Fear and longevity in the out of bounds
By Brad Frank |
| Photo by Jay Goodrich |
In recent years, I’m not pushing the boundaries often enough to drool over the latest telemark technology. Or to haughtily respond, “Ski, of course,” when asked what I do in the winter, like I used to a few decades ago. But a few times a year, out comes the old backcountry gear and up toward timberline I go, with only a handful of telemark and avalanche lessons to my name, received from a dirtbag skier whose most memorable survival advice was, “When dumpster diving for protein, always give meat a sniff-test, and cook it well done.”
A little voice says, “If you fuck up today, the nearest ski patrol has a better chance of locating yeti than your sorry ass. So what the hell are you doing up here, breaking trail so far out of bounds?”
“Good question, kemo sabe,” I answer to the specter of fear that shimmers over the virgin trail. Not long ago, I got back from an odyssey through the broken piece of our society that gave us gumbo, Mardi Gras and Louis Armstrong. I went to help a non-governmental organization (using the word advisedly, since most members of the group had spent most of their lives resisting or ignoring organization and its ugly sister, authority) distribute food supplies and set up medical clinics. By the time I arrived, most people were out of the scenes of devastation that fill a news-watcher’s dream of a hurricane’s aftermath. In the broken buildings of New Orleans, along the waterfront of Slidell, among the battered buildings of Waveland and Gulfport, people picked among the ruins. Inland, where the majority of the population had taken refuge, southern summer was in full swing. Love-bugs (socalled because they fly around in coupled frenzies) splattered on my windshield. Mosquitoes swarmed from the swamps. The National Guard and local cops secured government facilities and patrolled property interests. People were way down the list of priorities. Outside of shelters and distribution centers, with their attendant lines and incessant paperwork, help was ad hoc and inconsistent. Some churches served meals and others distributed food to take home. In some communities, recreation centers had been turned into food and clothing banks, while other areas had no access to supplies at all.
Accident scene assessment requires securing the safety of: rescuers #1, bystanders #2 and victims #3. Break the rules and you have more victims. Do basic first aid, then move to longer-term care (2nd Aid), while adhering to rules 1, 2 and 3. Physical comfort, food and fluids, morale, adequate rest, sanitation, observation and monitoring will keep most survivors on the road to healing, and this is where my adopted group of anarchists came in. Some were helping refugees at a shelter make contact with missing families, and linking them to websites for aid applications and missing-person searches. Others were cruising through the battered neighborhoods, handing people boxes of food. I found myself stopping at “free food” signs along highways, not to receive but to give food and supplies we’d unloaded from a truck the night before. Things went to hell the day a compadre in anarchy decided to argue ideology with a local authority figure as I made like Gandhi between them. I’m the one that almost ended up in cuff bracelets, because I almost forgot Rule #1.
So now I’m pushing through a foot of new snow, lungs burning with the exertion of supplying the demand for more air. There are efficiencies in uphill skiing that downhill runs, no matter the skill level, won’t allow. Stride length, weight shift, breathing cadence, the muffled sibilance of each step. Pole placement, perfect waxing that allows forward slides while snow crystals catch the other ski’s base, preventing backward slip and leaving no herringbone tracks for anyone following your trail. Done right, climbing skins can stay in the pack. I’ve been here before, many times. The trail is an old logging road that climbs straight up a timbered ridge, and there are deadfall trees criss-crossed in the forest, impossible to ski through with the limited snows of recent years. When alone, I climb too fast, with an internalized timeclock to punch as a measure of achievement. Like dreams of making first tracks on virgin landscapes, personal bests are burdens, so I force myself to lean on the poles and rest a bit, and look for the light between tree-trunks that signals the open meadows of timberline, thinking of avalanches and hurricanes.
In his book “Backcountry Skiing,” Lito Tejada-Flores writes that an avalanche happens when “a mass of snow becomes too heavy for whatever is holding it up.” It’s a usefully simple reminder that most skiers suffer their own folly when they take the wild ride that ends in death or a great “No shit, there I was!” story. Most often, that extra weight on the snow mass is the skier trying to cut a slope that should have been avoided. Though avalanche beacons are only useful after the fuck-up, gear pages are awash in ad/reviews (brand name, price and website address handily displayed), and I have yet to see a reviewer advocate that victims be left to their own devices. So I’m a bit chagrined at recent suggestions that New Orleanians just maybe deserved their fate, for the sin of living down there below sea level and not having the resources to get away from the storm; and that the nation should let them swim their way to higher ground now that the storm has passed.
I recommend “Backcountry Skiing‚” or some other comprehensive how-to-ski-and-survive book for the bedside reading list of wannabe (and long-time) backcountry skiers. Outside the boundaries patrolled by avalanche crews, it pays to have a working knowledge of snow and weather. Tejada-Flores lays out a pretty good explanation in a chapter called Snowy Secrets. The more who understand snow as a science unfettered by mystical intent, the less will need rescuing from avalanches. Same is true with hurricanes. When 300-year-old cities are awash under storm swells, we are looking at more than municipal plans gone awry or the wrath of a vengeful god.Warmer water means bigger hurricanes; and this year, the Gulf of Mexico is the warmest in recorded history. A societal commitment to scientific assessment of what is making recent storms so damn powerful is in order here, along with educating the masses and their pet politicians on how to live with reality,
Climbing again, and now the treetops have disappeared in cloud. I’m on the lee side of this mountain, and tendrils of cloud can turn to snowstorm quickly. I’ve aborted more than one of these solo treks to timberline. I’ve also skied around too many ominous chutes to call myself a daredevil. In fact, my memory is littered with unfinished climbs, sneak lines on rapids too tough to try and long detours to avoid a down-climb with no return route. The admission may smell like fear, but it looks like longevity in the mirror when I see the graybeard staring back at me. Above timberline to below sea level, caution based on knowledge is good survival strategy. Remembering the rules of accident scene assessment, I left Louisiana a couple of days before the next hurricane hit. At times, the best thing to do is to get out of danger, and come back when conditions are better. Easy to do when avoiding a timberline storm, not so easy when it means abandoning a city.
All of this means that our neighbors down on the south coast are likely going to need some help again, before the politi/corporations and bureau-cretins get beyond commissioning studies and hearings. Sure as avalanches will catch a few skiers in mid-fuckup this winter, hurricane season will roll around next year. There may be storms as great as this year, with evacuees and refugees scattered inland in the wake.You may decide to go and help out. Just remember that one thing best forgotten when you arrive at an accident is ideology. There will be time enough later for critiques and deconstruction, so leave the sanctimony at home.
“When you go” (as they say in the travel magazines), your 2nd Aid kit should contain the ingredients for a batch of gumbo. As supplies poured into southern Louisiana and Mississippi, water and military rations were plentiful if you could get to the distribution centers, but some other societal necessities were forgotten. Things like toilet paper, linens, toiletries, diapers, menstrual pads, soap, bleach, as well as sugar, vegetables, beans and rice.Yet within an hour of arriving in Louisiana I was offered a bowl of gumbo, made by a woman rescued from a rooftop several days after the hurricane had passed. I knew her as Miss Mary. She had been cooking comfort food for evacuees and aid workers alike, using whatever ingredients could be scrounged, and this recipe is in her honor. Simmer these ingredients for several hours: onion, celery, bell pepper, and some kind of meat (use whatever’s available, even if you have to sniff-test it and cook it well). Some recipes thicken the sauce with roux instead of okra, but the word gumbo is derived from an African language’s word for the vegetable we call okra, so I advise tossing okra into the simmering stew. When it is served, sprinkle filé powder on the gumbo. You’ll need a bed of rice to soak up the juice that carries all the flavors, and the guidance of a local can help you avoid slipping into the role of well-meaning invader.
There are always places away from the safe middle of a society, and people will always venture into, even decide to live in them. We can study avalanches and hurricanes, set boundaries on areas for living and playing, but we need to be ready to help those caught in fuck-ups masquerading as accidents. Like filé powder, the edge adds spice. I’m skiing toward timberline again, thinking about hurricanes, avalanches and living in a society that seems afraid to learn enough to prepare for the inevitable storms. Another book that has been on my bedside table recently is titled “Collapse.” The author, Jared Diamond, presents a persuasive case that all societies make decisions in response to changing conditions. Some choose well and survive, while others fail. It’s a good read for those of us who can’t seem to stay outside the bounds forever.
Once, after a winter of health worries, I took a last-of-season ski on this trail. The night had been cold, so ice was the order of the day in the forest, but the skiing was great above timberline. As I started down the old logging road, I felt pretty good. Then things went to hell. All the bumps had turned to icy jumps in the cooling evening. Rossis, boots, and skills were no match. I tumbled more than skied back to the patrolled part of society, hoping I wouldn’t become a project for search and rescue. By the time I saw and heard the highway, it was about all I could do to point myself home, but I’d addressed my fear of being too old in body to go beyond the boundaries, and return.
Contributing editor B. Frank is bitter at the MG office for stealing all of the early season snow this year. For unknown generous reasons, his home zone of southwestern Colorado decided to turn their snow patterns toward Summit County. We couldn’t help but accept. B. Frank’s last story was “Bait and switch” in #119.
