course was the reply and my heart damm near popped out of my chest. Shes smart and beautiful and all these things......and human! ohmygod!
   we wrote such beautifull mush back and forth it was almost surreal and at one point i remember her say something to the effect off if i asked she would say yes. I knew what that meant and almost did ask her right then and there to marry me. but being a true blue romantic fool i really wanted to do it the old fashioned way. in person. for real.
   We talked about everything and anything, the topic of substance abuse came up more than once and she was right to be concerned. i didnt hold back with the truth and it seemed true that there was a cycle that recurred.
   july chapter 4
riding and climbing and marla and bbqs at our new homestead. Casa Del Christopher! a perfect life and chris and jaqui to be married on august first, drinking heavily was still running rampant through my life though and the night before the wedding we tied one on real good like. i came too some time in the wee hours in a buddies truck smoking on a crack pipe. not perfect. came thru the door with a couple hours to spare first thing turn on the computer boom marla. saying something wonderfull. it would have been easy to ignore that conversation pretend i didnt see say nothing back. but no, i said i fucked  up, im fucked up i am freaking out.
   there was no sympathy, she was pissed said something to the effect of i thought you were broke? and what the fuck? and i cant talk to you im so mad. your brother is counting on you now get your shit together and stop fucking this up we will talk but it wont be for i while im so mad at you.
   morgan jean came and got me that morning. i told him what had happened on our way to wally world for fresh duds for the wedding. told him i thought i may have lost her cause i couldnt  lie or not smoke crack.
MJ is a fountain of wisdom with very few words attached. He said don't smoke crack joey and you wont lose her or have to lie. We did the wedding thing and it was beautiful mom and dad both made it i saw very little of either and they sat as far from each other as possible. the reception i drank water from a flower vase almost all night. my cousin drove people home in his new barracuda that we picked up in squamish the month before and expressed disbelief at my not drinking. somewhere in there i  lost some strenght dannys date was shamelessly hitting on me i was still reeling from the night before, a drink. some wine.then dancing, more wine. jarrett says he saw the switch flip. good joe to bad. coming back in with dirty knees and sweat flowing tina hanging back, then leaving with a couple bridesmaids and other people. we went to mcqueens slough and watched a lightning storm roll over the country side stripped naked and ran through the fields in the rain. a return to a more primal time. somehow a hottub and more debauchery. fuck it im allready down the tube might as well go all in.
   The next day i left for prrince rupert with jarrett and his family on a fishing trip. 4 days on a boat. a small boat ohmygod.

chapter 5

Fishing with the Bergs and Rod Tram the owner of the local sporting goods store. We laid a bunch of hardwood and tile in his house and instead of giving him a bill Jarrettt put it towards a charter trip on rods boat. We spent 3 nights and 4 days on the boat and i got to show my nieces so many fishboat tricks like crabtraps and knots and the shiny cartilage bouncy ball inside a sharks eye. We went for walks on the beach and found shells and murdered crab every night, Rod turned out to be an exellent cook as well and between him me and jarrett brandi never had to cook once.

reflections

 We are sittting in my boss and cousin jarretts truck driving to windsor plywood for materials, on a backroad outside dawson creek B.C. its winter outside and the landscape is white and blue with some dark green  patchwork quilt effect. spruce trees and fenceposts breaking the horizon line. we are rolling past a farmhouse and in the yard, in the snow at a fire pit sits an old man on a round of firewood in front of a campfire smoking a pipe and roasting a wiener on a stick. A small boy is playing in the yard nearby, tossing a stick for a dog.
  Thats what it looks like anyways, the old man looks very old. As old as mud maybe, and he looks as contnted as if he was the man who invented mud even. The child is a boy and very young and depite their winter clothes because it is -15 outside they both look very comfortable at their tasks. the dog all frisky thru the snow and the boys rosy cheeks. The old mans back hunched into the wind as he smokes and the fire smokes and the sun shines.
  All this in a moments glance as we roll by and then jarrett says ''did any one else see that'' quietly.
 ''the old guy with the pipe n stick''  My brother replies.
  ''Thats gonna be me when im old'' says Jarrett and we all agree it was a pretty awsome monent to drive through.