An intro for a paper on my grandpa

My grandfather is history and my grandfather is the earth. He endures with a stubborn, unexpected strength like a Juniper beaten by time and the elements clings to a cliff face where all other plants would have given up hope. The history flows from him like an inexhaustible spring, impossible to plug. It moves as freely as water running down a mountain swirling up and down and into every crevice of his memory without regard to whom is listening or how long he has been listening. My grandfather is the earth, but the earth is not friendly. He is as harsh, blunt and stubborn as the lowest point of the Great Basin, and tough, unchanging and permanent as the highest point of the Great Basin. He is a wind worn, craggy mountain of the high desert. He has no soft, forest bedding and he has no majestic pine trees. The white hair on his head is not snow; it is a cracked, bristly, dried up Artemisia Tridentata you will find growing on top of a high desert mountain. If you thirst for his wisdom, don’t look out south and west to the alpine country, look out east and north where the pine trees stop and the sagebrush begins. You will find a land that is harsh and hazardous and will not apologize for either of these.
My grandfather is this land, and they belong to each other. He has left more footprints on these hills than twenty representatives of my generation put together. The weight of his stories and memories could fill Lahontan Reservoir twice over and feed all the fish as well. My grandfather is this land and he does not apologize for it.
Until the age of six, he grew up in the Old Country. He is Basque and carries with him an ancient, mysterious legacy. His people were there before history was counted and his homeland was there before the peaks of the Alps had matured. He comes from the timeless Pyrenees where his first memory is chasing a chicken near a river. I can see my grandfather as a child running barefoot over the rich Pyrenees clay, dashing into a river and playing boyish games with the chicken – me boy; you chicken; I chase; you run.
When he came to America, all he left in the Old Country were his footprints and a dead chicken.
He leaves a new set of footprints now. He is old and bent over; he doesn’t have any feeling in his right hand and his left knee doesn’t work right. He has been through one heart attack, and we’re pretty sure a stroke. He has a calcium growth on his right collar bone and a large scar on his forehead from an accident that should have claimed his life two years ago.
We don’t let him walk in the desert alone anymore because one wrong step and we fear the worst. But this is our fear, not his. I once saw him pick up and carry an eighty pound rock – half has body weight and eleven less his years – and with the determination of someone who knows he will live forever purposefully drop it right where he thought it should go. And since my grandfather is the earth, he would know. If my grandfather could have his way, he would be romping through the hills picking up old cans to recycle collecting money to send to missionaries in Spain or Italy or Indonesia. He would be setting traps to catch weasels and skunks and gophers to keep them out of my father’s front yard. He would be in the land everyday collecting more stories and more history to pass onto this generation.
My grandfather is my predecessor, the footprints he has left in this land call to me with a jealous ferocity. I would love to respond and go back to a simpler life. But this is no longer possible. I fear technology has been the fall of my grandfather. The same things that have saved his life more than once is the same thing that slowly hastened the waning of my grandfather’s truly epic and timeless life. Who knows? Maybe if you look hard enough you will see some of his footprints across Spanish Springs and Lahontan Valley.
Their call will always remain as long as the earth remains with, hopefully, this question: Would you listen? Would you follow?

Just for the record

I am a fucking badass. I want the world to know that despite this spare tire around my sides, and some junk in the trunk I am in the best shape of my life.

Last Sunday I ran ten sets of bleachers* without stopping. Then I did the Rutten workout**. Then I ran 5 more sets of bleachers.

This Sunday I ran a mile then the Rutten workout then ten sets of bleachers without stopping.

I get down on myself, but the facts don't lie.

* A "set" of bleachers is defined by going up and down a single leg of stairs. The intensity of this workout varies depending on the side of the stadium you run the bleachers on. The entire stadium is equal to about 15 sets of the tallest bleachers (the south side)and twenty sets of the average size bleachers (the east and west sides).

** A "Rutten" is inspired by Bas Rutten. You do twenty pushups then run the length of the football field from the back of the end zone to the other back of the end zone. Then you do fifty situps, run down and back. Do twenty leaping squats (from a squatting position leap as high as you can into the air), run down and run back. This is all done without stopping. That is one Rutten. The Rutten workout consists of three of these with rests in between each Rutten. So that is 60 pushups, 150 situps, 60 leaping squats, and running about 1980 yards, which is around 1 and a quarter miles.

Psshhh! Whateva. I got that!

I'm going for two

Just to give it another shot, I'm going to ask her out again. Just to see...

You can probably guess that I'll be talking about girls

I just get down on myself. It's a confidence thing for me. I don't think that I would be worth their making time for me. I don't think I'm ever anything to wow someone. The more people get to know me, the more they like me, but whenever romantic feelings (on my part, it's never been theirs) get involved I don't know how to act. I have all these emotions so I think that if something were going to happen then shouldn't the other girl also have romantic feelings as well. Shouldn't she be as excited to see me as I am to see her. You know those side ways glances that people make when they're crushing on you? Dude, I don't get those from girls that I like... but I certainly make them all the time. This is gettin' old. I'm tired of making all the looks, and havin' all the eyes. I've got eyes for a girl that I see sometimes, but she don't have eyes for me, and she doens't throw any looks my way. I don't know how to make a girl like me.

When I was a junior in high school, and I got my one and only girlfriend (God, I'm a loser) she approached me about a date. I remember going on the date not thinking anything. I was like, "Sure, whatever, I'll go see a movie." Next thing you know, I'm seeing more of her and stuff like that, but the whole time I wasn't in love or really having feelings. It was kinda wierd. I just thought, "Well, some girl asked me out to a movie and I went. It was kinda nice." But that was it. Then we went to a second movie, and then coffee. I remember seeing her at church a few times, enough so that my mom knew who she was. Then I think she came with my mom to an honor choir thing that I sang in. We sat close and kinda made like touchy motions and stuff like that. We eventually held hands on the ride home and that was kinda what made it official. Uh, so yeah. I don't know. I guess I realize that it's wrong for me to assume that any girl that I have feelings for should have feelings for me. I went on a couple dates with Jen before I ended up with feelings for her. I do, however, remember that I was kinda looking for love at that point in my life, so I decided to go along with it because I was okay with dating. I would be okay now, but I don't know how, I'm just going to call her Mana...franken...heim... yeah, Manafrankenheim. But I don't know how Manafrankenheim feels about dating right now. I just really don't want to be shot down again.

That's where the trouble starts. I'm lonely, and kinda lookin', but the last two girls I've gone for have not "taken the bait." So, I definitely don't want to have that conversation EVER again. If there's such a things as chemistry, I don't know if I feel it between us. I freakin' cringe when I remember hearing that. I can be there as your friend, but I don't think I can be there for you as your girlfriend. Yes, these lines haunt me. Not to mention that every girl I've ever had feelings for has turned my down, or not turned my way. I've tried a few times. Twice in high school, twice in college with crushes here and there, but none of them have ever turned out the way that I want them to. This stuff turns my insides into a brackish waste where my heart is. I've crushed before, but I've never actually done it right. It's no wonder why I'm so insecure about my body, and my capacity for girls. I'm not a super-duper emotionally strong guy unless you piss me off, so I guess this is why I'm so wierd about dating and girls. I keep hearing people say Just try dating some people, but I too damn afraid. I've been turned down, and I'm not the kinda guy who can take that lightly. If I'm turned down, I figure it's because there's something wrong with me, and because I really wanted that person I went after, I want to fix whatever was wrong with me so that they will like me.

I need some mercy in a bad way.

bah

I saw Ethan today and throughout the course of the conversation I said a lot of stuff that had absolutely no merit for the rest of civilization. Neither Ethan nor I walked away from the conversation feeling like our lives were improved or touched in any way. I don't know, maybe Ethan feels like he's better fot it. We talked about, are you ready for it?

We talked about me ditching class so that I could pick flowers and leaves the petals scattered around the campus to make it prettier and give me something to do while I was ditching class. But then bees would have come because of the flower petals, and they would have been all like, "buzz buzz buzz buzz buzz buzzz buzz buzzzzzzzz!!!![Holy shit! Look at all these flowers. It's the mother lode!!!!]" And then deer would have come to eat the honey that the bees were producing and make the campus even prettier. But then Ethan was all like "Fuck you, bitch. Mu'fuckin' deers don't eat honey!!!" And then he slapped me. So I said, "Oh yeah, you're right." We decided that bears would come instead and then mountain men would come because of the bears and they would set traps for the bears, but that would be dangerous because people walk around campus everyday and someone would step into one of the bear traps. And then no one could help that person because they would be frantic and inbconsolable, and then wolves would come to eat that person and that would be horrible. At least, that's what I thought (I just farted real quietly and I'm in the library computer lab, and oh man it totally stinks and I'm stiing by this fan that's blowing to cool off the lab, so now my fart smell is going to fill the room. I might have thought this one through.). Ethan was all like "Fuck mu'fuckin mountain men! I kick Jeremiah Johnson right in his stupid ass for leaving his goddamn traps all over the mu'fuckin' place!!!" Then I was like "Ethan calm down. You don't want to see me angry. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry." But Ethan didn't stop, so I turned into the Incredible Morphin' Hulker-man and I was all pink and glittery, and had this lightning bolt scar on my forehead. I said to Ethan, I was all like "Peace friend Ethan. Tum-Tum and Papa Bear haven't made it back from chasing the bees and the honey, and the mountain men!!!" And then Ethan said, "Shut yo fuckin' mouth before I smack it. I'm the juggernaut, bitch!"

I decided to ditch class to write this?!
No, I swear I'm going to do homework. I even promise it.

Am I getting that old?

I was talking to this guy tonight after Living Stones, and he thought I was 25.

*cringe* 23 is almost 25, which is almost 28, which is almost 30!!!!

Ack!

For the record I am losing feelings for both of the women, and it FEELS AMAZING!!!!!!! Oh, man. To actually be in control of my thoughts when I was sitting by one of them tonight was a thing of beauty. Dude, that's a powerful God right there. I went to my "happy place" tonight at the worship leader's suggestion. The song he was singing ended with the line "there is hope" and the first and only thing I thought of telling God while we were hanging out in my happy place was "Let's go tell people..." I also imagined an ocean in my happy place, and I was asking God if there are people on the other side. I wanted to get into a boat and sail away.

Dude, I gotta be on my way out; the calling is just not getting any weaker. I don't know what it's going to look like, but, man, it's just gotta happen, or I will die!