This past Saturday night Scott, a few of his work buddies, and myself headed up to Brighton ski resort which is only about 20 minutes up the road from our house up into the mountains. This was my first experience snowboarding, and though I knew it would be challenging...I had no idea. I'm smiling in the photo, but definitely not smiling as I sit here writing this.It has not snowed up at Brighton for a week or so, and the ski/ride enthusiasts have packed down the otherwise powdery white substance into a bone-jarring force to be reckoned with. Scott patiently waited for me to get my cumbersome gear on while wearing thick snowgloves in the 20-something degree weather. Finally, I was ready to go. First stop, bunny land.
The "Explorer" lift had a few of the other beginners mostly on boards, some on skis, some on bike-skis. I went up with Scott, fell off the ski lift, and set the tone for the night. The first run down was a beating, I fell countless times, usually on my butt, sometimes on my hands.
Scott took off after awhile and I kept going. By the second lift up, I was able to coast off the lift without falling, and by the 5th or 6th time (though my body was screaming I should quit), I actually made it down the slope without falling, cruising along like I kind of knew what I was doing. And then the mighty series of falls started, two of which were caused by my very own husband whom I tried to scream at to get out of my way (he rides black diamonds...you'd think he'd be able to avoid a mad bunny on a slope). Lord!
That evening, I do not remember ever being so sore in my life.
My list of injuries:
- mild whiplash and very sore neck
- bruised wrists and right elbow
- bruised knees
- bruised tailbone and right butt cheek
- messed up right arm and shoulder from hard fall
- sore muscles all around
I had a few thoughts about coming to Utah and about leaving California. Mendocino County is where I grew up, the Ukiah valley actually, which is the county seat. Mendocino County is about 120 miles north of San Francisco in the Coastal mountain range. It is geographically characterized by steep, misty coastal mountains, redwood trees, and old vineyards and cattle ranches. In the 1980’s, it was an idyllic place to grow up, a mix of old-west Rockwellian and modern California rural. In other words; it was a very cool place to grow up.
ReplyDeleteBut in the 1970’s, and with increasing vehemence in the 1980’s a new , but very vocal minority group whined ever and ever louder to stop logging, and even growth and industry altogether. This wild collection of disaffected hippies, and socialist misanthropes, moved to the rural mountains of Mendocino County in the 60’s and 70’s to escape the polluted cess-pit that was the product of their “summer of love” efforts.
So naturally, and as they have done ever since whenever they have moved to a new area, they brought their decrepit social dysfunctionality and hatred with them. They rightfully earn a healthy load of resentment and hatred from the locals who had grown up there and seen the changes brought by these dirty-footed, hippy socialists. The locals I grew up with were ranchers, Italian grape farmers, loggers and fisherman. It was a place of hard working honest types who enjoyed a place as much as anybody could. It was mostly a county of libertarians, content to let anybody do anything , as long as it did not infringe on their rights or freedoms. Easy prey for nanny state liberals with a zealots mindset to control others. The socialists who moved into Mendocino County were the brothers and cousins of the socialists infecting Marin County, Sonoma County, Portland, Oregon, and later even Idaho. Wherever they went, they were convinced, like a modern day Vasco De Gama, that they knew what was right for the locals; and it was whatever the hell they said it was.
It would start innocently enough, by claiming that they wanted to stop the local logging companies from logging in certain areas, or not to log where the Northern Spotted Owl was seen (since that was a listed Endangered Species). Later the logging companies had to stop logging vast tracts of mountains and that put them out of business.
Then the mills went out of business, because they could not get logs, and because the busy-body socialists complained that the steam coming out of the mill was actually PCB laden smoke. Later, after all the industry had closed up or left, there was nowhere to work and nothing to do, well almost. There were things to do, the socialists made sure of that; there were after-all brand new government buildings, built by the same big government types to make sure that all the ex-ranchers, and ex-loggers, and ex-millworkers, and ex-truck drivers could get welfare. Sure food stamps and welfare didn’t replace the proud, high paying jobs they once held, but it was steady – right?
This is just one more example of the unintended consequences of unchecked environmentalism and crazy socialist/progressivism. My home town has to deal with the effects of a devastated economy, run away crime, unchecked marijuana and methamphetamine production and dealing, large populations of illegal aliens (mostly in the area to grow dope and take over the regional drug trade), this must have been a job Americans were unwilling to do, and of course the huge expansion of the welfare state in what was once, a thriving and proud middle class region.
I grew up with friends who made $60 to $90 thousand dollars per year in the mill, logging or driving a log truck. After socialist reforms and the unintended consequences of radical liberalism, they now make $8 per hour pouring lattes for adventurous yuppies from San Francisco come up to make fun of the rustic locals and taste the coastal wines.
After just about 15 years of hard work the advance force of hippies had managed to destroy an active, proud and thriving middle class community and replace it with a county full of dope growers, welfare rejects, fat-ass food stamp clowns, and illegal alien gangsters……YAY, isn’t social reform great everyone….!!!
No wonder Idahoans, and Oregonians and countless others don’t want California liberals in their communities – Nobody in their right mind would. My wife and I now live in Utah, and we love it; the mountains are incredible, and the sense of wonder I feel at being in a place where rationality and sanity have a place in the discussion is invigorating.
Almost daily, I am gob-smacked by the average Utahn’s capacity to be friendly and kind and respectful, to complete strangers. When I first got here I thought maybe people were angling to borrow money, or they wanted some other cynical favor. Later I realized; no, they don’t want anything, and probably wouldn’t take an unearned dollar for the offer. They are genuinely friendly and respectful of others. How refreshing.
In California it was always popular to say those types of things, but it was always a phony conviction by people full of anger and resentment. The one thing I miss least about California is the overriding stench of cowardice that comes from a perpetual state of passive aggressiveness. At first I could not identify what I liked so much about Utah, but now I know; its been a long time since I felt at home.
First time visitor to your blog here. Just wondering why you haven't written lately? You should grace us with a new post :)
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