Work

I’ve been working a lot lately. Woke up at 4, got home at 830 with just enough time to maybe be asleep by 930, so I can sleep 6.5hrs and do it all again tomorrow.

Job details: haul rock, dig hole, put in 10′ diameter culvert, fill hole, put back road.

You probably won’t hear from me for a while. Its finish one and hurry up and finish another. The big don’t eat the small, the fast eat the slow. Ha, that’s some shit I read in a book, but its true, as long as you don’t increase risk.

I’m going to have a nice savings account come winter. www.35thsnow.com.

” Rapper jocks, need to put a sock in they chatter box.”-DOOM

James Baldwin

“I reacted by trying to be pleasant—it being a great part of the American Negro’s education (long before he goes to school) that he must make people “like” him. This smile-and-the-world-smiles-with-you routine worked about as well in this situation as it had in the situation for which it was designed, which is to say that it did not work at all. No one, after all, can be liked whose human weight and complexity cannot be, or has not been, admitted.”

“But unless one’s ideal of society is a race of neatly analyzed, hard-working ciphers, one can hardly claim for the protest novels the lofty purpose they claim for themselves or share the present optimism concerning them. They emerge for what they are: a mirror of our confusion, dishonesty, panic, trapped and immobilized in the sunlit prison of the American dream. They are fantasies, connecting nowhere with reality, sentimental; in exactly the same sense that such movies as The Best Years of Our Lives or the works of Mr. James M. Cain are fantasies. Beneath the dazzling pyrotechnics of these current operas one may still discern, as the controlling force, the intense theological preoccupations of Mrs. Stowe, the sick vacuities of The Rover Boys. Finally, the aim of the protest novel becomes something very closely resembling the zeal of those alabaster missionaries to Africa to cover the nakedness of the natives, to hurry them into the pallid arms of Jesus and thence into slavery. The aim has now become to reduce all Americans to the compulsive, bloodless dimensions of a guy named Joe.” -James Baldwin

SuperPark15

Stefan rides for 35th Avenue, and I ride for/manage the snowboard team. He won an invite at a local contest to a big snowboard event called Superpark that happened down at Mt. Bachelor at the end of this winter. During the trip my car had to get towed, we almost didn’t make registration, I had to learn how to operate a brand new camera, and we had a gigantic condo all to ourselves. Fast forward a few weeks and I put all of the footage of Stefan together into one short edit and submitted it to Snowboarder Magazine’s Superpark Showdown. Right now it is in the qualifying stage of eliminations and currently has a short lead after one day of voting. In case you don’t have facebook and can’t look at the video on their site, here’s the video, and it is followed by what Snowboarder Magazine said about me, Stefan, and Figure8productions.

Snowboarder Mag.com’s words: “The final contestant in the 2011 Superpark® Video Showdown LCQ is Kelson Mcclung and Figure8productions. Unlike every other entry, Kelson chose to focus his filming on just one rider. The subject of Kelson’s short was Stefan Krumm, an unsponsored shred from Washington who received his Superpark® 15 wildcard spot from his performances at the Holy Oly and The Launch. Krumm is loose to say the least. When it comes to boardin’ his bravado takes point for his brain. In turn his style is compelling. While not as polished or diverse as other Superpark® Showdown submissions Kelson and Krumm’s colab isn’t without it’s simplistic charms. If you are so inclined to root for the underdog then go to the video and “like” it to help Kelson Mcclung dart his way into the 2011 Superpark® Video Showdown.”

Remember:

“I thought of white men arriving for the first time in an African village, strangers there, as I am a stranger here, and tried to imagine the astounded populace touching their hair and marveling at the color of their skin. But there is a great difference between being the first white man to be seen by Africans and being the first black man to be seen by whites. The white man takes the astonishment as tribute, for he arrives to conquer and to convert the natives, whose inferiority in relation to himself is not even to be questioned; whereas I, without a thought of conquest, find myself among a people whose culture controls me, has even, in a sense, created me, people who have cost me more in anguish and rage than they will ever know, who yet do not even know of my existence. The astonishment with which I might have greeted them, should they have stumbled into my African village a few hundred years ago, might have rejoiced their hearts. But the astonishment with which they greet me today can only poison mine.” – James Baldwin, Stranger in the Village

An Essay on Individualism: written for college credit.

Individualism:

Ralph Waldo Emerson & Henry David Thoreau

“It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) and Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) were products of the same social influences, restraints and freedoms. Emerson was fourteen years the senior of Thoreau and had a major influence on his reading, writing, and modes of thought. During these years, slavery was a very prominent form of labor in the United States. Frederick Douglass (1818-1895) would free himself from slavery during this time, and would write his Narrative of the Life (1845). Thoreau would spend a night in jail in 1846 for not paying his portion of the poll tax because he thought it to be furthering the proslavery agenda of the Mexican-American War (1846-1848). Both of these authors would live to read about Lincoln taking the Presidential Office in 1860, and would see the beginning of the Civil War in 1861. As one example, social tensions about slavery were very noticeable in their lifetime, and many people would remain divided on the issue until a much later date. However, both of these men never second-guessed the topic. Emerson encouraged to others what he practiced: find what is true in one’s own heart. One way to accomplish this is to ask questions of one’s self. Some possible questions that a person might ask him/herself during this time might be, “Is it right to enslave another human to do my dirty work for little or no pay? Is it right to whip them? Is it right to separate them from their families? Would I welcome these actions upon myself?” These are all simple questions, and individuals must ask question after question until an answer can be confirmed by what they believe to be true in their heart. Being an individual sometimes requires a person to go against the grain in order to stay true to what they have previously discovered to be true in their heart. Emerson and Thoreau preach this way of thinking most effectively in Self-Reliance (1841) and Resistance to Civil Government (1849), respectively, by telling the reader to use the proposed logic of “a majority of one” (being slightly more right than your neighbor makes you more right indefinitely), not to be a coward, and by using references to God. A societal change in a more righteous direction must begin with an individual way of thinking that is, on its face, different from the social norm. These two authors helped to encourage later individual thinkers who changed the world such as Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King Jr. to act on what they believed to be true in their hearts. These two social and moral activists are direct products of what could be considered “Emersonian” or “Thoreauean.”

We are all individuals; however, some of us tend to be more individualistic than others. This probably derives from having a more-conscious mind, than anything else. As Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.” But how do we become this great man who has developed a self-knowing and conscious mind independent from the multitudes of surrounding influences of the world in which we are enveloped since birth? In support of the indisputable case that most of us are not raised in solitude and are instead raised in the world among the crowd, we do not develop a conscious that is one hundred percent our own. Beginning at a very early age, other people constantly tell us how to think. Before we can even talk, many parents begin talking to us and explaining the world to our little sponge-like baby brains, and whether we are aware of it or not, we pick up and copy what other humans do around us. This valuable skill of “monkey see, monkey do” was a necessity to our ancestors who needed to avoid saber-toothed cats in their sleep: if your parents lived long enough to have a child chances are they were skilled at avoiding predators, and whatever they were doing they were likely doing right, or they would have ended up as a midnight snack for a hungry carnivore. However, today, what is the test for intelligence? How do we know which social actions to copy and which ones to reject? An individualistic approach to these questions is the only way to answer them. However, humans are rarely exposed to solitude for any substantial amount of time until our later years (going from living with parents in, and before, high school to living with roommates at college) and because of this, again, our consciousness is largely that of a social collective: of our surrounding influences. Therefore, a majority of our “individual” consciousness is grown and nurtured by society and not by the individual. To obtain a conscious and self-aware mind, a person must live in solitude. Only in solitude will a person’s own thoughts rule his every action. Only in solitude, a man’s thoughts are not diluted or influenced by the rest of society.

Before his time in jail, Henry David Thoreau sent himself to live with Emerson in 1841. On July 4, 1845 (the same year that Frederick Douglass finished his Narrative of the Life) Thoreau moved into a cabin that he built on Emerson’s land. In this cabin, in isolation and solitude, he wrote Walden. Thoreau deemed this move to the cabin an “experiment,” but Walden later became one of the most recognized pieces of American Literature in the twentieth century, and the act of writing Walden was a purely individualistic one that was largely influenced by Emerson himself. It could be argued that Emerson’s influence makes this move non-individualistic; however, it is not uncommon to find other people in this world who have similar mind-sets. It seems that the latter is the case here, and they helped to fuel each other’s thoughts. For two years, two months, and two days Thoreau lived the individualism that Emerson wrote about and encouraged, supplying additional perspective to individual thinking and, in effect, expanding the database available to other people with similar thinking patterns.

Emerson’s Self-Reliance may be the most individualistic piece of literature in the Norton Anthology. The fourth sentence of the essay is inspiring, “To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart, is true for all men, – that is genius.” This encourages independence in the mind of the reader and clearly explains Emerson’s underlying theory – we do not need to rely on other people’s ideas; we are better off by listening to our inner voice and acting accordingly. Also, if we do this we could be considered genius! If what is true in our own heart is also true for every man on the planet why should we listen to any other source? It seems foolish to do so if this is possibly a fact. Also, to believe that what is true in your own heart is a universal truth takes much courage for the fact that people will always argue against you, and they will have a different perspective than your own. However, it is up to the individual to stand up for what is in his heart, and to explain to the rest of the world what is true. If what is in his heart is not true, this will be proven. Conversely, if what resides in his heart is actually true he will prevail. But listening to others and doing what other people are doing cannot accomplish this. If you conform to the society around you the individual is lost. Becoming a true individual takes much courage, because, if you fail, you are a failure all on your own. This is the dilemma of the conforming non-individual, or the dilemma of the non-conforming individual, depending on how you want to look at it. It is also possible, I guess, that this is simply a small part of the overarching human dilemma and could possibly be why some people become “lost” in the tranquil, doubtful, and resulting chaotic frenzy that is created when the individual is separated from society.

Thoreau listened intently to Emerson, and in his piece, Resistance to Civil Government, Thoreau perfectly explained a few necessary qualities that an individual must possess. Beginning with an obligation to himself, Thoreau states, “The only obligation which I have a right to assume, is to do at any time what I think right.” This quote, found in Thoreau’s Resistance to Civil Government, is a mirror image of Emerson’s ideas. By having his only obligation to do what he thinks is right he is creating something unique every time he acts and thinks (or thinks then acts). He is not claiming to be right all the time. But only to do what he thinks is right. This is where courage comes back into play. A cowardly man will not always stand up and say what he thinks is right. Perhaps, he is not smart enough to formulate his own ideas; however, it seems that most of the time he will hold back his thoughts for fear of being ridiculed by others, and not because he doesn’t possess the brainpower to think on his own. An individual must be the first to resist something – to resist anything, and then, if his logic is sound, appealing and favorable, the crowd will follow. If there is never any resistance exhibited by any person that person is always going with the flow of what other people are doing; they are always taking the easy way out. Thoreau didn’t want to take the easy way out, and by clinging on to and drafting this obligation for himself, Thoreau is, in effect, creating an environment where he truly feels comfortable speaking his mind whenever he opens his mouth. This is a necessary step in the evolution of the individual.

Emerson’s writing was truly revolutionary and encouraged all of society to use each one of their respective brains more actively than they were most likely used to. This behavior deviated from the norm. There are many who came after him, but Emerson was a true revolutionary. It could be argued that Emerson was also an enlightened soul, and this might have helped him with his work. He was schooled in religion and fully understood the bible. This is how he was able to relate some of his abstract thoughts to the rest of society. This was a common ground that he had with his neighbors, a commonality. However, saying that, “Travelling is a fool’s paradise” was not common thought, I would assume. Human beings haven’t changed that much in 150 years. We still love to travel. But travelling is a fool’s paradise? This cannot be a common belief of his time. Who wouldn’t want to travel to Naples, Italy? He didn’t always share common ground with the people who made up his surroundings, because Emerson’s brain was more active than most: “Our minds travel when our bodies are forced to stay at home.” Clearly, his journey through this world was more metaphysical than what most of us can relate to. But in true individualistic form, he chose to be a little different than the rest of the crowd, and he was one of the first American’s to philosophize on the subject.

Thoreau once again picked up on this notion set forward by Emerson, and he also chose to adventure at home in an attempt to truly find what was in his heart: “As travelers go around the world and report natural objects and phenomena, so let another stay at home and report the phenomena of his own life.” However, Thoreau was slightly more of a radical than Emerson was. His refusal to pay the poll tax is a prime example of this behavior. His thorough criticism of the government was not going with the grain of the rest of society. He was highly critical, as any true individual should sometimes be, of his surroundings. To speak of slavery, Thoreau said, “In other words, when a sixth of the population of a nation which has undertaken to be the refuge of liberty are slaves, and a whole country is unjustly overrun and conquered by a foreign army, and subjected to military law, I think that it is not too soon for honest men to rebel and revolutionize.” An individual must initiate a revolution, and this individual must go against the grain. If a person goes with the grain, the idea of a revolution ever taking place is lost. Let us not be afraid of the word revolution, America was a revolution. And although Thoreau’s viewpoint was held by other great individuals, such as Abraham Lincoln, he was courageously and purposefully misaligning himself with the people of the South. He was taking a stand and speaking what was true in his heart. Over the years, it has been proven that, with regard to this instance, what resided in his heart was in fact true for all people.

Great ideas often times come from brainstorming activities and asking questions. Great individualistic ideas also come from brainstorming activities and asking questions, but for the individual we must ask questions to and of our self. What would happen if all of us were monotonous and had the same ideas; if we all followed and copied the people around us? It would be extremely easy for people of power to subdue us into a controlled routine that could fulfill their agenda. This thought might sound paranoid; however, as an extreme example, if we all copied what other people were doing we would be no more individualistic than a herd of cattle. People must take it upon themselves to have the same obligation as Thoreau had to himself; at least have this obligation when it counts if nothing else. The more ideas that we have floating around the better equipped we will be to solve problems when they arise, as indicated again by Thoreau: “Moreover, any man more right than his neighbors, constitutes a majority of one already.” The majority must start somewhere. However, this man will not know if he is more right than his neighbors unless he believes that what he is thinking is also true for his neighbors. If he is not more right he will be proven wrong. But to lose the battle before it has begun is cowardly, and as Emerson has said, “… but God will not have his work made manifest by cowards.” These words are encouraging and might be alluding to the fact that we are all capable of doing “God’s work” but we cannot be cowards if it is at all possible. We must think for ourselves, and we must stand up for what is true in our own hearts. We must be individuals.

OFWGKTA

Someone’s Gotta do it:

reading.

I’d Never

If I didn’t try I’d never fail

I’d never cry I’d never wail

I’d never get high fives or get out of bed

I’d look like a bum, and I’d only eat bread

If I didn’t try I’d never be cool

I might think I was cool, but I’d be a fool

If I didn’t try I’d never win

I’d never write thoughts down with a pen

If I didn’t try I’d never steal the show

If I didn’t ever try you’d never ever know

Protected: Short Stories of True Disbelief

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Protected: Dear John, (from some lady)

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