The dude abides: Mar 5, 2007

Monday, March 05, 2007

When the wind blows and the rain feels cold
With a head full of snow
In the window, there's a face you know
Don't the nights pass slow?

I have a dream.

I have had this dream for quite some time, dating back into the 90's, when I was practicing law, making money and hating life.

(I took a helicopter ride with Lizzy, my dad, my former partner, Karla, and her husband, Tim.)

It is a lucid dream, and I am living part of it already.

((We flew around the west side of Maui, then checked out Molokai, the Forbidden Island. Molokai was called that because it had a leper colony. Even today, only 5000 people live there year-round, as opposed to 200,000 on Maui, just a few miles away.))

I used to dream, there at my desk, or driving to court, or listening to some client bitch and stomp his foot like a child because things weren't going the way he wanted.

(((I drew the coveted "shotgun" seat, and, honestly, when we took off, it felt like getting high. Or so I have read. The pilot lifted about two feet off the ground and did this slow swivel around the launch pad. Dude.)))

Starting in September each year, I would fantasize about snow and mountains while I sat in Wisconsin, wearing a fucking tie, going to court, arguing with douchebags, on behalf of douchebags trying to get over on other douchebags, all the while trying not to let any of the stink permeate my armor.

((((The views weren't very good. Especially when we swooped through the valley where they filmed part of Jurassic Park.))))

My legal pad, my pen, my haircut, my fancy suit, my fancy education, my fancy words, my fancy car, my bullshit, my fake smile, my handshake... all of it was my armor.

(((((That last picture is of a waterfall that comes out of a big hole in the cliff roughly a thousand feet from the top. I actually have a few videos for you. They aren't as meth-addict twitchy as my snow boarding videos, since I am a little less concerned with ripping my knee in half or spreading my brains in a festive fashion across some pine boughs.

I figured that was the pilot's problem.)))))

And that armor protected my spirit. My joie de vivre. My elan. My Force.

((((((^^Are words even necessary?))))))

All that time, ten years, plus the four years in law school (which should have taken three, but I did learn to surf and play beach volleyball, so it wasn't a total waste), I could retreat into my armor, my shell, and dream of another day.

(((((((That last picture is a valley cut through 2000 foot, shear cliffs on Molokai. Some Duder built a house down there, where the river hits that little bay. You can only get there by boat or helicopter.

I am fairly certain there isn't any cell reception, or a Wal McMart anywhere nearby.))))))

The dream had two parts, one of which has actualized, here in Montana. I get to rip down mountain chutes, choking on powder with my best friend since age 13, make incredible music with an even more incredible woman, kayak, hike and see grizzly bears, elk and eagles, and soak in some of the most gorgeous scenery you can imagine.

((((((The leper colony was on that little peninsula there, surrounded by 2000 foot cliffs. Even today, you take a boat or a two day mule ride to get there. Down a 2000 foot cliff.)))))))

The other part of that dream involves me living part of the year in a a foreign country. Maybe an island. Maybe Costa Rica.

((((((Those are humpback whales.))))))))

In any case, it involves me sitting on a stool, under a tiki hut with a chest-high counter. In back of me, there is a cheap pegboard with fifteen coffee cup hooks, each holding a small, numbered key, corresponding with one of my fifteen mopeds. You come and rent them. By the hour, by the day. Whatever.

There would be a cooler, and little kid named Pepe, who would fetch me fish tacos.

I would have a little radio with an antenna, which would play the beisbol.