"Above It All..."

Friends: "Above It All..."


Independence Pass, Colorado, elevation 12,007...July 31, 2007

Standing in the swag of the Continental Divide, the mind, given time, conjures up wild imaginations of what it might mean to live "above it all." This altitude plays evil tricks on the mind, giving it illusions of grandeur and wild ambitions that a more dense atmosphere at sea level dispels as unreasonable. Maybe it's the wind that whispers these voices of illusions I hear, perhaps the same voices that were heard by the plundering hoards of Genghis Khan or Alex the Great--and now heard by the robbers of corporate America plotting their own brand of thievery atop gleaming city office towers. Perhaps.

We flew out here at 38,000 feet, "above it all," and beneath us across the dull mid-west for endless miles lay interesting geometric shapes of a variety of colors of greens, browns and grays. Above it all, the scene repeated itself and seemed like a fairyland of monopoly-sized towns and doll-like houses, occupied by hearty and industrious Americans. For whatever reasons, these people seem to prefer nature's vicissitudes, endless chores and the insipid sameness of life at ground level. As Charles Kurwalt once remarked, "There's a story at each point of light below." It's our story, too, at sea level.

But to be above it all, in the term's many iterations, both actual and metaphorical, we find ourselves often disconnected from the reality of life below. And we can't live above it all without some nostalgic longing to return to our lower-elevation links with its own brand of life.

I was "above it all" once in my youthful and early business career. In a high-rise office suite (at great cost, I might add!), it was exhilarating to sit and stare into the horizon of a teeming metropolis, contemplating real estate empires and ambitious exploits...as you recall, our dreams were large and vivid then in youth, and as I later discovered, foolish to consider at ethereal altitudes above it all .

Fortunately age, altitude and daily details succeeded in keeping most of us from being crazed by the hubris that sometimes accompanies being above it all. And I, for one, find I now enjoy the experiences of grappling with lawyers and thugs in the real world...like that proverbial rock-in-the-running-shoe, you know you are alive!

As we descended from above it all, our ears popping, speeding through verdant meadows and valleys, we left that beautiful but hostile altitude with a sense of relief, knowing that we'd soon be back among our own life-as-usual at lower altitudes. Down here at sea level our illusions of grandeur of life have morphed into the realities of an island paradise we share, albeit with its own challenges and joys. We are truly living "above it all". I think we have a saying around these parts that pretty much sums up our deplorable sea-level condition: "Living High on the Hog!"


Bud
August 2, 2007