Good Advice

It's been a long week...and it's not over yet.

It's also snowing again. Not that I don't like snow, but the weather has been so nice lately it's kind of a downer to see more of the white stuff blowing around.

But spring is coming, and with it the glorious Alaskan daylight and a summer filled (hopefully) with hiking, kayaking, and getting out and having fun.

I don't really have much else to say right now, but I will leave you all with one of my favorite all-time quotes. This is, in fact, some of the best advice I have ever seen, read, heard or pulled out of my ass. Every couple of weeks I try to re-read it, then sit back, take a deep breath, and let it sink in. It's simple, almost crude...yet speaks directly to the heart of why I think the way I do.

"One final paragraph of advice: Do not burn yourselves out. Be as I am - a reluctant enthusiast... a part-time crusader, a half-hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it. While you can. While it's still here. So get out there and hunt and fish and mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, encounter the grizz, climb the mountains, bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for awhile and contemplate the precious stillness, that lovely, mysterious and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in your head and your head firmly attached to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those desk-bound people with their hearts in a safe deposit box and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators. I promise you this: You will outlive the bastards."

- Edward Abbey

If you liked this, I would strongly recommend reading more of Abbey's work. "Desert Solitaire" is always a good place to start. Oh, and thanks to my brother-in-law, Rik, for taking that beautiful picture of Resurrection Bay while he was visiting last summer.