Vote! A revolution of one...

This morning Oregon Public Broadcasting reported that last night a man riding a bicycle threw a Molotov cocktail at a Portland police cruiser. He was apparently arrested seconds later and the cop car survived unscathed…

Sitting in the eye of your own hurricane it becomes easier to muse on just how strange the world is becoming… I was continuing on my calculated tack of eking out a little more time by selling off assets and reinvesting in more practical items for the long haul. Less sure of what the long haul may look like and not wishing to idly and invite depression, I proposed an adventure to escape the rainy doldrums of Portland. Let’s test out the ’99 Saturn wagon I had just acquired by selling off my gas-gulping truck… A road trip with my partner was just what we both needed.

Maureen proposed Olympia, just two hours north where one our favorite bands, Sassparilla, were playing at some no doubt divey bar. Neither of us had been to the capital of next door. As we drove I 5 Maureen read aloud candidate profiles, Oregon ballot measures, diligently filled in the bubbles making me feel more lost in my hurricane of financial and vocational woes. My mail in ballot had not arrived in So Cal, had not been forwarded…

It was drizzling beneath gunmetal gray skies in Olympia and it felt like we were driving through a washed out watercolor. We passed the capital on our way to our motel. The legislative building looked quite a bit like the capitol in DC. This capitol is the tallest self-supporting masonry dome in the US at 287 feet. It spoke of a slipping era of Doric, Corinthian and granite-blocked opulence. The downtown had yet to fall prey to serious attempts at urban renewal and felt strangely 1970’s ish.

We checked in to the hotel and I was instantly convinced the new tires would be gone by morning and the Saturn up on blocks so I parked at the front door beneath the brightest lights. We carried our extra clothes up the stained carpeted stairs past the aged security guard and questioned the wisdom of booking online, sight unseen… The ceiling had massive spackle marks and the walls had bare spots where it was obvious large framed pictures had recently been… Outside was a view of a back stairwell, the landing decorated with 100 cigarette butts. The room’s safe was broken.

We threw caution to the wind and left the computer in the room and headed to Capitol Lake for a stroll. Blustery, rainy… Angular dirty buildings on the grided streets, views of the port and horse skeleton-like cranes that seemed frozen in the fading light of dusk. Two bald men walked their dachshund and a black lycra clad woman jogged past. A homeless woman wrapped in a blanket strolled by.

Pre and post concert we wandered 4^th avenue - past sleeping homeless, leopard mini-skirts, used book stores that smelled of rotting vellum and counter-culture decay, a puking man who’s girlfriend rubbed his back. The vibe was very different from Portland making us feel tragically unhip. A bit like dreadlocked Arcata but with a grungier Seattle edge. Steampunk meets hippie post-apocalyptic hipster pirate rocker. Olympia seemed on the edge, a glimpse of where the world was likely headed in the wake of our Franken-hurricanes, super pacs and urbanity …Poorer, dirtier, more ambivalent and hedonistic, puking in the dirty gutters of yesterday’s Haight-Ashbury and bedfellows with H. S. Thompson and Bukowski.

For breakfast we hit up Dargan’s. It was packed. It was 11 and we waited half an hour for our Americano and soy mocha because they gave precedence those ordering Brass Monkey’s… Orange Juice with Olde English 800. As I ate my aptly named Volcano omelet with its fried jalapenos I wanted to Shazam the music that assaulted us like a tsunami through the speakers that seemed to have ripped cones to add to the grungy bass-laden atmosphere but my phone had died. No doubt the bastard child of a Radiohead/Nirvana tryst. The Wizard of Oz décor reminded that we definitely were not in Judy Garland’s Kansas anymore…

Leaves fell; amber beer was sipped from pint glasses by bandana slung corsairs, refugee roadies from a Guns and Roses tour. Scarecrowed scruffy rockers sipped espressos while their tiny designer dogs peaking out of slung messenger bags. I actually looked forward to returning to Portland, as short-lived as that feeling may be. Maureen and I talked of escaping and becoming baristas in a Mallorcan café…

Smooth sailing home over the border. Maureen dropped her ballot off at the Beaverton library along with others stuffing their hopes and dreams in a slotted wastebasket that might just morph into political sublimity. Doing some challenging calculations we figured out the Saturn got 36.5 mpg. Maybe there is still hope circumventing Thunderdome… By god I felt compelled to vote more than ever. Success. Another rejuvenating road trip.

 all images and writing ©Bennett Barthelemy

Heroes of the Vertical

Getting to interview some all time heroes in the climbing world for this Climbing Mag feature  was certainly one of the highlights of my life! 

All the interviews held surprises: My conversations (and later getting to do a photo shoot at Owens) with the late John Bachar surprised me - just standing with him, his incredibly relaxed but paradoxically intensely focused demeanor was unique and powerful; Johnny Copp for his very deep, mystical musings; Steph Davis for her very thoughtful and thought-provoking responses; Lynn Hill for calling me out on my interview questions saying, "I don't like to think in absolutes..." Kennan for his ability to blend his passions for photography, family and verticality. Lauren and Paul for sharing their love of the lifestyle... 

Most of us know these people from photos, a few seconds of sound bites in a video, a memoir written in tandem with another author... To have a back and forth, as limited as it was, but on deeper topics offered a dimensionality and depth which helped me to understand some of the commonalities about what makes us human and what makes some of us a little bit more successful... 

Unfortunately, these too are are just soundbites, snippets to offer a glimpse. The original interviews were of course thousands of words longer... 

Tom Frost should have been included in this project. Thankfully I got a chance to interview him a year later. Click here to read Tom Frost prespective - Tom, without a doubt, is one of the most amazing human beings I have had the good fortune to spend a bit of time with. We talked and I shot a few pics of him as he made a set of Frost Sentinel Nuts in his garage. From being one of the first photographers to lug a camera up El Cap, to hearing his philosophy, stories and perspectives about life and the climbing life, the magical moments with Tom I will never forget.

You all continue to be incredible inspirations- thank you.

Weather the Storms...

Fall leaves in cyclonic spins rustle through the storied concrete cave, chasing strays and stray thoughts...
Anchored, while watching jets arc from the tarmac beyond - as if shot from some massive, modern Mongolian longbow. Cutting through the leading edge of black storms, the endless wet of dark waves crashing through my afternoons and evenings. A hundred giant arrows launched ceaselessly into the calling void, imagining they safely deliver my thoughts to distant realities.

Maybe a tiny piece of me with each one, to one day be gathered up again as I explore those obscured latitudes so impossibly far away... My life moves in a fractured perambulation suggesting something sacred slipped. A ghost in my own reality as my mind constantly flies past this constant crushing of steel and stormy sky.

A tight rope, a slacked line, a thread well frayed and blowing in the ceaseless wind... Those few hours recapture the light, the warmth, the fading glow... Seeking to braid the fray, numb fingers chasing the numb mind, remembering solid knots to sustain a mobile, fluid anchor far beyond this prison of reflected light...

Ninkrossi Cyclocross...

All images and text ©Bennett Barthelemy

Something to be said for serendipity and timing... Scanned the internet yesterday for local events and found that Washougal's 3M Park was hosting the Ninkrossi Cyclocross event... Men and women elite raced together...

The love of competition? The love of physical pain?

Dedication to a sport took on a whole new meaning for me yesterday in the rain and mud while watching these athletes spin for an hour. Cowbells and cheers from what sadly seemed like only a handful of spectators... Family members and those who had already ridden there event or were yet to ride seemed to make up the bulk of the crowd...

Super fun to shoot... psyched to go back.

Carl Decker was only one that never seemed to be tired and won for the men.

Beyond the Southeast Corner

My recent rediscovery of Beacon Rock, beyond the Southeast Corner, seems destined to be short lived with the rain finally making its way back. Discovered some steep and techy pure trad lines fulfilling the requisite needs for exposure, adrenaline, adventure jungleneering with scenery quotient satisfied. Jills Thrill, Fear of Flying, Dod's, Dastardly etc... Last year I had a slow start but managed an intriguingly mossy, runout and  quite loose adventure route via the original 1901 romp which includes looping railroad spikes from the 1901 FA. The history was its selling point but it is not something I would choose to do again. Call me spoiled but also found the Southeast Corner and save a few moves of Warrior was quite underwhelmed in terms of quality.

Last year in the blazing summer heat I also slithered my way up Windsurfer, perhaps the best pitch there so assumed there would be a few more gems lurking. If it weren't for the fees to park, the near 9 months of rain and the hour plus drive, falcon closures, the endless trains blasting past it would be a much easier destination. Bugling elk on the island offshore (thanks Kenny for clueing me in that Elk are such able swimmers) and kiteboarders wheeling around the windswept surf and dodging barges is pretty neat when you get  up high enough. When I feel charged enough to tackle the slicked-out 11s I am sure I will enjoy the place even more.

Kenneth Allen follows Dod's...

Beacon does have a unique charm... Lots of sketchy pitons, techy slick climbing and tricky gear while negotiating loose rock and grass hummocks mantles and grades that seem like they were pulled out of a hat... The positioning is stunning and the staunch stalwart crew of disciples it has bred over the years is also quite remarkable... Check out the new and improved and recenyly ramped up Beacon Rock Climbing Association... I hope to make it out for the next trail day...

Escape Velocity

All images and text ©Bennett Barthelemy

“Every year I pick fruit in California, Oregon, Washington and Montana.” That’s a big migration. “No its not. Not compared to the world.”

I remember hearing that it required speeds of 17,000 miles per hour, or roughly 2.5 miles traveled in a single second, to escape Earth’s gravity and make it into space. There are times when I feel so heavily anchored it feels it would take twice that inertia to make it beyond incorporated space and into wilderness. Staring at the clock, looking through a pane of sun-reflected glass and trying to avoid wishing I was somewhere else. It takes work to enjoy the moment no matter how fractured and disassociated I may feel from the vertical, from the unpaved sources of inspiration, the uncluttered and unspoiled vistas where sweat and sights are savored.

Ultimately, there is the yin and the yang of it all -  the realization that you must have the dark to appreciate the light. The hours of “the bread and butter work” as Carl Sanderg described it, help provide a solid juxtaposition to better appreciate the seemingly ever-truncated flights of fancy back into wonder, the creative, the inspiring, the sustaining… Ultimately one begets the other…

The trick, as the Dalia Lama proposes, is to find completion, contentment, in any task or reality that you inhabit. The $8.80 an hour job that keeps you in poverty and just barely fed, engaging an environment where physicality rules and there is no room for individual expression or creativity… How do we find sustenance, the kind that feeds and inspires the soul, in the day to day with few hours here and there to resurface and breath the air that keeps us dreaming?

Wisdom, inspiration, kindness  - can come from unlikely sources and in the most unlikely of places… Making the everyday, the mundane – magical again. Finding the ever-elusive escape velocity to realize that flight of fancy, whether it is through a serendipitous moment or a roadtrip, a calculated afternoon allocating several hours to the whimsy of adventurous possibility with an open eye and heart - traipsing through the sacred geography of the vertical or the unexplored corners of the extended backyard – This for me is the joie de vivre, the wanderlust of the spirit calling, the call that must always be answered, that expands both internal and external horizons.

It requires a smile, a laugh, an openness to engage a landscape or an individual, let the armor down for a moment and feel, relate, empathize - allow perspective to penetrate the way the light from a forest fire tinged sunset changes the usual textures and colors at dusk. Reality must be challenged, shaken up to be expanded, better appreciated, made special. It requires effort, stamina…

“Every year I pick fruit in California, Oregon, Washington and Montana.” That’s a big migration. “No its not, not compared to the world.”

“Come back and next time I will tell you the story about this hat. Its my grandfather's, he was buried with it.”

Nascent Patriotism and Embalming

All images and text ©Bennett Barthelemy and some images licensed through Tandem Stock

“I think it’s just a place for a bunch of closet racists.”

Mike had just expressed a somewhat tepid response to my days plan - to casually intermingle with a 500 or so living anachronisms and a cadre of a dozen Meetup photographers from Portland. Enroute to MacIver State park, at the Clackamas Shell staion, I had randomly picked up Mike who was heading to his rented room on the other side of Estacada. Oddly enough, he was a photographer as well, shooting bands. I told Mike I had never been to a reenactment, never thought I would go - mainly because I too assumed I could find better things to fill my time. But this morning at 8 AM I found myself charging forward with some excitement.

I found a strange mix of emotions stirred while attending the Civil War reenactment... The first was a bit of shock at shoveling out five dollars for the state park entrance and another eight for the event. 13$ was how much a soldier in the Civil War earned in an entire month of fighting and I blew it in two minutes. Back then that same soldier could trade that months pay and get himself embalmed. Money really went a lot further then. This investment had me determined to make the most of the day.

As I parked I could see scores of the period white canvas tents set up in a section of the sprawling park that went westward into groves of trees and out of sight. It had turned out to be a stellar sunny day, the first day of fall, despite a bit of a dismal forecast for gray skies. The battles took place twice that day with over three hundred soldiers on foot, horses, complete with canons, muskets, rifles, revolvers blasting. Smoke, ear deafening blasts, the ground literally shaking… The choreographed battles, which I am guessing were meticulously researched and followed to the best reality given the terrain, troops and supplies and safety of everyone - were pretty damn epic despite the odd smile in the heat of battle.

I admit to getting emotional when the first soldier took a bullet and dropped. This took a while during real fighting apparently with each side getting closer and closer to each other because the accuracy of the guns was not great and you often had to aim high to arc the bullet – hard to be a straight shooter unless you could see the whites of their eyes, literally. It wasn’t the stirrings of some nascent patriotism but rather an empathic response to a glimpse of the reality of life and death on the front lines. The reenactors would speak in the present tense and it would be “our company”  -or as one hoop skirted woman told me from the Maryland camp which was a border state which divided families right down the middle as to which son might fight for the north or south, “We would stay in hotels in nearby towns while our husbands fought”. This definitely gave it an immediacy and realism I did not expect. Kids ran around playing croquet, there were polite repartees between husbands and wives. The food was period and localized as were utensils. They stayed pretty true to character. Union soldiers were not to cross into the Confederate camp and vice versa… I suspect the decades span of reality between the two worlds that these men, women and kids inhabited became more than a little blurry.

You could walk into camps and ask questions of individuals and listen to the programmed scheduled talks. Each would have a researched spiel about who and what they were about with some cool tidbity historical facts to try and put you there. During an artillery and firearms talk one soldier shared, “Imagine how demoralizing it would be if the man next to you just had his head blowed off.” This was the sound bite comments I came away with. In truth it was the walking through the various sections of the Union and Confederate camps that gave me the best appreciation for that reality. At the medical talk the nurse asked the crowd how you would get to the hospital. “Say your best friend was next to you and shot in the leg. Would you help him to find the hospital? No, because you could instantly be shot for desertion.”

 Field hospitals were open air, often because the newly invented chloroform would be knocking out the surgeons as well if they weren’t careful. Gut wounds? They gave you some laudanum and left you to die. The least injured was always taken first, probably because you could send them out to fight again. Amputations were exceedingly common. A grizzly affair of applying a scalpel around the limb to be hacked to peal the healthy skin back and expose arteries and muscle. Then the saw… then the filing of the bone… they would then tie off the arteries with strings left hanging out and use medically infused wax to mold the stump. After a few days the surgeon could gently tug on the string hanging beyond the stump and if it came free easily the could be reasonably assured that the artery had healed shut they would not have internal bleeding.

The embalming tent was perhaps the coolest. Apparently some 10% of bodies were embalmed during the Civil War, the new vogue thing to do. As a soldier you could pay 13$ to get a card and ensure an embalming of yourself if the chaplain found it pinned to your coat, and there was enough of you left on the battle field that the card hadn’t disintegrated. That way you could get home to be buried in the family plot. Creosote oil was often used but that would turn the body black. Then they used arsenic but embalmers were dying with its application. Gaping wounds had cotton or rope stuffed in them and then were sutured shut.

The army did not have ways of identifying next of kin so you would get a note that you had a package to pick up at the local post office. Oh boy. Is it that bag of apple seed? Hey, Mabel, that box is kinda big for for a catalog. Oh, shit, its Jimmy!

Some 3 million fought in the Civil War. Blacks (called coloreds there because they heeled closely to the vernacular of the times-I only saw one cell phone being used and one Red Bull and Mango shake being consumed by a reenactor), Native Americans… The embalmer was currently brokering a deal to sell his extensively researched act that he performed for 13 years as a newspaper reporter and said had a couple prospective buyers to carry on that torch.

I would gladly pay 13$ again to see that and watch another battle - for sure…