[at-l] Knowing that it's there.. and atml

[jestbill at yahoo.com (william fitzpatrick)]

"What I suspect did not enter MacKaye's
mind that much (or anyone else's, at the
time) is the notion that hundreds, or thousands
of people would attempt to hike the entire trail
from end to end -- or that folks would then
compete for speed records of the journey."

Technology improves, technology spreads, times change, purposes, motivations,
attitudes change...EVERYTHING changes.  Lead, follow or get out of the way. 
(At least wear ear plugs.)

Everything changes independently of you and me.  We each have a vote, but our
vote counts less than does our vote for President: not for much.  We can
organize and prosetylize but we still can't expect to get our way.  The Amish
have had nearly zero effect on the general use and spread of technology and the
combined world churches will achieve little more with regard to stem cell
research.  The tide is rising and the special interests may as well be toy
boats.

You guys can pick apart the dessicated carcass of McKaye if that's what floats
your funeral barge, but by now he's no more than the Buddha: a dried up piece
of, uh, earth.


--- Raphael Bustin <rafeb@speakeasy.net> wrote:

> 
> [rafe]
> >If you think
> >cell phones are more destructive to the AT
> >than autos, highways and smog, you're not
> >being rational.
> 
> 
> [snodrog]
> >Illustrated in Anderson's MacKaye biography are Ben's own hand drawn plans
> >for roads to be built to access AT shelters. Thank goodness we have today 
> >the AT
> >Avery built and not the ridgeline carnival of resettled asylum and workcamp
> >candidates MacKaye dreamed up during his depression over his wife's 
> >suicide. As
> >a proponant of bringing electricity and telephone to rural areas, there's no
> >doubt MacKaye would've approved of cell towers and windmills as part of his
> >"installed recreation lands".
> 
> 
> Hmm.  You're twisting my point.  A road
> leading to a mountaintop isn't the same
> as a busy highway running alongside it.
> 
> Approaching NOBO, you walk most of the
> ridgeline in the Presidentials before you
> become aware of the Mt. Washington auto
> road.  The road up Greylock is pretty innocuous.
> We each can name many others, and I'm not
> counting the thousands of USFS roads.
> 
> But it's hard to feel wilderness when the
> echoes of traffic from an interstate come
> wafting up the slopes to the trail -- and
> stay with you for miles.  You know, like
> the air brakes on an 18-wheeler barreling
> down I-84 at 70 MPH.  Or just the general,
> incessant, fast-tires-on-concrete noise.
> 
> Man, I'll tell you -- that's what **I** mean
> to get away from, when I'm in the woods.
> The speed, the frenzied, unthinking motion.
> The thoughtless waste of energy.  The
> thoughtless consumption that drives all of it.
> 
> MacKaye wasn't interested in making the
> woods less accessible.  He wanted people
> to go there, and stay for a while -- and be
> content during their stay.  The trail was
> just a path between the camps - only one
> of four "bullets" on his list.
> 
> MacKaye's ideal still intrigues me.  He was
> a creature of his time.  Electrification was
> a classic CCC/WPA sort of project.  So
> was the building of fire towers and those
> beautiful cut-stone bridges on the Blue Ridge.
> 
> (We couldn't be having this discussion
> without electricity.  Nuff said.)
> 
> What I suspect did not enter MacKaye's
> mind that much (or anyone else's, at the
> time) is the notion that hundreds, or thousands
> of people would attempt to hike the entire trail
> from end to end -- or that folks would then
> compete for speed records of the journey.
> 
> 
> rafe b
> aka terrapin
> 
> 


JestBill  Ga--->Me '03

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