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2002-02-26 - 9:31 a.m.

I have recently been unmotivated to write.

The fact that I don�t like writing, and that writing for me is a battle doesn�t make it any easier either. But I need to see a different message when I open my page. That last one is depressing.

Happy thoughts are what I need now.

1986�My father makes the effort to contact me, and salvage some sort of relationship. In and amongst the letter that I received from him there is an invitation from him to come and visit Colorado. At that time in my life I had only traveled up the eastern seaboard. So of course my reply was a yes.

I remember flying for the first time. What a rush. I had a window seat, and from the moment that I sat down I never looked anywhere but out that window. The first leg of my journey was to Kentucky somewhere, and after a mad dash to my connection flight, I found myself looking down on the Midwest. It was breath taking. I was lucky in that it was a beautiful clear day in late summer. I was amazed at how straight the roads were and how perfect the land looked from 30,000 feet. But I was confused by the large squares of land that had a big green circle of life in them. I later came to learn that what I saw from the sky was an irrigation pattern.

As we were approaching Denver, the mile high city. The city nestled next to the mighty Rocky Mountains. I remember seeing�nothing. It was odd, here I was 30,000 feet in the air, flying towards the largest mountains in the US, and I could not see them. In fact I even entertained the idea that they might not really exist. Funny thing was I never saw the mountains until I left the airport. Seems that I was always looking out the wrong window, or something.

My father met me at the gate, and we promptly sped off for home. My pop dislikes airports I think. Probably because he has to spend so much time in them. When we arrive at his place in Denver I was greeted by quite a sight. Art every where, a huge fish tank with a monstrous Oscars in it, a stuffed bear prowling around the living room�and much much more. For dinner we had Shark, with an orange glaze, and soon after we were on our way to bed, for tomorrow we would be getting an early start.

I am going to skip around a bunch now, and gloss over some of the less memorable parts of the trip in favor or describing to you 4 events. I hope you like em�and if you don�t�well I certainly don�t care.

Day one. I got to climb my first mountain in the Rockies. It was miserable. The wind was howling, it was foggy, and the snow/sleet was coming down, and to tell ya the truth I was totally unprepared for this. I knew I was going to get sick, fall off the mountain, or worse. Then as I rounded a bend in the path I found my self standing face to face with a young big horn sheep. To tell ya the truth, I think it scared the crap out of us both. We just stood there looking at each other for a moment, and then the sheep bounded up the slope into the fog. All I could think was�wow.

That set the tone for this tour of the Rockies. That night we camped at a little camp ground that my pop knew about. We had fresh pan fried fish for dinner, and again turned in early. I can remember hearing an owl hooting in the darkness, and that was about it. Sometime in the middle of that night, my pop woke me up. The first things out of his mouth were shhh�and don�t move too much. And he pointed out into the middle of our camp site. See we left the door to the tent open with just the screen drawn shut so that we would have a good view of the world from our �bed�. I followed where my pop was pointing, and in the light of the very bright moon I saw a shadow moving about the camp. That shadow came closer and closer until I was able to make out what the critter was. It was a skunk, and a curious one at that. In fact that little fellah walked right up to the tent screen inches from my face, and gave my pop and I a good sniff, before something caught his attention. The skunk in front of me whirled around just as another skunk entered the camp. And I�ll tell ya, it was obvious that they didn�t like each other. Now here I was in quite a spot. A skunk butt pointed mere feet from my face, and a fight brewing. God I hope that skunks don�t spray when they fight. The last thing I need is a face full of that stuff. (even if Jozer thinks it smells like shredded wheat). Fortunately the fight never occurred. One skunk decided that it was time to leave, and the other decided that it was time to examine the tent. I actually had that critter walk on top of my leg as he scurried along the side of out tent. (Needless to say the tent we were in was a fairly small a-frame looking thing). Finally the critter got bored with us, and he finally decided to leave, so it was back to sleep for us.

The next morning we woke up early, broke down camp and headed for the main event of our trip. We were off to climb a 14er. Now for those of you who don�t know, a 14er is a mountain that is over 14,000 feet high. Just on a side note trees don�t grow above 10,000 feet. There is not enough oxygen to support them.

Mt. Sherman, 14,036ft. at its summit, and I was getting ready to climb it. This was going to be exciting, provided that I did not get altitude sickness. Now my pop had warned me that at this time of year we needed to make sure that we were coming off of the mountain by noon. Every day, storms would roll in and pound the top of the mountain, and we certainly didn�t want to be there when that happened. So we parked the Jeep (yeah my pop drives a Jeep also), and started up the mountain.

I am going to have to stop here today. I have a class to teach in 20 min, and I need to make sure that I am prepared.

Coming up next: ascending the mountain!

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