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Making
things happen - with integrity. A weekly CyberMemo designed to keep you on task. Monday November 4, 2002 Volume IV Number 44 |
FOCUS - The Zip Line
It’s no secret.
There is something in the male DNA that responds to the lure of the battlefield. It certainly isn’t exclusive to the male gender; women can be as competitive and prone to violent confrontation as men, no doubt. But it is clearly typical for the male of the species to rev up at the invitation to participate in a physical duel of just about any sort; where winners and losers are labeled as such by the end of the day.
Call it a stereotype of manhood if you must. However you try to explain it away, it is for real.
That’s why top favorite movies include Braveheart and The Patriot and We Were Soldiers, all starring Mel Gibson in the leading role. Add to those Saving Private Ryan and The Gladiator, and you’ve compiled a composite archetype of the complete man, unafraid, focused, bold, daring, determined, resolute. The three Gibson movies feature a male character who is strong and fit, steely eyed and ready for battle. But the violence is not gratuitous or unwarranted. It’s not violence for the sake of violence. It is, rather, unavoidable. A real man, a man of principle who is thrust into the clash of armies or nations will ultimately prevail. It’s a matter of duty. It is his role to protect; his obligation to resist a clear threat to the tranquility of hearth and home. Guys not only cheer him on, but see themselves vicariously in the role. It’s something primal.
In The Gladiator, Marcus Aurelius, Emperor of the Roman Empire, aging and preparing to pass his Kingdom to the next generation, could not grant his blessing to his own son, Commodus, as his successor. Commodus was self absorbed, coddled, spoiled by the privilege of wealth. He understood nothing of the demands of the battlefield. He was soft, devious, conniving, deceitful, cunning, untrustworthy. The Emperor knew it – if Commodus assumed the throne, the Empire would surely crumble.
Maximus was the son Marcus Aurelius didn’t have. He was every inch a man. His words inspired armies. His determination in battle set the example - his men followed, and fought until death or victory, whichever came first. His comrades stood with Maximus, braving storm and foul weather, hardship and hunger, pain and adversity, together overcoming the odds. And together, they celebrated victory. The Emperor would hand the throne and the power and authority not to his son, the expected heir, but instead to the worthy candidate, Maximus.
But Commodus intervened, becoming a villainous anti-hero; one only Maximus could set straight. The Gladiator.
The characters Maximus (Russell Crowe) and Captain Miller (Tom Hanks in Private Ryan) and William Wallace (Gibson in Braveheart) and Benjamin Martin (Gibson in The Patriot) and Lt. Col. Hal Moore (Gibson in We Were Soldiers) were all stirred by an instinct to protect and preserve their homeland. In the case of Private Ryan, the entire mission was the rescue of a sole surviving son. A family torn by the ravages or war must not be cut off from the generations, if it can in some way be prevented.
Men understand these things.
When nearly fifty of us guys gathered on a mountain top this weekend, we talked about men as warriors. We acted like warriors for a couple days. We talked like warriors.
We found out it’s not only primal and fun and nearly universal.
It’s biblical, too.
* * * * * * * *
Up in the San Bernardino Mountains where the air is clear and clean and the pine forests fragrant and the slopes steep; littered with the crumbling boulders and rocks and gravel of decomposing granite, and the jagged peaks form the distant horizon, guys with guts ride the Zip Line.
First the harness. The nylon belts fit tightly around the thighs and the waist and attach to a clip which fastens to a pair of heavy cords and clips, which eventually will secure you to a steel cable, over a thousand feet long.
Then you strap on a silly looking helmet. A hard hat.
Once the harness is in place and your head protected, you are ushered to a spiral staircase perched on the ledge of a sheer face overlooking a dried up river bed which winds its way down from the high country. There was a time when water tumbled over these stones, enough of it to smooth the rough edges off the rock, leaving them shaped and rounded from the endless current and flows of rain and melting snows. But at the end of this summer of drought, the wash is bleached white and parched from the relentless sun, and bone dry, and a long ways down.
Holding the two clipped lines from the harness in one hand, you grip the stair rail in the other, and wind upward round and round climbing to the top. It’s a narrow platform of heavy lumber, suspended over the gorge like a scaffold. When you step off the stair to the wood, an experienced assistant clips your harness to a safety cable as you straighten up and view the scene, a panorama of mountain peaks and tall pines and the riverbed below… way below.
The moment snatches your breath away.
The perch is attached to four utility poles, embedded deeply in the granite below, and held straight by a series of other cables, pulling the poles upright against the considerable weight of the long steel lines dropping precariously into the canyon below. Your guide cracks a joke, a throw away line, like, “watch your step,” as though you aren’t, or “pretty nice view from up here, don’t ya think?” as though you hadn’t noticed, or “ya wonderin’ why you agreed to do this?” as though he’s reading your mind.
Along the way to your appointed cable line are more instructions, primarily about the soon-to-be-announced signal that it’s your turn to jump. Off the edge. Into space.
When you get to your launch position, your assistant transfers your clips, one at a time, from the safety cable, up above your head to the trolley that will transport you some three football fields from your perch to the rocky valley floor below. Once in place, he tells you, “You're set.” From that point on, it really doesn’t matter anymore… you are secure, even though you feel anything but. He leaves you there in solitude, to consider your life and creation from a vantage point you’ve never really known before.
Guys learn from the earliest stages to disguise their fears.
Our guys were no different. They stood on that perch, stoic. Funny helmets in place, and holding on to that tether with white knuckle tension. Grinning. Nodding. Like a walk in the park. Hearts beating wildly. Breathing mountain air deeply.
“Ya OK?” we’d ask.
“Fine.” With a nod. “Doin’ great,” they’d say.
But you knew as you looked up at your pals facing a moment of truth, the ultimate leap of faith, that just beneath the calm and the eye of the tiger, lurked sheer terror.
“OK, I’m gunna count to forty-two, and you’re gunna jump, OK?” All four on the platform attached to cables some fifteen feet apart nodded at the ready. “FORTY TWO!” he yelled. And off they went.
One of our guys sat down on the platform, and gingerly pushed off into the open air, uncertain that this harness and the cable above would really hold like they said it would. Free from the boards, he took flight, and whooped in delight, leaving his fears behind. Other guys eased into the jump, while still others took a short running start to speed up the ride, screaming in gleeful defiance of gravity. Several guys from our troop turned backwards, and hanging from a single clip cart-wheeled themselves in suspension from the cables, accelerating downward, flipping and turning, then hanging upside down, arms extended, hooting and howling in exultation, their voices echoing back off the walls of the canyon as onlookers watched, wagging their heads in disbelief as grown men for one brief moment in time recovered a boyhood sense of wild and reckless abandon that until now got lost somewhere on the road to adulthood.
I was official videographer. I captured some of those moments.
And as a grand finale, I made the leap, too. In one hand, I held the strap that secured me to the cable above. In the other hand, my camera, rolling, set at wide angle. And when the man said, “GO!”, I jumped, and filmed the descent.
The audio captured my involuntary gasp and jerky utterance as I leaped off the edge and made the drop until the cable caught me and I started the rapid plunge to the valley floor.
I think I’ll edit that out.
* * * * * * * *
Us guys on a weekend getaway agreed. Our lives are like a battle. We are men, comrades at arms. Our speaker, a Mel Gibson type, called us to something higher, something good. We dared to take a leap of faith off the lumber planks and trust our equipment and enjoy the journey. The brotherhood developed between us bonds that are stronger. We pledged support for one another on the field of battle, and along the way, encouraged in each other a commitment to a little style and grace as we soar above the rocky riverbed of life.
Together, by the fire on Saturday night, we appealed to a Higher Source, affirming our intention and our aspiration, in it all, to be godly men.
Under the stars shining clear and bright in the mountain sky, we had a clear sense that our prayers were heard.
And that together is better than alone.
* * * * * *
It’s Monday morning. You are a leader.
Because you are a leader, man or woman, you know the smell of the battlefield. You know something of the dangers and the weariness and the loneliness and the fears and the surprises and the twists and turns and suspense and the demands. When someone, a comrade, comes into your life, and understands the challenge and faces it with you in a rare combination of earnestness and good humor, you get the energy you need to carry on.
You need this.
If you don’t have it, look for it until you find it.
It’s good to talk theory. Brainstorm alternatives. Check with the experts. Do your testing. Gather in the results of the survey. Set up the systems. But ultimately, you’ve got to take the leap.
Strap on the harness, snap the clip to the cable, step up to the edge, and jump.
That’s where the real learning begins.
The Zip Line.
Go for it.
Posted in Valley Center, California
© Copyright Kenneth E. Kemp 2002
Special Thanks to my good friend David Belcher, owner of Rhino Media Group and creator of WisdomGram
LeaderFOCUS is a service of Good Stewardship Associates
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