Vegas Baby!

Saturday, 21 February, 2010

At RCA the staff has to experience the program just like the kids do. In training I was blindfolded, lead into the wilderness and not trusted. Once I earned staff trust and hired on as an intern, I was allowed to carry and knife and a few other things. Students/new staff carry their stuff by rolling survival packs and strapping them to their backs with seatbelts. Once phases 1-5 are complete, students/new staff are allowed a ‘fancy pack.’ After three weeks of internship I was able to complete all 8 of my phases, and now have the right to bring out a ‘fancy pack’ to carry my gear in. I hit a few different websites trying to scope out what kind of pack I was looking for. I had seen a few different packs from other staff that I really liked. One in particular was made by Arc’teryx. Sage my trainer carried the Bora 95 model and said she loved it. Compared to some other packs, it looked streamline and less technical. I liked how there weren’t very many crazy straps or random pockets hanging about everywhere. It had a clean look to it. I read a bit on performance and customer satisfaction and found the Bora 95 to be superb – right along with the price tag. I didn’t know if I needed a ‘$500-good’ bag. I put the Bora out of my mind and started looking for other bags more in my price range. I was surprised to see that the majority of the extended trip backpacks were over three hundred bucks! Who would have thought?! I had a pack back home in Washington, but it would never be large enough to carry all my gear. Move of a summer minimalist type bag.

So – my search for a backpack continued. I had narrowed it down to two or three from a couple different websites. I wasn’t overly excited about any of them… but knew that I could learn to love any of them. However! With a little more poking around… I bumped into a closeout sale of last year’s model Arcteryx Bora 95’s on the REIOutlet website! I decided not to buy it right away, rather to sleep on it a night to keep my head clear. I came back the next day just as excited as before with credit card in hand. The Bora 95 would be a good bag for me… streamline, simple looking, within my price range, backed by the REI guarantee… perfect. I jumped on the website and searched the REIOutlet website. After a few minutes I started to get a little bit worried thinking that they had already sold out. Nothing. My heart sank – I had missed out. Shoot! I cursed myself for having waited and lost the deal. I knew I could never afford the Bora at full price, and started to look around for something else. A few minutes later my excited came right back as I came across that Bora 95 once again. Maybe I had missed it? Or it had disappeared momentarily? Or someone canceled their order and it got put back? I didn’t know, but I did know that I wanted it! I purchased the pack and sent it to the closest REI to me – Las Vegas. I could have had the thing sent directly to me for thirteen bucks, but I’d never been to Vegas before and thought it a good opportunity to check it out.

I arranged for a day off work and found myself a guide. Well, Heather wasn’t much of a guide – but I did enjoy the company ;) I had planned on waking up early so that I could finish my laundry, clean the car, eat a good breakfast and grab a shower before heading out. Of course it never works out to plan - my phone died in the middle of the night killing my alarm clock – putting me a couple hours behind where I wanted to be. The car didn’t get cleaned, my laundry stayed right where I had it the night before and I felt so rushed I didn’t eat breakfast. I did however, catch that shower. Over the last few months I’ve learned to love those fifteen minutes of cleansing amazingness, I wasn’t going to miss that.

I should have printed off directions, but instead just took a few notes on a random piece of paper. I also should have printed my online purchase receipt for my back pack. And what I really should have had was the receipt for the fanny pack that I was planning on returning that day.

I headed off the mountain for St. George to get an oil change and pick up Heather. Usually I would have liked to have it done before picking up the date… but Heather was a champ and came along for the adventure. We had to go to three different shops to finally find one that was open. There was a Jiffy Lube on the way out of town. It was a little more expensive than I would have liked to pay – but was relieved to finally have it done. In the waiting room they had the Olympics playing on the TV. Surprisingly I hadn’t seen any of it yet. I sat down for a moment and watched curling.

Vegas was only two hours from St. George. I had put Heather in charge of music – a decision I quickly realized was a bad choice ;). For the most part I was a responsible driver, only hitting the rumble strips two or three times. I think I impressed the girl with my multitasking skills – driving while fiddling with the music, rolling up the window, grabbing stuff from behind my seat… I think her exact words were, ‘you scare me.’

Back at home my dad would always remind my mom to visit the bathroom before getting into the car. It wouldn’t be very long before she would be asking to pull over for a restroom. These last couple weeks I’ve come to understand my mother a little bit better. I’ve been drinking a lot of water, trying to stay hydrated hiking out in the wilderness and living in a wood heated lodge. Out in the woods I don’t have to worry too much about finding a bathroom, they grow up almost everywhere. However, when stuck in a car for a couple hours and after drinking several liters of liquid… haha. About ten miles away from the store my stomach started to hurt. The dull ache kind of hurt. I knew I could still hold it, but it wasn’t comfortable. I started singing random songs, saying random things, jumping up and down in my seat… The only thing that was stopping me from pulling off the side of the road was Heather doing the same thing. She was holding it as well. With a smile on my face, I suggested that we keep driving to see who could hold it longer. The person that peed their pants had to clean the car seats.

We made it to REI just in time. To continue working on my tough skills, I calmly walked around the car to open the door. I tried to act as natural as possible, grabbing my fanny pack from the back seat and walking towards the front entrance. I wish I could have run through the front doors and on to the bathroom. But with the pack in my hands I knew that I had a few minutes of waiting at customer service before being able to wander the store. The line wasn’t too long, I could wait it out. I told Heather that I would wait here in line and that she could go ahead and find the bathroom. “Hi, I need to return this and I have a package that I need to pick up.” The cashier asked for my name and went to the back in search of my pack. She came back empty handed and verified my name. My heart sank a little baby bit, and my thoughts returned to my ever stretching bladder. The lady was entering in some information on the computer with a confused look on her face. I really had to go. I didn’t think that I could last much longer, especially if the box was MIA. “Umm, is it alright if I run to the bathroom?” Heather directed me to the bathrooms in the back of the store where she hurried towards the door with a Women’s printed on it. “Didn’t you already go?” “No way – that would have been unfair – I was waiting for you.”

She beat me out of the restroom… which shouldn’t have happened – me being a man and she being a woman and all… Walking back to the front desk I almost felt like a million bucks - a couple pounds lighter but still with an aching in my lower abdomen. The lady brought out a backpack looking box and showed me that the ‘L’ of my last name had been cut off the label. I asked if she could hang onto the box for a little bit while I picked up a few other things in the store. She agreed and gave me a credit voucher for the fanny pack.

With a smile on my face and a twinkle in my eye, I suggested to Heather that we start on one side of the store and work our way to the other, hitting every single isle. I felt a little bad when I stopped to play with random cool things that I saw along the way… After a few moments I would realize my ‘kid caught in a candy store’ syndrome and pull my shopping list back out. “Right… Backpack covers…”

My purchases included a bivy sack, sleeping pad, backpack cover, and paperwork pouch. I knew it would be an expensive day but rationalized my spending in two ways. One – It’s for my job. I spend more time out in the woods than I do anywhere else… so if I’m going to invest money to improve my standard of living, it’s smartest to do so for the wilderness. And two – I made a list. If it’s on the list than it’s not impulsive buying and I spend guilt free. The trouble came when I had to pick out a sleeping pad. Thermarest had so many options! Super compact, lots of loft, half sized, purple, lime green… I wanted something sturdy with a medium thickness, other than that I didn’t really care. I should have asked for someone to tell me about them, but instead just picked a decent looking one off the shelf and called it mine. To make sure I felt good about the decision, I walked around with it under my arm for awhile. We looked at a few other things and then called it a day. I still felt pretty solid about my REI Camp Bed so it came with me.

Leaving REI we were completely lost. And we were okay with that. We didn’t really have an agenda or place to be so we just drove randomly. I had heard of Vegas drive-through marriages and really wanted to see one for myself. Instead I saw a lot of billboards with half naked women on them. Heather and I the last couple days had been talking about eloping. This discussion continued in the car on the way. A drive through wedding would have been extremely convenient… you don’t even have to get out of the car! Our conversation moved towards parenting strategies and what we wanted for our kids. And that’s when it all blew up. I wanted athletics to be a part of their lives and she cared nothing for sports. Ouch. Subsequently we decided to hold off on the drive through marriage for a little bit until we could work out our differences ;).

We snacked on some Cheez-its in my car and started looking for a place to eat. In trying to decide which restaurant to stop at – Heather brought up that we didn’t have to eat at a restaurant, unless I wanted to have that ‘restaurant experience’ and all… I told her that I lived in a restaurant and didn’t mind eating elsewhere. We went to Smiths and picked up sandwich makings for a picnic instead. We got back into the car and headed off in another random direction to try and find a park of some sort to sit down at and eat. We passed a chapel with a circle of grass in front and decided that there was no better place. We circled around to the back of the building to try and get away from the noise of the busy road. There wasn’t any lawn back there, but we made due with a thrown blanket on the sidewalk in the shade. It was surprisingly peaceful… sun shining and birds chirping. I pulled out my wilderness journal and shared a few fun poems and stories. I was a little embarrassed, reading out loud stories about fictional animal warriors that I had made up or random poems that I had written. We danced randomly in the parking lot and sang silly songs.

On the way out I tried to find ‘The Strip’ that for me defines Las Vegas. We got close to the Space Needle looking tower (Stratosphere) but then gave up and headed for the freeway. I needed to fill up on gas, so I pulled in behind an older looking car with California license plates. I popped my gas door and stepped out to take off the gas cap. Randomly the Cali plates guy walked up from behind me and asked if he could fix the dent in the back of my car. “I could knock that out for ya for like, 15 bucks whadoya say?” I tried to peel him off by saying that it wasn’t my car (it’s my parents…). He then started asking for me to give him some money, to help feed his starving kids. “I came here looking for a job, wild goose chase I tell ya.” I pulled out the coins in my pocket and handed them over. My attitude was more towards getting the man to leave me alone rather than being charitable. Back in the car I started to reevaluate what I thought about beggars. I feel good about donating money – but hate to be taken advantage of or manipulated.

We happened upon the freeway after getting turned around a few times. I was glad to be headed home, but not looking forward to driving the 4 ½ hours back to the lodge. Heather pulled out some Celtic music that wasn’t half bad. ;) When we got back to Saint George we got ice cream cones and walked around in the rain. We even had a moment where we did a polka up the side walk. As I was leaving, Heather read and gifted me a poem that she had written about a feeling that she told me about earlier. It was a great poem; I was thoroughly impressed with her writing. We said our goodbyes and I jumped in the car for home.

Usually my rides back to the lodge take me four or five hours from Saint George because I end up leaving so late. I would make it about halfway home and then have to start pulling over for power naps to prevent myself from falling asleep at the wheel. Sometimes I set a 20 minute alarm, other times I just sleep. Consequently I am turning a two hour drive into a four or five hour drive. Tonight however was going to be different – I left around 8:30 with plans to be home no later than 10:30. Things were going well for me until I hit the base of the mountain. I gassed up at Pipe Springs, about 45 miles away from the lodge and headed up the hill. The rains that were dumping in Vegas and St. George were also dumping in Arizona – but as snow. It first started out as a little bit of slush that I had to slow down for. Soon after that the slush turned into a few inches of snow on the road that I had to drive over. My windshield wipers could hardly keep up with the galaxy hyperspace looking blizzard outside. I noticed a few ruts in the snow from a car that must have been ahead of me and decided it best to follow them. My heater couldn’t keep my windshield from fogging over and all my side windows were covered in snow. The ruts turned into what must have been a plowed lane that I could comfortably drive through. I caught up with the plow and another car driving right behind it. We caravanned for a bit until the road took a funny turn and the plow went off the road. Stuck. The man looked over his rig for a moment and then came and spoke to us behind him. I told him that I was just headed for the Lodge a few miles away. He said that the vehicle in front of me was also headed for the Lodge, and asked me to drive ahead leading him. I wondered if I could make it through but his confidence gave me enough courage to take the plunge.

The bumper of my little Honda was plowing snow the whole time. I did fairly well until my window fogged up something terrible and the road started another slight upgrade climb. Ever deepening snow and me trying to wipe the windshield down with a napkin lead to a complete stop. I tried backing up a little to get another run at it. Stuck. I could back my way down the hill but couldn’t get enough speed to tank up the hill and through the snow. I decided it would be best to wait for the plow to get unstuck and jump behind him once again.

After about a half hour wait, I spotted a rotating light in the only uncovered spot of my side view mirror. I could see him plow by the rig behind me, and then get out and shovel/push the rig onto plowed pavement. Next was my turn. He drove up near me, explained that he was going to ‘haul ass and blow right past me.’ Then he would continue plowing a hundred yards or so before backing up and digging me out. He blew past me alright, but didn’t make it very far before coming to a halt and spinning his tires. He spread sand as he backed down and tried once again. On the third or fourth try he was able to plow that hundred yards before coming back to help me out.

After about a 30 minute digging and pushing adventure, we were able to get my little Honda back onto cleared road. The plow guy explained that he didn’t have a lot of sand left in his truck so he’s not able to get a good grip on the road. He encouraged us to follow from a distance because he might have to do a lot of backing up and re-approaching. I got in my car excited to get moving once again – only to watch the plow get stuck once again. The more he spun his tires the further off the road and into the snow bank he slid. The plow man got out his square nosed shovel, dumped some sand from his truck, and started sanding the areas in front of his tires. Two or three times he tried moving without any luck. He repeated the process over and over until he was free at last and moving up the road.

We came to a fork in the road where the plow turned left. I wondered what was going on – if we were there and I just couldn’t see? But instead the plow man explained that he needed to stop at their sand yard and fire up the tractor to fill his truck back up. He’d be about 20 minutes. Over an hour later he returned to find our rigs snowed in once again. Another digging/pushing adventure and we were free. The plow rounded the corner back up the hill and bam! Stuck again! By this time the snow was at least 18 inches deep, and twice that on the sides of the roads. I took a few pictures on my camera phone and sent them to the lodge. “You gotta look outside and see this stuff! It’s really comin’ down!” I was at most 2 miles from the lodge, but hours from my bed. I asked them to keep a door open for me and they all went to sleep.

My snow filled adventure goes like this… Follow the plow until he gets stuck. Try and be a plow – fail – get stuck. Follow the plow again – plow gets stuck multiple times. Arrive at the lodge, park my car in the only plowed out lane and walk through thigh high snow to the lodge.

It took me over four hours to travel those last forty miles. And of course I barely made it to the bathroom. :)

My Bathroom Revelation

This is a journey entry I wrote the first night of training while in the field.


7 January, 2010 – Halfway between Rustler’s and Jackson

Our meeting started out in the Conference room of the RCA offices. I showed up just on time as people were sitting in a circle around a bunch of African drums. I was extremely relieved to have shown on time. I didn’t want to blow my shot. This morning in the shower I looked at my watch and somehow thought of the date. I knew yesterday was the 6th because I wrote it on my tip tally. For some reason I thought I had until tomorrow, Friday, to get to Enterprise. I shouted, ‘Oh no!’ and started toweling off as fast as possible. ‘Walker, I screwed up!’ I quickly dressed and got my things to the car. ‘Can you cover me Walker? I open on grill…’ I started the car, wrote Kelly the manager a note, and headed for the gas station. I hadn’t yet filled since retrieving the Walkers from St George. I saved the receipt to hopefully be reimbursed later. 5 miles down the road I thought I ought to call someone letting them know I was going to be late. I looked for my folder of paperwork. It wasn’t in my bag – not in the hatch… Freak! Back to the lodge.

I sped the whole way – passing two sheriffs along the way. I left at 7:4 and walked in the RCA doors at 10:05. Dang good time.

We were encouraged to play around with the drums for a bit on our own. Then we were brought together and played as a group. A man they called Lynx pounded out the heartbeat and the group followed along. The idea was learning to live together in harmony. Of the four beats in a measure, the first two represented the heart beat. Much like we are drawn to our Mother’s when we are an infant; beats one and two serve as the unifier. Once we pay homage to the heart beat then we have beats three and four to do our own variation. Doc. Dan, the clinical director, then explained that this next week of training was to see if we could follow the heart beat of RCA.

Lynx then pulled out a dry erase marker and took his place at the white board. He talked about the different ‘Ego-States’ that each person goes through. Of the 7 identified, only one is desirable – that of ‘Adult.’

After an hour or so of instruction, we were asked to fill out some paper work, take a urine test, and asked to pull out our stuff and start prepping for takeoff. Lila, AKA ‘Silent Sage,’ showed us how to pack a survival pack and set us free to do our own. I pulled my stuff out of my car and tied the saddest looking survival pack ever. I realized that I had forgotten my enamel ware cup in the kitchen sink back at the lodge, and had to scramble to get them to sell me a cooking pot before we left. We loaded up in the Suburban and put on our blindfolds. Students don’t need to know where they’re going. And at this moment – we were students.

After about an hour of driving, we pulled up to a place Sage called ‘Outpost.’ We took off our blindfolds and pulled our packs down from the rack on top. Outpost apparently was used for special occasions such as graduation. It had a fire pit and a few buildings with grass roof tops. We did a little more prep work and then hit the trail. Throughout the hike Safe would call out, ‘half quart.’ This meant that we had to show staff that we had half a quart, drink it, and then show it again to prove that we had drank the water. ‘Get a buddy and make sure they down half a quart.’

We only put in two or three miles that day. We stopped twice for breaks, ‘Half Quart! Along the way we learned names.
(Here are some notes I wrote down to help me remember who is who…)
Matt – Tall and bald. Super athletic.
Tim –
Caleb – BYU grad, former RCA employee, Earth name ‘Crow.’
Laura – Wild, outspoken, former wilderness worker
Kathy – Older woman
Emily – Sweet, soft spoken, almost cute.
Lila – AKA ‘Sage’ – Almost five years with RCA

About 6:30 we broke hike. (I’m not sure why I wrote it this way – but apparently ‘broke hike’ meant that we stopped hiking…) We had to half circle around Sage and do a chant. I was number one, so I started. “Trainees! Count off!” ‘One’ ‘Two’ ‘Three’ ‘Four’ ‘Five’ ‘Six’ ‘Seven.’ All together – “Trainees!” Sage’s response was, ‘That was pathetic. Try again.’ On the third time counting off we were loud enough to satisfy Sage. We were allowed to drop our bags and pull out our leather gloves for camp chores.

We were put to work digging holes, gathering wood, setting up a place to sleep, etc. We were allowed two cuts with a saw to make our digging sticks. After what seemed like three hours of digging we had a pit large enough. Sage started a coal and Caleb got us a roaring fire. I hauled in a few dead trees for firewood and for sitting. As I passed one of the guys their comment was, ‘Wow, looks like #1 has been busy!” We were asked to gather around the fire with our journals, water, and food. “Write the date, location, how many miles we hiked, and a page about whatever you want. Then on the backside write a half a page about a goal, and then a poem on the bottom half.”

I’m still writing… Everyone else was done and kinda waiting. “Are you waiting on me” Yup. “Oh, well I could write forever – can I finish up later?” The next thing to do was to wash up. Face, feet, hands. Sage pulled out a bag of small pellets that dissolved into toweletts. “Wash your face, check it off. And then your feet.”

We had to heat more water for our hands so I took the time to keep writing.


Goal:
The ultimate goal is Exaltation. However, a subgoal that I would like to work on throughout this week involves hard skills of camping/survival.
- Survival Pack – Accessible, Balance, Compact, Streamline
- Fires – Collecting fire equipment, proper use
- Overall Organization and sense of place/purpose

Poem
Gazing up into the Sky
I take the time to…
Admiring her beauty…

(Maybe some day I'll come back and finish this poem...)

Hello Once again!

It’s been awhile since I’ve had the time to do any blogging. I survived my training week, worked a double shift to start out, and finished all my phase work during my internship. I am now back at the lodge taking advantage of one of my breaks to sit down and type out a few stories. Yesterday I was lifting a heavy stone table and tweaked my back. As I laid down in bed last night I could feel all of my soar back muscles. When I woke up this morning, my back was no longer tender – but I had developed a rather painful and annoying kink in my neck. So as you read, imagine me sitting at a desk typing with my head tilted to one side to relieve the pain. :)