Thin Men, Yuppies, Saints, X'er's and well me...

“A yuppie most nearly approaches sainthood,” the book noted, “when he or she is able to accomplish more things in a single day than is humanly possible.” (The Yuppie Handbook)

"All of which means that the archetypal yuppie of the eighties sounds precisely like, um, everyone you know."

"By now, in fact, an argument could be made that the yuppie phenomenon is the most enduring and influential social movement of the past 50 years. The boomer media love to get all swoony over the Woodstock era, but how many real hippies do you know? The only remaining trace of hippie ideology can be found in supermarket aisles full of organic, farm-raised food—but don’t kid yourself: Those people creating a boom market for Whole Foods and organic baby food are yups, not hippies. Dead rebel artists like Burroughs and Kerouac were long ago turned into useful “bohemian” brands, tailor-made for Gap ads, but nobody actually aspires to be a beatnik anymore. (At this point, beret might as well be French for dickhead.)"

"Even back in 1991, novelist Douglas Coupland, the man who introduced the term Generation X into the mainstream, was picking up on a generation’s natural vulnerability to comfort. “When you’re 27 or 28, your body starts emitting the Sheraton enzyme,” he told People. “You can no longer sleep on people’s floors.” By 37, the Sheraton enzyme mutates into the Four Seasons endorphin. People, like neighborhoods, have a tendency to gentrify. On my recent trip to the West Coast, I went back to the section of Pasadena that used to be my beloved slacker drag strip in the eighties—a scrungy wonderland of pawn shops, Bukowski-approved dives, vintage clothing shops, used bookstores, greasy taco trucks. As I poked around in this," "it came as a shock to see that every last drop of that suburban boho-scape was now gone, replaced by upscale trattorias and tapas bars, boutiques and Pottery Barn and Tiffany’s.

A shock, but only a minor one. While the yuppies were colonizing my favorite neighborhood, apparently they were doing the exact same thing to my brain."

Jeff Gardinier (The Return of the Yuppie)

Do not go where the path may lead,

go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Blackfoot Maiden

I took this picture this past August 2006. Mighty was trailing behind me and it was a lovely day. Not too hot nor too cold.

I love Rocky Mountain wildflowers and have spent years trying to identify which ones can be used medicinally. When I took the picture you see of the Indian Paintbrush from outside in my yard, it was a lovely cool afternoon and Mighty was trailing behind me sticking his nose in logs and burrows. It was a very lovely memory. I've spent many hours/days/months/years with Mighty traipsing around many a mountain hill while I've been hunched over a particular plant or specie. I also think this is why I became such a rabid fan of disc golf...one would inevitably throw a disc in a bog full of Shooting Stars and Columbines...pure heaven!

I came across the story of the Blackfoot Maiden in Terry Willard Ph.D's book Edible and Medicinal Plants of the Rocky Mountains and Neighboring Territories. I quote him directly

"There is a beautiful story about the origin of Indian Paintbrush in Anora Brown's Old Man's Garden which she has taken from Mabel Burkholder's book "Before the White Man Came"

Once upon a time, a Blackfoot maiden fell in love with a wounded prisoner she was attending. The maiden realised that the tribe was only nursing its captive in order to torture him later. She planned an escape of the prisoner, accompanying him for fear of the punishment for such a deed. After some time in her lover's camp she grew homesick for a glimpse of her old camp. She finally went to the site of her old camp, hid in the nearby bushes, and over-heard two young braves discussing what would happen to the maiden who betrayed them, if only they could find her. Knowing she could never return, but nonetheless longing to return, she took a piece of bark and drew a picture of the camp upon it with her own blood, gashing her leg and painting with a stick. After drawing the picture, the maiden threw the stick away and returned to her lover's camp. Where the stick landed, a little plant grew with a brush-like end, dyed with the blood of this girl, which became the first Indian Paintbrush.