In the Shadow of Mountain and Man.

It was there in photo and in story. It loomed overhead every time we chugged up the winding road to South Lake Tahoe, always too distant to fully grasp, yet too monumental to ignore. All year long its snowmelt cascaded down to the highway in an awesome display, inspiring even the most ignorant of wayward traveler. I'd listen to the retellings of my father's post-high school adventure up its face; how he and his friends set off with gear-burdened packs and Scotch-Guarded Levis. He showed me snapshots of the United States Coast and Geodetics Survey marker at its summit, adding an official seal to its intrigue. Pyramid Peak was always more than a mountain; it was a looming rite of passage waiting to bind me to wilderness, to the endurance of its struggle, and to my father.

This was the year. This was the summer.

By carefully avoiding hunting, fish gutting, heavy equipment operating, and prolonged exposure to dirt and mud, I know I'm a bit of a softy compared to my old man. With this all spinning in my head during the trip’s planning, I’d come to believe that my infallible father’s trip happened in a day. A day! Moreover, my research from a certain website led me to believe it could be done in a similar amount of time.

All excuses aside, I admit the trip into Desolation Wilderness and eventually up the giant rock pile was hastily planned. My good buddy Matt and I decided we’d hike the east face from Twin Bridges, following the Pyramid Creek Trail up Horsetail Falls. We’d stay to the left of Avalanche, Ropi, and Toem lakes and settle in at Gefo, the closest body of water to the peak. We’d relax by the water, plan the morning’s climb and full wilderness descent, and enjoy a nice dinner. Somehow, I failed to realize the final three miles to the summit meant a sheer scramble of vertical bouldering and a near 2,500-foot rise in elevation. All told, while day 1 included an afternoon trek of four miles and 1,000 feet, day 2 meant an ache-awakening three-mile climb immediately followed by a blistering ten-mile descent.

Somewhere before the ascent, I conceded underestimation, and was ready to throw in the towel. Matt wasn't, however, admitting that it would be unbearable to face my dad having not done what we set out to do. It didn't help matters that I was somehow convinced the guy'd originally done it in one huge push.

Did I enjoy the natural splendors, the star-strewn sky, the quiet solitude of the wilderness? Did my lineage, like a magnet, pull me through my vision quest as I resolutely marched into the clouds? One thing's for sure: I am my father's stubborn son, and despite the requisite planning flaws, I trudged on in enjoyment--or by God I faked it.

So with that, I present shreds of the trip. The photos below recount the all-encompassing nature of the ascent. You’ll see backpacking, camping, hiking, mountaineering, sight seeing, cliff scaling, trailblazing, and trail scouting.

Concern nowhere to be found, Matt is still not convinced I ever followed a trail.

Toem Lake, 3.5 miles into the journey, and far nicer than our destination of Gefo.

Consulting the map at something labeled "Kama Lake." Pyramid in the hazy background more than a ridge away.

Base camp, sheltered just below Gefo Lake.

Matt in the kitchen just before we lost the sun.

From left to right: cabernet, lentils, rice medley, and pita.

Looking down on Toem, Ropi, and the pointed shadow of the fabled beast.

Matt in repletion.

Me, satiated.

The calm before the storm.

I can't tell you what time we woke up because we left our watches in the car.

Matt scaling rocks above Gefo Lake without oversized backpack or complaint.

One of many heave/water breaks while scaling the east face.

I'm not even close at this point, but I've convinced myself I'm making progress.

The view became increasingly expansive. At the top of the image you can see the south shore of Lake Tahoe. At the bottom, a spec of Matt.

How sweet it is.

Looking quite accomplished, though still less than one-third done with the day.

Summit view west.

Summit view east.

A bit more in focus than the copy my father took nearly thirty-five years earlier.

You’ll notice no pictures posted from what I’ve built up as an extremely grueling descent. Truth be told, only three exist, and all of them were taken before arriving back at Gefo and rekindling our affairs with fifty-pound bags. (Ironically, the final photo from the trip is of a flower.) Naturally, the compulsion to document got lost somewhere between fatigue and delirium.

Hawaiian Vacation 2008

After six lovely days on the islands, we're happy to be home. Below I've included some photos from our adventures on Kauai and Hawaii. Highlights you won't see include snorkeling (turtles, eels, and countless gorgeous fish in brilliant coral gardens), time and money at the Royal Kona Coffee Company, more of the same at the Mauna Loa Macadamia Nut factory, and a crazy nighttime adventure to Volcano National Park's "End of the Road" (which included heavy rain, flashlights, and fickle strangers hiking craggy lava). Enjoy what made it!
A day's worth of travel deserves a mango margarita at Brennecke's in Po'ipu Beach, Kauai. I helped.

Enjoying the first vacation sunset looking back toward Po'ipu Beach Park.

Trailing Stephanie on a hike through the isolated Na Pali coast. This trail turned into a muddy, miserable mess.

Cliffside in Waimea Canyon. We hiked to the left lip of the waterfall pictured below.

Looking back at our destination. Estimated drop between 800-1200 feet (discrepancies permitted for obvious reasons!).




Sights from the National Tropical Botanical Garden!

Rainbow Falls, Big Island.

South Point, the southernmost point in the United States. Here we saw crazy local cliff jumpers and their sheepish children.

Stephanie braving the wind at Black Sands Beach.

Me capturing the millionth moment at Black Sands.



Another trip highlight: the South Kona Fruit Stand. (Get a smoothie!)

Our route through the Kilauea Iki Crater--across a hardened lake of lava.

The outpour from Halema'uma'u. The sulfur dioxide emitted is substantially larger than the previous day's.

Views of the ever-growing island. The lava meets the sea.

And of course, there are a million more, but you get the idea.

Not There.

Hawaii is the quintessential American paradise. It's a slice of heaven beneath a familiar flag. There's no messy exchange rate, no adapting to operating a car from on the other side of the road. There's no thong-laden, oil stained beaches, and there's no pocket translator. It's a string of islands offering different personalities and flavors, and it's right there off the coast of California.

For me at least, Hawaii's always been cloaked in a mystical aura. It's a weird cultural mural of Polynesian-hippie-volcano lore mixed with pure American commercialism. The state (or multiple states, as I see it) is all happenstance. It's an oasis the earth spit out smack-dab in the middle of the big blue Pacific. In my mind, it was always a place where the cars are Woodys, the drinks are mai tais, and the surfboard racks are never empty. You replace waves with a shaka, or the "hang loose" if you're from da mainland. It was a postcard colored in tanned white skin and tropical flowers, in Tommy Bahama and Jimmy Buffet slack. It was never authentically Hawaiian, though.

And growing up a white kid in America, Hawaii stood as the answer to the Whuddle I do if I ever win the Lotto? question. It was the place everyone wanted to live on elementary school MASH charts (actually we adapted it to C(astle)M(ansion)A(apartment)S(hack)H(ouse)G(arage)), right next to New York and Florida (the other lands fabled in cinema). Hawaii was the light at the end of any number of self-imposed tunnels, a prize that, when attained, could alleviate all of the ailments of a life of servitude off the island. Living out my teenage years in what I considered a small, boring town, I couldn't help but imagine an alternative to the Bud Light cans I found thrown in our driveway. I couldn't help but daydream about an end to late nights spent in parking lots discussing our lack of options; the sweet breathing to follow countless sighs at how nothing ever happened in The Ville. I figured anything with palm trees and smooth shore break would be better than what I was living.

Even as undergrad drew to a close, I continued to find myself fantasizing about a retreat to the islands. Unattached at the time, I put the island on my plate of possible temporary destinations. I thought I saw things clearly and simply. Work, surf, fish, live aloha. I convinced myself I could handle the tourists. I could cater to them. I was fresh off a stint in the hospitalities industry, so I could endure. Vacationing in Maui in 2005 only furthered my fantasy.

Actual life, of course, happened much differently. And thankfully so. In my actual life I returned to the islands, this time to Kauai and Hawaii, and do you know what I found? I found the result of my silly fantasies. Without even looking, I found those same Bud Light cans, this time littered on beach front streets. I noticed numerous groups of locals standing around truck beds in parking lots, presumably talking about how there's nothing to do. I found paradise--it's a string of small, boring towns surrounded by a steady flow of visitors and the same big blue ocean.

And I again learned my Gertrude Stein, as I tend to do from time to time. In her book Everybody's Autobiography, she recounts how the desire to visit her childhood home in Oakland led her on a fruitless journey on which she was unable to locate the actual house. She said, quite profoundly, "There is no there there." That is, what we concoct and envision rarely manifests exactly the way we hoped. Like Stein, I went on vacation hoping to enjoy the paradise I'd constructed in my mind. Instead, I felt the familiar strain of perpetual human longing. I saw general dissatisfaction surrounding tiny glimmers of hope. It's all the same, just in a different setting.

Actual life in paradise is no vacation. It's still just actual life.

Yoga for the Modern Time Traveler.

Not since CSUMB's free evening classes of 2004 and 2005 have I practiced yoga. At the time, I saw it as a hip alternative to stretching, something I rarely coupled with my frequent aerobic exercise and strength training. And, of course, the sessions were free. Undergrad, an endless mecca of identity creation, also allowed me to sample all things hippie, so at the time, free yoga seemed a nice complement to an afternoon of thrift store shopping, drum beating, beatnik reading, and granola buying.

More often than not, these yoga trips were aided by, well, the other additive of green living, so it goes without saying that practicing yoga was never really about the breathing. In fact, I largely considered it an incense-doused guided meditation with friends. But, it proved an easy place to give in to the practice itself and enjoy experiencing a new way to let go of the world outside.

Now, no longer an undergrad and no longer desiring incense or thrift store t-shirts, I decided to again partake in yoga, but this time at the weekly yoga class offered at 24-Hour Fitness. Now a paying customer, you'll usually find me sweating it out like the rest of the lifeless souls who decided a gym open 24 hours a day is the nautilus of choice. Actually, I fit in surprisingly well there considering 24-Hour houses some of the most neurotic and image conscious individuals I've ever seen. (I concur with my friend Kaylan--it's a meat market, but you can't beat it for an evening of exercise with a side of people watching.) So there I found myself, in sandals and soft cotton waiting for class, momentarily stuck on the other side of the fence, looking back at a factory of sweating, heaving machines running their equipment into the grimy, dark floor.

The doors opened and saved me from more self reflection on my role as usual sweater/heaver. Setting my water and towel down, I expected some Nazi spin coach with a Madonna head mic to put on a down tempo house mix and start coaching. While setting up, I ran down my history: three years since the last unfurl of my sticky, purple mat; three years of inadequate quad and deltoid stretches pawned off as "warm ups" before any number of 6-10 mile runs or weight room tour; three years holding my yogic breath. This will probably hurt, I thought.

All said and done, the session was both challenging and soothing and exceeded my expectations. This time, feeling less like a hippie and more like an athlete exploring another facet of physicality, I huffed and puffed my way through the hour-long exercise. While considering all the possible differences I could encounter after my three year break, it was the one unforeseen details that proved the largest hurdle.

The adult mind--mine, at least--would not stop running its internal monologue during the session. (Perhaps the neuroses of the gym is in my brain now?) Ideas and thoughts ran on in a seamless line like tracks on a iPod playlist, and my ears rang with, Am I doing the pose correctly? Should I look like her when I do this? Did I pay my credit card bill?

Oh, inhale.

Isn't Friday so-and-so's birthday? What should I cook for dinner?

Exhale.

Oh. She's changing positions. My leg doesn't go as high as hers. Is that a cramp? Ahhh! It is! Shift! Do I need to go to the store?

It took me nearly an hour, but I finally turned the volume on my brain down. I either organized or ignored the clutter and gave in to the breathing and the focus. I am not yet willing, however, to consider yoga the appropriate time to do such business. I have too much hope that it's more of a purposeful time than personal thought time, that it's more about accomplishing the let-go than sorting through things so you can let go. Other time--driving, say--is a time for interacting with mental lists.

As the session ended, I opened my eyes and reentered the well-lit world refreshed and relaxed from roughly seven minutes of changed perspective. I felt pride for finally escaping my own boundaries, despite the time it took to get there. Victory tasted sweet. So sweetly effective, however, that I was a useless lump of thoughtless sighs for the next 90 minutes.

Therein lies the danger of letting go in a world so driven to perform. Once you book your ticket, you find the vacation too enjoyable to abort.

When I finally came to, it seemed I'd gone back to 1989: TV listings revealed another hideous Gong Show remake, Bush held the office of U.S. president, the words "troops" and "Afghanistan" appeared in the same headline, airlines folded, and Batman and the Joker were all the rage.

Cooking with Culture.

Anne Lammott summed it up nicely. "There is ecstasy in paying attention."

Though she was urging budding writers to act as recorders and conveyors of the human condition, her words undoubtedly send ripples that lap at all shores, no matter your place or purpose. Because it's true. The more you see, the more you allow what's around you to permeate your beliefs and self-created certainties, the more you're apt to learn and understand. And hopefully, in a cyclical sense, you find yourself more equipped to pass on some shred of insight to others who are, like you were, finding ways to observe.

My summertime attention-payment is putting me in debt. Everywhere I go, whether at market, running circles around a downtown park, or in quiet contemplation on a layover in Salt Lake City, I always find myself wading in the endless primordial ooze of my own cultural theories.

Today's observations are the result of Bourdain overload. Now if you don't know Anthony Bourdain or his recent foyer for television and travel , I can bring you up to speed in a New York minute: Lifelong chef writes on the side. His book is well received, so he decides to travel to far off places to explore the food and culture, using his name and cooking connections as a platform for his adventures.

And I must say, in a summer void of all things new in the televised world, it's been nice catching up on Bourdain's adventures. He's a bit verbose at times, silly at others, and always a notch below annoyingly self-involved. But recently watching episodes from past seasons (in no particular order because it's not necessary), I've noticed the ways the show creates a harmonic aura around the bonds between food, culture, and community. Whether he's eating in with a farming family in Laos, at a vendor cart in Korea, or at a rooftop party in the slums of Columbia, the show puts exotic notions of cuisine and culture to rest by highlighting the way food tells a story. Bourdain himself confessed the belief that when someone serves you food, they're presenting to you a version of their life and story.

These stories are made enjoyable because the show lacks a pretentious Western view commonplace in the kitchen. No Top Chef, this man is neither teacher nor critic; he does not descend upon the people and places to guide their culinary hand. He's no Ramsey, yelling and shouting in a chaotic madness. He shows the necessity and value of sacrifice, ceremoniously offing a pig in one episode, and shooting rice whiskey to pay his respects in another. He swallows grilled sparrow and smiles, not because it tastes exquisite, but because he's a guest in a foreign place and knows the value of respect. In same vein, he also knows the merit of fried food and beer. He complements the hands that serve him pig "poop chute," and he's quite liberal with his cigs.

It's great watching a man who refuses to dance get up and do so at the request of his host. He arrives and leaves as a quiet guest, merely traveling and paying attention, and asking viewers to do the same.

And the more I watched, the more I cringed--at its genius, that is.

The sad brilliance of No Reservations isn't apparent until you set the stories told in worldly episodes next to those that unfold here in the states. Aside from a the fantastic display of food and culture produced in Hawaii (to speak plainly, it's very unAmerican), and the Pacific Northwest (odd), Tony's work at home paints a bleak picture.

The underlying connection between food and tradition so clear in his offshore work is absent, and in its place, we're left with a hodgepodge of ideas and pallets gone awry. Invited to parties and celebrations in other countries, we see nothing of the home or the community in the states. In Vegas we're left with upscale casino discomfort dining, trips to shooting ranges and strip clubs. In Jersey it's more of the same, deep fried something-or-others and TV-based bus tours. Once cliff jumping in Sicily, now we eat grilled cheese and Heineken at a dilapidated Ho Jo's on the Shore. They tell the same story, but in undeniably different tones.

Cleveland, Los Angeles, South Florida... there's no continuity here beyond the fact that we're in a place where the culture is distance.

Now, maybe it is Bourdain overload. Maybe I've taken too much time to observe. Maybe that cultural theory muck is like quicksand, and I'm just shouting my last thoughts before going under. Or maybe this travel show from a chef's perspective is pretty damn insightful. But can food really be the glue to hold it together? Can we really only focus on sustenance as it pertains to self, family, and community, and still make ends meet? If we set our schedules to include setting our tables, if we decide that tradition need be no more than nourishment and good company, will the rest fall into place?

Truth is, we probably can't pull off a large-scale value shift. But maybe as we scatter our stones through life, we'll send off the kind of far-reaching ripples that return the favors of the ones we've received.

But then again, it's only a television program.

Summer Days, Drifting Away.

Who would've thought I'd sit here, in the finance- and grief-stricken summer of 2008, typing out a piece of choppy verbiage that recalls and makes relevant the words of John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John?

Tell me more, tell me more.

The summer's been oh-so kind to my mind. But as it speeds off like grease lightening, I'm realizing I have little to show for it.

Enter my third (or fourth, or fifth?) rendezvous with le blog. Bear with me, I can explain.

I'm a dabbler. Always have been, always will be. I am an accessory in the creative world; but a grain of sand in a musical desert, a leaf on the art tree. I can't write much more than a poem or a short story because of the grandeur of the commitment. Same goes for reading. Why do you think I stopped at Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire? It's hard for me to take a lot of what I do seriously because most of it only represents a momentary conviction. But that doesn't mean I'll stop doing it.

And that's why the blog and I should get along. There's just enough time and space here to record an observation, dissect an issue, or detail an adventure. There's no plot, no extensive revision, no performance-based component. I'm going in with the mindset that I'm writing a column, pure and simple. It'll be right here in print, and if you want to read it you can. I'm not charging admission, so there's no anxiety for perfection or to perform.

It's getting hard to send out 30-plus Christmas letters in which I hack down a year's worth of details into three nice paragraphs. I haven't even considered what this blog might save me on postage.

News flash to a dabbler desiring stability: "diligence"--not "grease"--is the word.