Year of the rat

I just heard somebody say that this year, 2008, is the Year of the Rat. I hope the guy who uttered that is knowledgeable. Otherwise, this could be the year of the dog, the horse, the monkey – whatever. Aside from the sinister title of this year, the Rat, the fact is that every year is, factually, the year of the rat. Look back in time, could you not see the perimeters of your life streaked with a rat, or even two, scurrying to the hole in the wall? It is very probable that you heard these creatures cavorting in your ceiling, obviously wrestling with one another, and wrecking havoc on your sleep. But not only sleep, but we know that flea-infested rats, with disease originating in China , and carried on vessels trading with Europe , came down and infected European countries with the so-called bubonic plague, alias Black Death, and killed off about half the population of that continent. So, can one sneeze at the figure of the RAT?

But perhaps the more sinister type of rats, are the humans who have adopted rat-like habits. Like thieves, for instance who, in the dark of night, clamber up the walls of affluent residents. What is worse is that these rat-like humans also victimize even poor folk, finagling the clothes hanging on the clothes lines.

I will not go into the “rats” that infest our body politic. These creatures have proliferated. The have become bolder. Ok guys, this is your year.

But why write about rats. Shall I spoil the flavor of the year by touching this depressing matter? Would it not be better to look at the stars and forget the mud (at least for a while)?

Last night I watched a blind man climbed Mt. Everest . His name is Erik Weihenmayer who became blind at the age of thirteen.

Of course, the difficulty for someone blind would be staggering. The plan borders on the impossible. The stats say that only one in ten who attempt to summit Everest makes it. And all that relates to sighted people.

A blind man?

Skipping the technical description of the climb, the dangers that have widowed and orphaned many, Weihenmayer grouped his way up to the summit.

What does this say to us? Does it not say: courage to face the odds, to shout to the heavens “No guts, no glory.” The days of 2008 will come, each with its own particular challenge. We can either cry or laugh. Laughter is better.

* * *

FROM RALEIGH TO RENO : We didn't tarry much in Phoenix . We stayed about four days. I have my memories of Arizona , that trip to Superstition Mountain , the Tonto Indian ruins in the Apache trail, the climb up that peak near Phoenix . My brother wanted to bring me to Tombstone , the scene of the Fight at O.K. Corral, but I guess I was becoming lazy. Looking at the birds pecking at the grass of the golf course was a lot cooler.

To travel from Phoenix to Las Vegas , Nevada you have to take U.S. Highway 93, which passes through places like Wickenberg, Wifieup (as in Wake up?) And then Kingman, a big city framed against a wide mesa, a level plateau, that looks like a table top.

It is a trip with a surfeit of cactus, sand and rock. You are now travelling North, and somewhere to your left, miles and miles away, is the Colorado river that connects with the Hoover Dam, to the north. The waters of the Colorado , at this point, hurries southward, towards Mexico , and eventually empties into the Gulf of California .

I had passed this route before and I was surprised, approaching the outskirts of Kingman to discover that the highway was named after Andy Devine, the comic actor which some of you (maybe few) may remember.

In any event, soon we were at Hoover Dam, the huge body of water that supplies Las Vegas and California cities. The road of the dam was so clogged with traffic that we didn't go down.

We see Lake Mead as the car maneuvered the flanks of the low mountain. One wonders at the charm of this famous lake.

Soon it was Boulder City ; Las Vegas was not too far away.*

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