Going down thirty and fighting with crocodiles

2004-08-26 - 8:19 a.m.

As you probably guessed, my trip with my dad and grandfather wasn't nearly as bad as I feared it would be. In truth, torture came in to play very rarely.

It's hard being with my grandfather because he is deaf. He can hear a tiny bit, but only things that are shouted directly into his right ear and then only sometimes. First of all I hate shouting. I tend to be rather anti-noise. Secondly, I'm horrible at shouting. I have a terribly soft voice that isn't loud even when I want it to be. So basically direct verbal communication between my grandfather and I is out. Sure I can mouth basic obvious things and he will know what I'm trying to say (like "good morning") but that won't get us far. I brought a writing tablet and a pen so I could write things to him, but that's slow and a pain in the butt. So mostly our conversations are one-sided with him telling a story and me nodding and smiling. It really sucks. Worse is when there's three of us and we're doing something like eating dinner or riding in the car. My dad and I will be having a conversation, but how can we include Grampa in it? I feel like we're ignoring him half the time. Perhaps someone else might be more ingenious about figuring out ways to communicate with him.

Another annoying part was listening to my dad complain about how stubborn his father is. I wanted to tell him that in the pain-in-the-ass-father department I have him beat by a mile. I didn't, though.

Anyway, my grandfather insisted that we take his car on the trip. He drives a Chevy Malibu, it made for a lot less space than we would've had in our Subaru Legacy, but we managed. The funny part, though, had to do with my grandfather's deafness. His car, for some reason, thinks that the emergency brake is on even when it isn't. As far as my grandfather knows, the only result of this is a light on the dash--easily ignored, right? Sure, except the car also lets us know the brake is on by beeping. Every time we started after coming to a stop the car would beep fifty-five times. Luckily, we mostly did freeway driving so we didn't stop very often. If we had been doing more city driving it probably would've driven us nuts. We never told Grampa about the beeping.

We ended up camping in a forest service campground called Robinson Creek, which is just a few miles downstream from Twin Lakes in Mono County, not far from Virginia Lakes. We got a campsite right on the creek and spent the rest of the day fishing (my dad and grandfather) and reading (me). The next day we drove to Mammoth Lakes and rode the gondola up to the top of Mammoth Mountain. We had a picnic lunch by Horeshoe Lake and then drove up to Virginia Lakes where Dad and Grampa fished at Little Virginia while I read some more. Throughout the whole trip we had great weather until the morning of the third day. It was really windy--windy enough to blow away my grandfather's tent even though it was staked down and had all his stuff in it. Wind isn't good fishing weather and it never makes my eyes happy either, so instead of doing more fishing, we packed up and headed home.

My dad and I basically got along the whole time. I find that without my mom around my dad and I actually get along better. This isn't because my dad is any less annoying, it's because I behave better. I have trouble showing people that I'm upset and apparently without my mom to draw attention away, I even have trouble showing my dad. So I didn't feel any better about being with my dad, but I wasn't able to display how I felt so at least he felt better about it. I know it doesn't make sense, but it's the way things are.

So this morning I set my alarm for six (although I woke up at 5:59) and went for a 5.3-mile jog. I finished today in 54:05 which is a 10:12 pace. Not super great, but not too bad either for me. Between mile 1 and 2 I began having intestinal issues. I try to go to the bathroom before, but you know, sometimes things just don't want to be easy for me. Anyway, I'm trying to train my brain to know that no matter how crappy I feel (sorry, bad pun), it will not make me cut my jog short. It's been shown that sometimes when people give themselves a break because they're in pain, they actually cause more pain. It's a psychological thing. Like if every time you get a headache or have lower back pain or something you take the rest of the day off work and go home and lie down, then pretty soon your brain figures out that pain equals no work and it starts causing pain. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that everyone's pain is all in their head, I'm just saying that rewarding pain can cause more pain and I'm not going to let that happen to me. So anyway, I kept jogging and eventually the pain went away so maybe my brain is starting to learn the lesson that pain isn't worthwhile. Also, last week while I was watching the Olympics they were interviewing a runner who I think was something like 37 years old. She was saying that getting old means that when you're running and you have a choice between going home and heading out a bit further you choose to go home. So today I chose not to be old.

Also, today was my first day jogging since the local schools started. I tried to go early enough to avoid any school traffic (since I jog right by two elementary schools), but a nearby junior high starts pretty early so I started passing some junior high students on their way to school. And I got harrassed by three pimply little hoodlums on bikes. Today I kept my temper and largely ignored them, but if they keep it up I doubt they'll be so lucky. I may be fat, sweaty, and out of breath, but I can still make your life unpleasant.

OK, since you read all the way to the end you are rewarded with pictures! Yay!

Clouds as seen from Shot Rock

Me reading by Robinson Creek

The Minarets as seen from Mammoth Mountain

Mt. Dunderberg and Little Virginia Lake