Saturday, July 07, 2012

Survival school 14-day field course

I am in Provo. Survival school just ended this morning.

Killing and processing the sheep was emotionally intense. Solo turned out far more liberating and creative than I expected.


Twinsies!  I am wearing the same shirt style and shorts as another student.  He is an actor who played Ziggy in The Wire.

At base camp, preparing to embark.

Laying out my blanket pack on the first day.

On the last day, two of the students ran after our shuttle van, to be playful.  I miss our little community!

The other students blew me away with how incredible they are. Not merely in athletic prowess (there were so many marathoners and pole vaulters and super hikers) but also in attitude toward life. I felt like the frog in the well, who did not realize how big the sky is, and how many amazing pursuits people could have.

7 comments:

  1. You killed a sheep solely for your entertainment? Sickening.

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  2. No, dearheart, I'm pretty sure they ate most of it, and there is nothing at all sickening about it. You catch it, dispatch it, cook it and eat it: belly full, mind happy. If the supermarkets vanished tomorrow, you'd be engaging in the same behavior to avoid starvation (at least until your crops were out of the ground--and even then, I expect the raw caloric value of animal fat would drive you to consume it, while you searched for a suitable substitute like pine nuts, etc). Hunger supplies a motivation unlike any other... :-)

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  3. It was not for entertainment. It was to appreciate what happens behind the scenes when we get meat in our food. Everyone involved is now mindful of the sacrifice the sheep made to give us sustenance. It is a lot more conscientious than eating meat with no idea of where it got into the supermarket / restaurant.

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  4. Wow, you're still alive. Congrats!

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  5. You survived!

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  6. You didn't have to kill the sheep!

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  7. You and your friends killed a sheep! What does that prove? Does killing a helpless animal prove how tough you are?

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