Earth Matters: Payback

I had just been caught at the unspeakable, and we won’t speak of it at any length here. My father labeled my behavior unspeakable, a not unexpected departure from my teenaged business as usual. We often landed on different sides of the fence; no surprise there.


I knew I was in it hip-deep in front of the fan, though, and stood ready to withstand my father’s wrath. I was still a minor and recognized his ultimate parental authority over me…just barely. I settled back in a chair anticipating all kinds of black scenarios, but he surprised me.


“I do not approve of what you do,” he said, “but I am not going to judge you. I will leave that to a greater judge than me.”


My first thought was surprise that my lawyer father wouldn’t act the judge. My second thought was that my father’s religious faith must be substantial and his love for me great. Furthermore, if he wasn’t going to judge me, then he might not exact punishment. Whew! What a load off. My surprise was piqued because I had thought my father unerringly of the spare-the-rod-spoil-the-child persuasion.


Since I was often on the receiving end of punitive response, I grew with the perception that punishment should at very least be carefully tailored to the infraction. I figured the Catholics might have it pegged with mortal and venal sin. Mortal wrongs were really bad and mandated severe punishment. Venal stuff, on the other hand, was perhaps not so morally bankrupt, but instead the consequence of failings hardwired into human nature. And after all, I was nothing if not human. I still am.


I also remember one of my first high school research papers, a study of capital punishment. I barely understood what I was researching at the time, which makes it even more improbable that I should remember it all these years later.


The gist: Does capital crime like homicide warrant the death penalty? After weighing conventional wisdom on the matter, I came down somewhere in the middle, conflicted and ambivalent, but convinced for whatever reasons that bad actions can expect to be met with severe retribution. That realization kept me out of trouble…well, most of the time anyway. Yet the threat of retribution didn’t deter others from wrongdoing.


Without calling it either venal or mortal, in 1974 President Gerald Ford pardoned former President Richard Nixon. Nixon served as my first serious political whipping boy during those Vietnam days, and his blatant disregard for law during Watergate further incensed me. I was outraged that with the stroke of a presidential pen, Nixon would walk; he would escape punishment for breaking the law.


Years later, and on a different political tack altogether, President Bill Clinton got into all kinds of trouble. The payback was a partisan effort to exact retribution on Clinton for his dalliance, appropriate if only because a president should exercise propriety. But after all, what Clinton did wasn’t murder. No one died. Clinton’s impeachment lasted months and cost taxpayers millions. What did it accomplish? Not a hell of a lot.


So have you guessed where all this is leading? Yup, when we’re talking presidential malfeasance, all roads lead to George W. Bush.


The Justice Department recently released Bush Administration memos declaring interrogation of “high-value” detainees outside proscriptions of domestic law and the Geneva Conventions. The memos claim Bush had the authority to approve any technique needed to protect the nation’s security. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld outlined twenty-four interrogation techniques to be used, among them “walling,” waterboarding, sleep deprivation and slapping.


Over objections from human rights groups and even members of his own administration, President Obama at first said he would absolve CIA officers from prosecution for using torture. He wants to move beyond, “a dark and painful chapter in our history.” Then he equivocated, laying it on the Justice Department or whatever; the saga continues.


Like before, I am ambivalent. The excuse, “just following orders” seems less and less exculpatory, but that’s what military service is. The buck must stop up the chain of command, at the highest office that issued the order. Then go after that guy and make the punishment appropriate to the offense. The Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld cabal—someone in that hierarchy must answer. Taking those guys down, though, will require a greater judge than me…or maybe not.

Earth Matters: Obligatory green article

“You sold out,” accused my friend, a critic but friend nonetheless.

“I did no such thing,” I answered indignantly.

“What?” she asked. “Are these trees here different than those over there? How can you defend one bunch and not another?”

“I’ve re-evaluated my footprint,” I said. “I’m choosing my battles. I only have so much fight left in me, and I need to concentrate my energy where I think it’ll do the most good.”

I considered that a pretty good answer. It still sounded reactive and defensive, though. I call myself a treehugger and don’t like it when respected colleagues get in my face. Fifteen years ago I’d have been the critic. No one said it would be easy.

Easy or not, the wheel has turned from brown cloud to the vigorous green of awareness under the Obama Administration. The pendulum swings. Nor does it hurt that Earth Day morphed into Earth Week; only one week to be green. Suddenly—we are so psyched—everybody and everything is green.

This isn’t a bad thing. It is backlash from previous environmental wreckage. It could facilitate a return to sensible and scientific policy decision-making. What a concept. It is ironic though, to witness the turnaround from just a few years ago, when it was cool to be as greedy as we wanted to be, with little regard for the world in general. George Bush gave us that.

While enjoying our born-again green awareness, though, we must beware what we used to call “greenwashing.” Now we call it business as usual, whether green or not. Greenwashing is corporate and political slathering of a thin layer of green paint over the egregious brown cloud. It isn’t deep and authentic green; instead it is spin orchestrated to make the consuming public believe it’s all good. We’re on the path to environmental consciousness and a sustainable future. It’s a feel good thing, isn’t it?

True to my belief that balanced attention to television is a good barometer of popular opinion and conventional wisdom, green pixels flood from the glowing box. Green commercials are legion. Green products abound, whether or not their net impact on the planet is negative or positive. Green in the cash box is what counts.

On the internet I found green mortgages, green lenders, green politicians, green action funds, green learning sites and no lack of green spending sites. I visited MSN’s Lifestyle site where they encouraged me to “get my green on.” They invited me to tour ten coastal eco-resorts, and thoughtfully provided an Earth Day shopping guide. At Twitter I can join Generation Green to receive tips and tricks on how I can take action to protect my planet.

FOX News tells me sternly: “Green it. Mean it.” FOX wants to partner with me, “to help take simple steps that will help deliver a better planet to the next generation.” That makes me all tingly. These are the guys that bring us Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity and Greta Van Susteren. Green me up, Scottie!

NBC Nightly News featured an Earth Week series on the planet’s oceans: how we are filling them with trash and killing coral reefs. Part of the series described the crash of world fisheries by pollution or over-fishing. NBC neglected to mention a story reported a few months previously about Alaska’s proposed Pebble Mine and its threat to the Bristol Bay salmon fishery. Bristol Bay is one of the North Pacific’s most important fisheries. How green is that?

Green may be with us for a while. We will either figure out how to minimize our footprint or not. If not, we’ll keep pretending we are. Individual personal choices may yet be the best way to be green; those choices might mean not buying the green product, not buying anything at all.

I remarked on a friend’s new mid-sized pickup truck. Formerly she drove a big F-350.

“It’s my husband’s way of conserving,” she told me, “but I still have the other truck.”

Earth Matters: Obamaisms

It probably started with the Tower of Babel and a bonehead named Nimrod. After the Great Flood effectively reset the clock on technological enterprise, Nimrod and his crew decided it was time to put down roots. They directed a then-united humanity to build the city of Babylon.

At first, Babylon didn't have much of a public works department, and construction was higgledy-piggledy. But Nimrod gathered his engineers, and together they conceived the idea of building a ziggurat, a great tower so tall it would have its top in the heavens. Humanity has always conceived big.

The project might be no big deal today when God is busy elsewhere in the cosmos. But in Biblical times God was trying to organize religion here on Earth and He took exception to Nimrod's hubristic effort to touch the sky. Seeing what the Nimrod crowd was doing, God judged humankind too big for its britches. If we could build a tower tall enough to touch Heaven, what would we think of next?

"Let us go down," said God, "and there confound their language." Soon, unable to understand engineers (ya think?) or each other, workers quit building and scattered across the planet. God figured all was good and went off to create the Andromeda Galaxy and Crab Nebula, apparently still works in progress.

God confounded our tongues so thoroughly that we invented a science to figure it out. "Etymology" studies the origin and development of linguistic form; from its basic elements and earliest use, through changes in form to its current and common usage. Etymology studies the evolution of language.

While biological evolution is an imponderably slow process, linguistic evolution is a human construct and happens faster. Following our diaspora from Babylon, varying languages informed us and became as much who we are as epicanthic folds, curly hair or variously colored skin. At some level, each generation contributes its own iteration to the process.

Take the word "dude," for example. When I was a kid my father took us to a dude ranch in Wyoming. Dudes were basically everything cowboys weren't. We were tourists, clients and city-slickers. We demonstrated no horse sense and practically no common sense. We were mostly a nuisance, but ultimately we provided the beans and coffee. A generation later, "dude" is just another word for person, male or female, common-sensical or not. The word has changed; language evolves.

Given the informative nature of language, it is no surprise that leaders and politicians influence language. They are, after all, in charge of coming up with the tag lines, catch phrases and sound bites that inspire, instruct and threaten. Their words contribute to our language. Dwight Eisenhower coined "military-industrial complex." Sen. Joseph McCarthy got a whole argot named after his intolerant and unfounded anti-communist pursuits. "McCarthyism" has evolved to describe demagogic, reckless and unsubstantiated accusation, especially toward a political opponent.

Nixon's Vice-President Spiro Agnew was particularly adroit at evolving the English language. Agnew—his speechwriters—coined "nattering nabobs of negativity," and "radiclibs." Radiclibs were radical liberals guilty of "pusillanimous pussyfooting on the critical issue of law and order." Law and order under the Nixon Administration: what a concept.

Because of his inability to put words together or craft a complete and meaningful sentence, George W. Bush has contributed to the English language in unforgettable ways. "You teach a child to read," observed Bush, "and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test." He asked, "Is our children learning?" and later said, "The illiteracy level of our children are appalling." Bush defended his own mastery of the language: "...I do not need to explain why I say things. That's the interesting thing about being president." Bush was so cool.

Saint Obama is a different breed of cat, well-spoken and articulate. Detractors grew accustomed to continuous verbal bumbling during the former administration, and roast Obama for invariably using a teleprompter. But hey, if you're going to write a dynamite speech, you might as well get it right when you say it.

History and usage define and create evolution of language, so Obama's policies won't translate into the vernacular for some time. Whether he succeeds or fails at economic policy, the president will be known for Obamanomics. If he is successful at facilitating Middle East peace, we will have the Pax Obama. EnvirObama will address the grievous harm to our environment visited by the former administration. And if he somehow fixes health care and other entitlements, we will have RxObama. But I wonder, did Barack Obama ever call anyone dude?

Gravity Works: Spring tease

The fat lady is so over it. She finally had her say, and got to take off that itchy corset. It was doubly uncomfortable under her retro one-piece, and made it almost impossible to buckle her boots. To her credit, though, she looked pretty good flirting with the half-naked young stoners on Paradise deck. Who could blame her?


Besides, I know for a fact she wasn’t pounding down Phoenix Bowl or hiking Teocalli Bowl in that corset. Late season snow made for outrageous powder in all those favorite lines, and even motivated me to hike for it. I got fooled several times, skiing Morning Glory in the zone and forgetting the traverse back onto Headwall was closed. Oh well: the skiing invariably turned out to be great, and the hike out wasn’t all that onerous.


I am pretty sure, though, the fat lady made it to the peak of Crested Butte Mountain where a closing day party gathered to sing along. I’m not absolutely sure she made it to the party because I didn’t make it up there myself. Instead of hiking to the peak, and knowing I wouldn’t be able to enjoy the luxury until next ski season, I concentrated on skiing a few final lift-served runs. Why hike, I ask myself, when I should be skiing?


Unlike some of my more enthusiastic colleagues, exercise isn’t my sole motivation for skiing. I ski for fun and lifestyle, and if I must, I will commit exercise to accomplish that. I don’t entirely enjoy hiking up mountains, but the rewards are proportional to the effort. Regardless, I am honestly looking forward to skiing places where ski lifts will never turn. There is something to be said for that…besides the view and of course, the exercise.


One distinct phenomenon colored our final ski days: A great amount of Utah real estate blew into Colorado. Ski Utah, stay home. High winds carried red dust from Utah’s Colorado Plateau desert over our Colorado mountains. It was positively apocryphal; blood-red skies howled as red dust covered everything and colored the snowpack. It wasn’t the first time we’d witnessed Utah red—Taylor called it Navajo snow—but it was...memorable.


Skiing Navajo snow in flat light helped me distinguish the surface; slicing through it was a colorful experience. But it’s not all good. That stuff will make the snow melt faster since it absorbs instead of reflecting sunlight. It might make for good corn snow, but will probably also limit opportunity because the snow will get too warm and soggy too fast. Nor does Utah red bode well for summer water retention, since the snowpack will melt and flow back to the desert before its water has time to sink into the ground.


Red snow didn’t prevent the fat lady from warbling on the peak. She closed out eighteen months of skiing for me, the longest ski season of my life. It isn’t completely over yet, though, since I still anticipate skiing during May and June. But even the diehard in me recognizes a coda when he hears it. Hardly had her dulcet echoes subsided when chairlifts closed and ski patrollers pulled the ropes.


With ropes gone and closures vanished, the whole mountain is open again. Teo Two might offer decent powder, and the West Side will offer good corn to anyone with the energy to get up there. Moguls will vanish into the surface and the skiing should be good. For my part though, when I choose to hike, I’ll do it somewhere I haven’t ridden lifts all winter. Hiking makes me more discerning.


Always bittersweet, I concentrated my last few runs on not getting hurt, not getting hit. Sometimes I want ski season to last forever; sometimes it is entirely appropriate that it be over. One way or the other, over it is.


Once again, the cyclical nature of resort living defines my life. We lifestyle enthusiasts pack off into whatever off-season pleasure and adventure we can conjure. Winter passes, spring teases and summer beckons. Don’t complain about the heat.

Earth Matters: Scribble

I have a hard time calling myself a victim because I know I am very lucky. I am lucky because I got what I wanted. I live in a place I wanted to make my home since I was a kid. I try to be a good citizen in the natural community that surrounds me, and I engage a human community that is as much a part of me as the air I breathe and the snow I ski. Such is the nature of my place and my home.

One affordance of my place is its isolation. While isolation is not necessarily a good thing for our growing tourist industry, it is mother’s milk to those of us who walk the trails and climb the ridges. Living at the head of the draw in the fastness of the Rocky Mountains offers peace and refuge we can walk to. Isolation insulates us from the vicissitudes of life in that big world out there…most of the time.

But this time, those vicissitudes are so severe they have finally trickled down to places like Crested Butte. Resorts are places where visitors have a good time and spend money if only to escape their everyday troubles at home. We will always host visitors, but now perhaps not so many. And that hurts.

Thus, I am not a victim of a trashed economy, but merely a participant. I participated by getting laid off one writing job—hopefully only seasonal—and laid back at the other. I’d rather be laid back than laid off because I consider myself a pretty easy-going guy and have a lot of practice at being laid back. It’s in my temperament.

Given that, I anticipated relief from a weekly deadline I’d met for some thirty years. I actually like that deadline, though, because it requires sitting down and writing, actually chasing the cursor and getting words down on a page. Sometimes that is no easy task, yet it is one that has become a part of me and my routine. Routine is also part of my temperment.

So I faced my deadline day with ambivalence…and succumbed to routine. I sat down to write knowing this week’s offering wouldn’t appear in this week’s paper. With luck it would run in a couple of weeks. The pressure is off, but instead I labor under a different master, one of my own contrivance; one more easily duped but less easily appeased. Scribble on.

Thirty years is a long time to scribble and I’m an old dog who looks askance at new tricks. But if I want to scribble at all, if I can’t adopt new tricks, at least I can adapt to a new way of scribbling. What that means is coming up with a new formula, foregoing the old as too dense, too involved and, well…too much.

“It doesn’t have anything to do with your art,” said my boss, trying to hide a grin, “but with reductions in advertising because of the economy. We don’t have as much room for words. You have to cut it down.”

“But how will I develop complex ideas?” I asked. “How can I generate and hold interest? How can I use sources to make a point without all those words.”

“Did you ever hear of a sound bite?” he looked at me, the matter closed. That’s why he’s the boss.

That’s what a new formula is: short, fast and to the point. Think attention deficit.Bite my tongue.

Furthermore, it is no secret that newspapers—print media in general—are in trouble. They’re going broke, and apparently even our resort newspapers are feeling the crunch. Is there any guarantee that when the economy rebounds newspapers will bounce too? Not necessarily. So where are we getting our information?

Information is flowing across the internet. Even television relies on the internet to decide what is on the public radar, what news is fit to air. And many of those radar blips come from blogs, comments and commentary, diaries, journaling and vanity publishing, all freely available online. Anyone can blog; it’s Darwinian.

I have been trying for some months to successfully enter the blogosphere, but that environment is different than writing for a local weekly newspaper. The blogosphere hosts a broader audience. Readers are interested in more diverse topics than we can perhaps generate up here in our high-altitude isolation. Writers have to earn readership and it isn’t easy to place even well-crafted sound bites where readers can find them.

But I’m not letting any of that discourage me. I figured out how to blog, where to publish my (extended) sound bites, and now I can feed my need to keep scribbling. Write on. Now if only I had a deadline.