Hearing “Highway to the Danger Zone” at a piano bar. It was request night for tips, where the requests were ordered by how much the tip was.
Most of the tips were $1 to $3. I laid down Highway with $5, mostly as a joke.
What I got was a panio cover made up on the spot, and it was the best version of the song I ever heard. Will likely never hear it like that again.
Happiness?
Idk I just cant feel it anymore, especially not after that monday nazi salute, I’m about to die (by the hands of the government)
I aim to kayak West Cold Creek again, and do better than merely survive. I have more experience and better gear, not sure of my strength. (I should note, Florida is the flattest state in the Union, creeks are slow.)
To save you a wall of text, here’s what I wrote the night I got back. Yes, it’s overly dramatic and disjointed. I was disjointed. Now I have an inkling as to why combat vets usually don’t talk about fighting. There’s a sense of, “You weren’t there, can’t possibly understand, why bother?” Wrote this to get my head on track, it helped a lot.
here go if you're interested
Went to conquer the West Branch of Big Cold Creek. Bucket list thing.
Got my neighbor to extract me at the Adventures Unlimited landing. LOL, the plan was to get all the way back to Carpenter’s Park in Milton. Nope. Couldn’t talk to him, sat quietly on the ride, shocked to be out of there.
We get back to my car, young rednecks hanging out under the bridge, jammin’ tunes and drinking beer. Young girl comes running up:
“Oh my god, is that your car?!”
“Yeah, that’s me.”
“This is gonna sound so weird but can I give you a hug?”
“Uh, sure…”
SQEEZE
in a rush of words
“Oh my god we saw you take off yesterday AND YOU NEVER CAME BACK and we were talking about who to call for rescue and we thought you might be dead and we didn’t know who to call and oh my god I’m glad you’re OK!”
SQUEEZE
Nobody goes down that creek. Nobody. Even the guys at Adventures Unlimited didn’t know about West Cold Creek. And they WORK on Big Cold Creek! 2-miles of non-stop deadfalls, downed trees blocking the way every 50’, 3 jams in 30’ was the bonus prize. Humped my kayak and gear over-and-under and through dozens. Logs; slippery, mossy, underwater, rotten, floating, covered in spiky branches. Over one and the current slams you into the next, on the wrong side. It gets worse the farther you go.
7 hours, 7 o’clock, 1.8 miles, no strength left, can’t make the main creek. 3 more impasses in sight. Soaked and submerged in West COLD Creek, over and over, for hours. Thinking hypothermia might in the works (sometimes one can’t tell because adrenaline, people die in summer temps), went to strike camp.
South side; solid creeper thorns, impassable, looked North, across the creek. No lie, a patch of sunlight (weird in these thick woods) shining on a flat, elevated position. Barely bigger than my tent. Like God himself pointing His enormous finger, “No you idiot, there!”Dragged my gear up a 45º incline, tied the boat to a tree, pitched camp. Nearly everything in the hull soaked, dry-bags too loose. Clothes and linens dry! Splatted gear all about, got in the tent with dry clothes, warmed, rested, took stock, took a beer. Got gear squared away, hung a clothesline. Like it’s gonna dry. So wet a road flare couldn’t start pine needles. I have created smoke!
Next morning, laid on my bedroll for hours, too sore to move. Heard day trippers, tubers and canoers, yelling on the main creek. People that close. Just gotta get off this tributary. No matter what I can pull the life-vest ripcord, float to a sand bank, await rescue.
OK; Tylenol, cold espresso, trail mix. 1 hour and I’m home free.3 more hours to until I saw Salvation Beach.
Wasn’t supposed to storm but I spent an hour or more hiding when it got bad, 3 storm bands, hanging on tree limbs under banks. Nowhere to safely get on shore, 20sq/ft of any land was a godsend and deserved a stop. Oh, and bailing the kayak with a dish rag after I lost my sponge. “Always carry a towel” is sound advice (Bugblatter Beasts aside), a big yellow sponge is a necessity.
So tired I flipped the kayak for the first time (and that was after I hit the easy creek). Lost my weapon, new and old phones, GPS, monocular, ecig, knife, don’t know what all. One bag but it was the good stuff. Still had survival gear.
I was extraordinarily cautious; one accident could strand/kill me. No getting out without a chopper and sling. Sometimes I wanted to quit, give up and fire a pair of flares at the next helicopter or plane. “How am I going to lever this @^%*! boat over this !#@%$ log with 10 gallons of water in the hull and taking on more!” In a storm, flooding my boat from top and bottom.
One time I grabbed the T-handle on the front and bailed into the swirling green. Don’t care what’s down there, this yak is going over this log. Promptly run over by my own boat. Came up laughing! Beat that one!
4 miles down the main creek I landed at Adventures Unlimited (local outfitter), borrowed the office phone to call for extraction. Looked rough climbing out of there, rain top shredded down the back, covered in bruises and lacerations. Workers at the landing were shooting the bull with me until one guy really had a look, “Do you need help man?” “Yeah, I do. Not with you guys this weekend but I need to call for a ride. Mind if I walk up to the church or cemetery, see if I can get a signal?”
I’m faithful about only testing one bit of gear at a time, way too much new stuff on unfamiliar turf. Many lessons learned. LIFEWATER STRAWS WORK! (Ask me, I could be a spokesman.)
16 Band-Aids/patches on my hands alone. I’m black and blue all over but from the knees down it’s frightful. Thought my legs were tanned and dirty, nope, bruising so solid it’s an even color.
Did I mention the non-stop boat full of spiders? And the big yellow sponge? Fun fact: You can flick banana spiders out with a big yellow sponge. Otherwise grab their leg and yeet 'em.
I’m going back in.
EDIT: Forgot the part where I hit a 5’ wide dead tree blocking the way. Couldn’t pull my gear over it, no way in hell. There was a 12" tall triangular opening on the left side. Held onto to a rotten branch, stomped my kayak under water and through the gap.
I’m really into the whole “man vs. nature” conflict. See y’all. I’m hiking out to see if I can spot that momma bear again.
Watching Arcane.
Having a family.
Died and visited God at His place +
Yes, I can’t wait to go there again…
I had morphine at the hospital once. It was like a blanket woven with fibers made of love, calmness, and warmth. I would love to feel that again, but not a good idea. I can easily understand how someone can get addicted to opiates.
First time I took amphetamines, it felt like a buzzing I’d had in my head all the time was suddenly gone and I could actually enjoy the quiet for the first time.
It was so great that I swore never to take them again, cause I knew I’d want to take them every day and get addicted.10 years later I was diagnosed with ADHD. Turns out amphetamines just let me feel what it’s like without symptoms for the first time.
Now I do take them daily (but at a much lower dosage).Let me get a couple
Honestly I’d settle for easy access to a saline drip. The raw hydration and cool sensation in the veins. The medical smell too.
I have to drink like 6 liters of water to sort of almost feel that hydrated in a day.
Same. It felt like heaven and you just felt perfect all around. And that was just a dose of pain relief. I tried LSD last year which i enjoyed, so i‘m sort of open to try new drugs in a controlled environment. Opiated however, never. I was lucky to experience it in a controlled environment like the hospital to realise this drug is not for fun, it will make an addict of you.
Yep, dangerous stuff. I once had some minor surgery done. Afterwards I was sitting outside in a patient waiting room in a bed waiting for the drugs to stop working.
I brought my laptop and watched some episodes of Curb Your Enthusiasm. It was hilarious and super comfortable.
I can never do that again, it’s obviously super addictive. The medical professionals are right in being really strict when giving out opiates in my country.
Apparently people’s responses in this situation are a good indication of their vulnerability to addiction in general.
Anecdotally it makes sense. I’ve had morphine multiple times (after accidents) and found it meh. I certainly wasn’t asking for more. It so happens that I hardly ever drink and I’ve never done drugs of any kind or even wanted to*, despite having no moral objections to them and being around a ton of people who do them all.
*Okay, except psychedelics.
I think it varies by class of drugs. I’ve used opiates and benzos before and enjoyed myself without feeling like I’d really care to try it again, but I definitely flirted with disaster/addiction with simulants for a decade plus and alcohol for my entire adult life.
And it didn’t take long; the first time I tried any stimulant I chased it, and I’ve tried a lot of them.
Psychedelics, on the other hand, I love but in must people there is little to no danger for addiction. I’d go so far as to say that unless you have a family or personal history of schizophrenia, psychedelics are almost a must for understanding or coming to peace with life, death, and society.
A good psychedelic trip is literally life-changing, and even a bad trip is life-changing if you go into it with a decent trip sitter and the attitude that a bad trip is still just showing you yourself and the things you need to work on.
I quit taking oxy once the pain subsided so i could have a beer lol. 15-45min of feeling like “everything is fine, really” while being forcibly dissociated every few hours was nice. Not worth the constipation at all.
Dilodin via IV drip was pretty great though.
I never came close to describing morphine even half as well as you did. And it still doesn’t do it justice.
Morphine is the best. And that’s what makes it the worst.
Childhood
Looking out over unbroken old-growth tropical rainforest as far as the eye could see. It was beautiful and gave me hope for our slowly dying world.
I’d like to be able to raise my children again. I think I could do better.
Kimberley M., 1998
Flying with my father. Flying was his passion and I only ever got to ride with him once. Sadly, he passed several years ago and I’ll never get to go up with him again.
Happiness
Appalachian Trail for sure, I only did a couple sections but I am absolutely going again if I can. One day I’d like to actually do the whole thing but I just don’t have the time.
Touching a woman’s breast consensually.
Same, I’ve only ever touched my moms breasts
when I was a baby and my mom was breastfeeding me
You lucky bastard!
Can confirm. Worth it.
