My best friend just passed away. After college, I traveled out west with my girlfriend at his urging. He told us to save $500 and just drive around, see what we could find. I remember calling him from a pay phone in Arches National Park, Utah, and going on about the sublime beauty and the sunset and the great stretch of land. "John," he growled from his trailer in the mountains, "I already told you, that is where America and Ed Abbey finally agree." Indeed they do.
And though my friend's life was cut short, his spirit will linger out there, where the wind cuts across the plain, where he kept his heart.
I have posted this so many times my keyboard is wearing out. But anyway, it deserves another round.
from a speech by Edward Abbey, Missoula MT 1978
"Do not burn yourselves out. Be as I am. A reluctant enthusiast and part-time crusader. A hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the West. It is even more important to enjoy it while you can, while it's still there. So go out there, hunt, fish, mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, encounter the griz, climb a mountain, bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet elusive air. Sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness of the lovely, mysterious, and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves. Keep your brain in your head and your head frimly 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 safe deposit boxes and their eyes hypnotized by their desk calculators. I promise you this: You will outlive the bastards."
