On Rock Climbing and marriage

The second honeymoon (10 years later)was sort of a revisit of the first honeymoon. We spent the first one in Maine and Nova Scotia and ended the experience angry at each other (who angrily mumbles "Fuck off" to his new bride? Unfortunately, I did.) This time around we stayed in the states--Massachusetts and New Hampshire--and we didn't end the trip safe in the rough arms of wrath.
One of the highlights of the trip was our climbing Rumney Rocks in NH, an internationally recognized sport climbing spot--truly! We heard some variation of German, some east Asian language, French, and a few others spoken while there.
Of course physical effort is required, but just as importantly, or perhaps more so is the mental aspect of climbing. Each step and handhold must be thought out and care must be taken to not accept defeat. After several hours of climbing, the physical can trump the mental and one can surrender to the mountain. The reverse is true too; it can appear that there is no way one can climb any further--where am I going to put my hand? That tiny ledge will NOT support my foot (those climbing shoes were amazingly spiderous by the way) and so on.
Marriage (for me anyway) was and is much the same way. We rely on habits, find ourselves clinging to the wall full of fear, seemingly with no way up, and think "It'd be much easier to just rappel down." And that is true: it would be much easier to quit, rappel down, and pack up. One has to fight against that insidious voice, that feeling that threatens to absorb you. When I think she's the greatest bitch in the history of mankind, when I would like to do just walk away from marriage is when that resolve is needed. To be honest, I have many, many, many flaws and shortcomings too that create the same response in her. So, I can let the circumstances get the better of me and be like all too many people and abandon my vows or I can pause, look at the terrain before me, and plan a way up. The temptation to despair is strong, but the vista from the top is worth the struggle, the sweat, sore muscles and tender fingertips. I don't know what the summit of a marriage looks like but the more time I spend "climbing" the more I want to reach it.
Climbing rocks was tough, but rewarding; I think it is the mental challenge that draws people again and again to climb. To overcome the fear is to master some part of ourselves that needs discipline. Marriage kicks my ass, but I'm becoming a better person because of it. To those who persevere is given great reward. I'm looking forward to the next ten years with my wife.

Worth Quoting

There are but three social arrangements which can replace Capitalism: Slavery, Socialism, and Property. --Hilaire Belloc The Servile State

Good reads of 2009

I haven't made a list like this in a while, and I believe I discussed most of these on the blog as I finished them, but I thought I'd make a handy short-hand list for you and me. These are only in the order I read them and do not indicate any preference. The Open Door * Frederica Mathewes-Green The Children of Hurin * J.R.R. Tolkien The Omnivore's Dilemma * Michael Pollan Agrarianism and the Good Society: Land, Culture, Conflict, and Hope * Eric T. Freyfogle Wonderful Fool * Shusaku Endo Up the Rouge: Paddling Detroit's Hidden River * Joel Thurtell and Patricia Beck Johnny Cash and the Great American Contradiction: Christianity and the Battle for the Soul of a Nation * Rodney Clapp (I started the following in December, but I haven't finished them--so far they are excellent: Love and Hate in Jamestown * David A. Price and The Picture of Dorian Gray * Oscar Wilde) Try one of these--let me know.

Independent Women?

During breakfast today I was reading an excerpt from a play in The New York Times Magazine (I know, I was a day behind and read Saturday's edition yesterday) entitled Rust . The play, written by a professor at Grand Valley State University, here in Michigan, is a nonfiction drama about the closing of a GM plant in Wyoming, MI. The play itself sounds interesting and I enjoyed the excerpt, but what caught my eye was something a character said. The character is "Academic" and plays a historian and guide to the playwright, also a character. He is explaining the rise of the automobile factories and the effect of the car on American culture. He says, "Women became independent, they go from producers of food and clothing to consumers of food and clothing." This was meant as an earnest, praiseworthy point. I would counter with "How far we've fallen." To say that a woman (or a man) is independent because she has moved from producer to cons

I Am Not Hamlet

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