"Gimpy. With A Moment To Reflect" or: "Happy Carnival!"

To review:

Returning to the ADK i was in a bad way emotionally, and went off into the mountains looking to cause the kind of physical agony that would harmonize the feeling in my body with the torrent in my mind.  i believe the syntax went like this:

I wanted to hike so hard and far that every sinew would snap, every bone burn and break.  I wanted to stand at the bottom of a canyon and call an avalanche down.

While no avalanche came, (save the subsequent, melodramatic, literary one) i met a woman on the trail who was a barrage of a different kind, who provoked me to unleash the kind of physical assault on myself a paint can full of whoopass couldn't contain.  The moral to the story being that if you're really dedicated to an idea, if you want something very badly, you can basically call it on yourself.  I believe the New Age hippie-dippie folk refer to this as "manifesting."  Some of the more grounded set might call it "getting what you ask for."  I think we can all agree that in this case at least, the most apt term might be "dumbassery."  Longstoryshort, i twisted my left calf into a pretzel and have been laid up, staring out the window ever since.

Yes, Ma, i've been stretching.  Heat and ice, anti-inflammatories, self-massage, long epsom salt baths, the works.  I'm on the uptick.  Next week's going to be a marathon series.  My goal is 16 peaks in eight days, an Everest or two in elevation.  We'll see.  By the end of the week the temperature is forecast to plummet harder than a twerking booty to a bass drop.  Further evidence of how small and insignificant are our intentions when faced with the reality of Mother Nature's.  The Winter 46 is no joke.  Respect to all that have accomplished it; deference to all who watch the newcomers like myself arrive every winter convinced we're the next on the list, who have every right to snicker silently to themselves as they watch us drag our tired asses back home licking our wounds.  

So while out of commission, i thought i'd take this opportunity to reflect on some things i've been meaning to put down about this area and the people here.  Specifically, how there doesn't seem to be one among them who is the type to silently snicker at the fools who slink away in defeat.  In fact, every person i've met, on the trail or in town, has been one of the most hospitable i've run across this side of Nepal - the Land of "Namaste" - which is saying something.  The people of Saranac Lake have to be the least cynical, most unabashedly happy and friendly Northeasterners there are.  I'm talking Midwestern humility matched with Southern charm.  I didn't think that was possible in this corner of the world, much less the North Country, where the winter wind rips hard enough to tear the skin off your nose.  Not to mention that they are also in fact New Yorkers, whom, as a native of the Bay State, i have been bred to regard with at least feigned contempt.  

All apologies to the die-hards back home - these folks are irresistible.  

Yesterday was the kickoff of the annual Saranac Lake Winter Carnival, an event that's been held in this town every February since 1947, with origins as far back as 1897.  Darcy, the woman i'm staying with, insisted over breakfast that i go into town with her to catch the woodsmen's competition. 

"Come on, it'll be fun!"  She said.  "You have to get out of this house."  Though completely content to mope and soak, i relented.  She walked, i hobbled, and beneath a gently falling snow we passed through throngs of wool-hatted and rosy-cheeked locals down to the main stage along the shore of Lake Flower to arrive right as the competition was ending.  As the crowd disbursed, only a dozen or so carved bears stood testament to the artistry that had occurred.  Not to worry though, there was a veritable cornucopia of winter variety still to come.  

We walked the lake shore passing the Arctic Mini-Golf course.  A series of snow men and castles made with integrated PVC tubing allowed for leisurely, club-toting enthusiasts to knock their neon orange balls through to the snow "green" on the opposite side.  We took in the curling exhibition where for $5 you could "throw" (?) three "stones" (?) down the ice while two designated broom-handlers vigorously swept out the path in front of it.  Onlookers clapped (un-ironically) when any "thrower"... did a good one (?).  

Passing by the ice palace, the main attraction of every Winter Carnival, we checked out the work of the all-volunteer ice workers union (Local IPW 101 - "International Palace Workers") who'd pulled nearly 3,000 2'x4' blocks of ice from the lake and piled them into the form of a medieval castle, complete with imbedded lighting.  

Snowmobiles whipped up and down the lake as we returned to the main stage where the highlight of the day was just starting - the Ladies' Fry-pan Toss.  Though there was no correlating men's event, i overlooked the institutional sexism, and watched while women of all ages, shapes, and sizes lined up one-by-one to toss a cast iron skillet as far as they could across a field of snow.  It was obvious after just a few contestants who'd been training and who hadn't, yet despite some abysmal tosses i couldn't hear any discernible razzing from the crowd.  It was unbelievable!  While the New Englander in me appreciated the quaint, down-hominess of the event, the Bostonian in me was choking back an up-swelling load of sarcasm and pun-spitting that would spray verbal graffiti all over this Rockwellian scene. "Hey, somebody oughta pee-test the one with the guns there!  JUICER!"  Or: "Oh they're going crazy out here!  It's pan-demonium!"  Feeling ashamed at the sardonic default setting of my psyche, i chose instead to excuse myself before i blew a fuse, limped gimp-ily into the nearest bar and had a beer.

It's difficult to imagine what it must be like to be a local here.  To know most everyone, saying hello to anyone you make eye contact with, to be genuinely impressed by the favorable hop a skillet takes off frozen turf.  In the evening i walked among the throngs, as courteous in manner as they were massive in number, back down to the ice palace for the big fireworks display.  No one pushed, people left room for others in front of themselves, taller people stood naturally to the back.  It was fantastic - I was able to get right up to the fro-- just kidding ;)  Seriously though, i've never seen such unapologetic enthusiasm.  There was music playing on loud speakers, your standard, digestible, classic rock fare, and not just a few, but nearly everyone there was belting out the lines without fear of shame (and it wasn't even "Sweet Caroline").  When the Carnival King got on the mic to wish everyone a happy carnival, the response came in harmony: "Happy Carnivaaaaal!"  The ten-second countdown to the fireworks was a town-wide chorus.  

The fireworks lasted maybe six minutes.  At best.  Seriously?  Not a soul protested.  "Unbe-LIEVABLE!!" was all i heard.  It was genuine.  Heading back toward town, people sloughed in a line down the slush-and-sludge-riddled sidewalk without complaint, accommodating for the speed of the slowest, no one trying to pass.  Some who had cars parked along the street elected to walk along the roadside on their return.  A few strayed toward the middle, holding up a sizable line of cars behind them.  Here we go, i thought.  Fireworks over? Let the fireworks begin!  Not a car horn sounded.  At each intersection, pedestrians conceded their God-given right-of-way to allow for cars attempting to turn.

As i skirted the curbside crowd, cutting off a left-turning Toyota, I silently wondered if the next forty years will be sufficient time to disassemble the conditioning that's made me such a product of my environment; time enough to delve into the soul-searching i surely require. 

While somewhere, far off in the distance, the world's tiniest violin played...

;)