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Alfred E. Newman Safety
Reivers Dustin
11/21/09 #7431
I've tied myself in knots lately on the safety thing. Thank goodness for some of your posts and personal discussions you guys. Last night Hilde sat me down and said basically, 'you are trying to control things which you cannot'. (Although I am this crazy sexy webmaster type dude - there are limits to my awesome powers. At least she thinks I am. And no she didn't actually say it, but … you know. Oh yeah, back to the point.)
Paddling has been very good to me. You guys are the most awesomely cool people I've ever met. I mean, look at us! I could hardly bear a loss to the group. OK, so without getting mushy, you get the idea. And I know it's mutual. I've seen the look in Brian B's eye when we were looking for a paddler. He and a bunch of us formed a sweep and got to business. We would hate to leave a friend in duress.
But we might have to. For any of a million reasons. I don't care about 'adequate thermal protection' or how solid somebody's remount is. If you go in a Borat thong, get ready for some ridicule. But, jeeze guys, if any of us were tender flowers we wouldn't be doing this. Actually, I might look pretty good in one of those … er, never mind. (It would take some severe manscaping.)
For myself, I spare no effort to:
1) be strong & skilled enough to master the situation.
2) judge my limits.
3) have proper gear in bullet-proof condition.
I must trust you to do the same. My kids are grown and gone. You are not one of them.
It's down to one thing. Please do not make me leave you without a chance if I can't help you. Get the radio (or cell). Yes, I've heard the arguement that a radio breeds irresponsibility. Hell with that. Unless you paddle a wooden boat, you couldn't even do this sport without the technology advances. If you draw the line at getting a radio you just might be telling me to live with your loss. Don't do that to me.
OK. So my old man worked as a high scaler on dam projects. They had a joke they told each other:
-The high scaler is on the cliff face prying rocks and slips. He can't stop, but just gets one hand on the end of his rope. He calls out for help: “Oh God! Send help! Don't send Jesus, - this is a man's job!”.
If you are going on the cliff. Tie a knot in the end of your rope dammit.
rd
