Hi guys, I wrote the part II to the first story I posted 3 weeks ago.
I think moving together is an interesting action. Basically what it means is that you are roped to your partner on perhaps easy but massively exposed terrain. Easy in this sense is usually also very relative to the ability level of the pair. It means that due to a lack of protection between you if one of the pair falls, you both fall. So you have to have ultimate trust in your partners ability. Indeed, just on Sunday I was talking to a mountain guide which told me about a fall on Aiguille du Peigne, while a rope team was moving together.
You often don't see ultimate trust in the modern world invested in to a comrade, perhaps outside actual warfare. This is part of the reason why I think Alpine climbing is basically a substitute of this for the modern man. You go in to dangerous places, to do risky things, you don't bring back cattle or women or anything useful for that matter. But perhaps, you show that you could, if the times were different. You seek the same valor and the status that comes with this. Which is why a lot of climbers look down on people using guides, they see it as stolen valor. The first Englishman, Charles Hudson who went up Mont Blanc wrote a book in 1856 titled 'Where There's a Will There's a Way: An Ascent of Mont Blanc by a New Route and Without Guides' which was the first written articulation of this sentiment.
I think the psychology of this sort of adventure seeking has much more to explore. But I haven't yet delved in to it too much yet.
I am not sure if its appropriate for The Motte main page, given the general topic of discussion. But I thought I'd share this anyway given that I think the story series might interest at least some of you here. As some of you may now I had kidney failure and then was subsequently on dialysis, then a transplant, now I am trying to come up with a solution to never be on dialysis again.
This particular chapter of this personal story covers the time period just before my kidneys failed. Its set in the high Alps, which adds a bit of something different.