Don't Just Stand There!
So there is this flick called Touching the Void. It is the story of two young mountain climbers who decide to climb this big ass peak in Peru, one that has never been climbed before and it is basically the story of how wrong something can go.
What happens is they climb the mountain, which they find to be way harder then expected and while descending the weather turns bad and they run out of supplies. To make things worse as they are descending one of the two guys falls and breaks his leg in three places. Generally this is accepted as a death sentence. Dude A would usually say to dude B with the broken leg, “Yo, I’ll be back with help ASAP” with the understanding that 1) That broken leg dude is going to be dead way before help ever arrives and 2) that no help will come looking knowing he is already dead on the mountain.
In any case, for crazy man-love reasons I don’t want to go into because I tear up, dude A (who we will now call Simon) begins lowering dude B with the broken leg (who we will call Joe) down the mountain on a 75% slope by rope. Basically letting Joe slide down 100ft at a time and then walking down to him and sliding him down again. Mind you it is like -1000 degrees and joe is sliding down a mountian with a broken leg. At one point for reasons we won’t go into, the line snaps and Joe falls 100ft into through a patch of ice and into an ice chasm. Simon looks down into this tiny hole, calls out Joe’s name (which there is no way anyone can hear because of the screaming wind) figures Joes is dead and heads back to base camp alone.
But dumb ass Joe isn’t dead. Joe has fallen into the ice chasm onto a tiny ledge. To his left is a vertical ice wall and to his right is a vertical drop into darkness. So he does what any same person would and takes a nap. In the morning he realizes a few things: Simon must think he is dead, because he really should be at this point. He is only 21 years old and dying on a ledge in an ice chasm in Peru is totally lame.
And he realizes one last thing that I have carried with me. He realizes that at this moment in his life, he is better off making choices that will turn out badly for him than making none at all. Because by making no choices he is going to end up at least as badly as if he making poor choices. And sometimes life is like that. Sometimes you don’t really know what is going on or what something is about or if the risk is worth it, but sometimes just knowing that doing nothing isn’t going to improve anything is the nudge you need to act. Also you shouldn’t climb fucking mountains.
Back to Joe, knowing there is no way he can go up, he throws his remaining rope off the ledge into the dark abyss below and lowers himself further down. And I’ll leave the story of Joe there for you, you can rent the movie, and if you find that kind of thing fascinating you might want to try reading Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
What happens is they climb the mountain, which they find to be way harder then expected and while descending the weather turns bad and they run out of supplies. To make things worse as they are descending one of the two guys falls and breaks his leg in three places. Generally this is accepted as a death sentence. Dude A would usually say to dude B with the broken leg, “Yo, I’ll be back with help ASAP” with the understanding that 1) That broken leg dude is going to be dead way before help ever arrives and 2) that no help will come looking knowing he is already dead on the mountain.
In any case, for crazy man-love reasons I don’t want to go into because I tear up, dude A (who we will now call Simon) begins lowering dude B with the broken leg (who we will call Joe) down the mountain on a 75% slope by rope. Basically letting Joe slide down 100ft at a time and then walking down to him and sliding him down again. Mind you it is like -1000 degrees and joe is sliding down a mountian with a broken leg. At one point for reasons we won’t go into, the line snaps and Joe falls 100ft into through a patch of ice and into an ice chasm. Simon looks down into this tiny hole, calls out Joe’s name (which there is no way anyone can hear because of the screaming wind) figures Joes is dead and heads back to base camp alone.
But dumb ass Joe isn’t dead. Joe has fallen into the ice chasm onto a tiny ledge. To his left is a vertical ice wall and to his right is a vertical drop into darkness. So he does what any same person would and takes a nap. In the morning he realizes a few things: Simon must think he is dead, because he really should be at this point. He is only 21 years old and dying on a ledge in an ice chasm in Peru is totally lame.
And he realizes one last thing that I have carried with me. He realizes that at this moment in his life, he is better off making choices that will turn out badly for him than making none at all. Because by making no choices he is going to end up at least as badly as if he making poor choices. And sometimes life is like that. Sometimes you don’t really know what is going on or what something is about or if the risk is worth it, but sometimes just knowing that doing nothing isn’t going to improve anything is the nudge you need to act. Also you shouldn’t climb fucking mountains.
Back to Joe, knowing there is no way he can go up, he throws his remaining rope off the ledge into the dark abyss below and lowers himself further down. And I’ll leave the story of Joe there for you, you can rent the movie, and if you find that kind of thing fascinating you might want to try reading Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
posted by Yen at
5:30 PM
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