Woodsie
Trail Wise!
Colorado
Posts: 272
|
Post by Woodsie on May 2, 2016 17:51:14 GMT -8
My opinion of another persons fear may be that I find their fear unreasonable but to that person their fear is sound. I agree with this 100%. I am terrified of spiders. I know it isn't logical, but it's a real fear for me. I'm okay with other insects and snakes; spiders can send me into hysterics in short order.
|
|
rebeccad
Trail Wise!
Writing like a maniac
Posts: 12,677
|
Post by rebeccad on May 2, 2016 21:10:16 GMT -8
I only fear that my last day will surprise me and I won't have the opportunity to tell everyone what I think of them without reproach. LOL! A coworker sang "Take this job and shove it" at his retirement party (in fact, for those who care, he was the original for the Ninja Librarian). You are planning to take it to the next level.
|
|
BigLoad
Trail Wise!
Pancakes!
Posts: 12,923
|
Post by BigLoad on May 2, 2016 22:02:08 GMT -8
What is unreasonable fear?
Unreasonable fears are what other people have. All my fears are totally reasonable.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on May 3, 2016 6:11:55 GMT -8
I had been doing training hikes with a loaded backpack. I was at the turn around point for the day when I made a decision to keep on going. My Topo map showed there was a trail to the mine on Iron Mtn. When I got to a junction the way onward was not clear. Instead, I was looking at manzanita that had grown to a bit over waist high.
No, I was on my first backpacking trip. I had not told anyone where I was going. Heck my wife would only find out when I did not return at the end of the day. I was not going to let a patch of waist high manzanita stop me on my trip of stupidity.
I plowed on through with my trusty frame pack catching on many of the branches of the manzanita. I did it. There before me, at the end of the manzanita patch was trail. Me, my pack, and my gear were on our way to see this mine on Iron Mtn. A trip of one calamity after another. Heck I was even wearing a pair of Jordache white jeans.
I had been letting my wife know that on one of these trips I was going to try an overnighter and not to worry, too much, if I do not come home at the end of the day. This day was a Friday, I had taken off work to go on this little jaunt. The date is easy to look up cause on Sunday the Northridge earthquake was to happen.
I fell into a rhytm with my hiking stick on the old trail. A few moments to introduce the hiking stick. It was an oak broom handle, I got from Home Depot. It would play a role.
Every once in a while I'd stop to look around and take in my surroundings. On a few of those stops, I'd heard the movement of sliding rock and sand. I'd look around to find the source of the sound but was unable too.
All of a sudden the ground just slid out from under me and I found myself in a liquid sea of rock, dirt, ground debris, and noise.
When I went to the ground, the hiking stick was thrown out from me. I was being swept along downhill face first. And here is where I learned about the freezing terror that became a part of my existance. On one hand things were happening fast, on the other hand things were happening very slow. I was able to see what was going on around me and take it all in but at the same time I was thinking of my wife and kid and how they may never know what happened. My body was a rigid floating piece of debris flowing downhill.
My hiking stick flowing down the hill became the focus of my attnetion. I see it doing little bounces as it flowed quickly down the hill. The hiking stick then sailed over an edge, hung in space for a moment, then one end turned downward. I watched the hiking stick disappear over the lip of a 400ish foot drop. I thought "I'm next."
My mind unlocked with that thought of "I'm next" and I pushed my arms into the liquid ground. I grabbed a tree root which stopped my slide down hill. I was turned to face up hill and fought with the dirt that built up in front of my face. I, eventually, felt the ground slowing and solidifying. I quickly drew my arms to the surface and laid there recovering from the experience.
I did make it to the old mine at Iron Mtn. I did make other errors on that trip but the way I feel and deal with fear was changed.
Oh, when I got home my wife explained how she found this course put on by the Sierra Club on backpacking and she had signed me up for the course and had already mailed the check.
|
|
jazzmom
Trail Wise!
a.k.a. TigerFan
Posts: 3,059
|
Post by jazzmom on May 3, 2016 7:01:17 GMT -8
I don't have a lot of fears in general, and no unreasonable ones that I can think of. I think a lot of people think I don't have enough, to the point of stupidity.
But, a little sadly, I think I'm developing one. My father passed away a little over a year ago and my mother is in hospice right now, dying of cancer. I'm an only child and I'm suddenly scared to death of getting old. Between the two of them, I've seen all the terrible things that happen... my father had Parkinson's, couldn't walk, had dementia. My mother's still sharp as a knife but we're having to totally compromise that in order to manage her pain. Getting old sucks, and the process of dying sucks even worse -- and no way to avoid it.
|
|
foxalo
Trail Wise!
Life is infinitely stranger than anything the mind could invent.---Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Posts: 2,359
|
Post by foxalo on May 3, 2016 7:24:36 GMT -8
As much as I love being around a fire, I have a fear of dying in one. Goes back to when I was in fifth grade and seeing a house burn down from across town very early Christmas morning. The next day, I found out it was one of my classmates. Everyone but the father died.
What's weird is that I don't fear traveling or hiking alone. I've had relatives make comments about how awful my husband is to let me do that alone. Would I like company? Sometimes. But it's not needed. I'm a big girl. Some fears have been overcome simply by doing the activity. I find I fear less as I get older.
|
|
|
Post by Grizzly James on May 3, 2016 7:32:05 GMT -8
Well, I dunno, but it might be relative.
I once went trekking the high mountain grandeur of Montana. Around the gorgeous frosted ramparts there, and along the winding, ever-tumbling glacial run offs. Five days of Rocky Mountain bliss. Or would have been. Prior to wilderness entry, a local ranger discoursed us on the recent bear mauling that happened the day before, how a fellow got his face ripped off and so on, told us to be careful, and we were on our way. I must say, hiking through the forest primeval, where the blood is still wet on the rocks from a grievous mauling does rather tend to rattle your fear quiver. There was a certain, undeniable electricity in the air that tramp, one of which was only subdued by the kindly graces of sleep. I remember curling up with my beloved bottle of bear spray each night, sucking my metaphoric thumb, hoping that if anything, sleep took me quickly. Looking back on it now, yeah, it was an unreasonable fear, I suppose. Hark, I would stand a better shot at being clobbered via a run down to the local mini mart for a bag of potato chips, than I would some unsavory bear encounter. But try telling this logic to me then, whilst spooning my pepper spray each night.
I do not play the lottery, but I do have a good lucky feeling most days. I remember one time the doc and I were encamped up at ten thousand feet, at the base of a mountain pass in Wyoming. I had just sucked down a quagmire-like bowl of salty chicken muck, when the first rain drops from a storm spattered over the land. I slunk into the tent to wait it out. Sure enough a land-locked tempest was born, and the winds howled like Joshua's Trumpets. Lightening bolts exploded like warheads all around us, and I could smell ozone in my vestibule. Thanks Wyoming for the sporting weather. The wind increased, flattening my little tent, which must have been a sight, since I was sitting bolt-upright inside it. It draped over me like a wet pair of underwear. And lightning continued its parlay with the land, and I could hear rocks tumbling off the cliff-sides that which ensconced our camp. Yeah, not a good place to pitch your tent, but aw well, you know how it is.
Anyways, the lightening was getting rather frequent, cracking with mighty bangs all over the place. But the wind let up a little, and my tent perked back up in a showy display of resilience. And the rain continued to drum over the fly. But the lightening. It wouldn't let up. If anything it was increasing. The Doc moaned from his tent, muttering his dislike for lightening. I dunno, I've always felt pretty lucky concerning lightening. It is with the same conviction I believe I cannot win the lottery that I reckon likewise, lightening probably won't find me. Even so, I am an astute and learned backwoods man, and I know what to do if lightening is in the air.
I had read one time that if you're going to get clocked by lightening, the best shot you have of living through it is if the lightening bolt hits you in the butt. Come to think of it, I'm not sure where I read that, but these are the thoughts that come to you during moments of fear. So, I folded my sleeping pad into thirds, thus to insulate me better from the ground, rolled over and raised my arse to the heavens. I posed there, listening the lightening explode, and the rain beat over the tent. I must say, I felt a bit like the fool in this position, the feeling only exacerbated whence the Doc unzipped my vestibule and poked his head in.
"I hate lightening" he bellowed.
"I'm OK with it", I croaked.
"I'm not", the Doc said" "And by the way", he added, "What are you doing?"
"I'm resisting a lightening bolt", I said. "It's what you're supposed to do."
The Doc just shook his head.
The rains at last tapered, and the tempest sailed over the mountain pass for more unlucky campers. But another one brewed in the west. So quickly we stuffed our gear into our packs, and made way down the mountain side for lower, more carefree elevations.
Yup, should have never been camping up there in the first place. And I still don't know about that lightening technique.
-GJ
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on May 3, 2016 7:33:56 GMT -8
Well, if you believe Spock, it seems that anything other than because his own planet was destroyed is unreasonable fear. From Star Trek, Into Darkness, Spock, ever reasonable, says: I could have said it in fewer words: "Real men don't fear." But that doesn't mean I believe it.
|
|
mk
Trail Wise!
North Texas
Posts: 1,217
|
Post by mk on May 3, 2016 13:47:59 GMT -8
I once went trekking the high mountain grandeur of Montana Grizzly James - you have the best stories!
|
|
|
Post by High Sierra Fan on May 3, 2016 15:32:25 GMT -8
"Unreasonable"?
Any concerns I do not share, obviously.
|
|
johnnyray
Trail Wise!
Argle-Bargle, Jiggery-Pokery, and Applesauce
Posts: 2,050
|
Post by johnnyray on May 3, 2016 17:04:12 GMT -8
"We have nothing to fear but fear itself" sorry had to.
|
|
rebeccad
Trail Wise!
Writing like a maniac
Posts: 12,677
|
Post by rebeccad on May 3, 2016 21:17:40 GMT -8
The wind increased, flattening my little tent, which must have been a sight, since I was sitting bolt-upright inside it. It draped over me like a wet pair of underwear. You, sir, have a most amazing turn of phrase. I salute you. But I'm pretty sure you were mixing up advice about crouching on your pad and advice about bending over and kissing your posterior adieu.
|
|
|
Post by Grizzly James on May 4, 2016 4:51:35 GMT -8
You, sir, have a most amazing turn of phrase. I salute you. But I'm pretty sure you were mixing up advice about crouching on your pad and advice about bending over and kissing your posterior adieu Well thank you! I do take that as a great compliment coming from a distinguished author, such as you. I appreciate that! And yeah, wouldn't surprise me none is I was mixing up neural pathways that day. It was sporty out there! Take care -GJ
|
|
|
Post by Grizzly James on May 4, 2016 4:55:02 GMT -8
Grizzly James - you have the best stories! Thank you kindly, mk. My privilege to share them, tho I'd just as soon make stories swinging in my hammock with a manly beverage in hand, but alas, that's not how it usually goes in the wilder places. -GJ
|
|