 |
| Laurence walking an 8a! |
When I was young, I was brought up largely by women. They were tough, small and of a mixture, artistically and sensibilities wise. Although men were generally absent I didn’t need their so called male influence, as my aunties mother and grandmother had adequate amounts of all those so called male attributes like courage and strength and testosterone. My teachers were women and they were clever too boot, in short I was always impressed by women in general, plus and it was a big plus, they smelled better than men. Things have changed since I was a small boy, most significantly, men now smell like women. But these sweet smelling well-quaffed ‘men’ seem to lack the old masculine virtues and attributes. As a friend put it the other day ‘they still have cocks but they don’t seem to have any balls’, a bit harsh but then she’s a harsh ski de fond girl, tough and uncompromising. Just look at rock climbers now, bunch of hairdressers if you ask me. Gritstone climbers using bouncy play pen mats at the bottom of routes that were done sometimes half a century ago. Or alpinists not going into the mountains unless they have this years lime green super jacket with matching impossible to walk in trousers which costs more than the annual wage of the porter who is carrying their computer with its solar energy hook up to the latest world wide webpage of haircuts for big brave mountain bashers.
When I was young it was normal to hold stereotyped views about women because our society was more stereotyped and sexes were very lets say ‘type casted’. Now it’s different, we, ‘men’ that is, are encouraged to explore our feminine side and like fools we do. So we become pretend women or at best girlie boys, what we don’t understand is that women aren’t girls, they never were, and we have fallen for the oldest ploy in the history of Mankind, or clearly Womankind, cos we have been duped, and have happily gone on with it, cos our egos are out of control. That’s what women have always known, keep flattering us, and we are easy to control. There’s a good boy, good effort, well done, you're such a brave boy. And thus we are chained, thus we are controlled, relegated to watching formula one racing forever, and by god don’t we deserve it.
 |
| Laurence on fragile ice, no gear. |
When I was young no women had ever run under 2hr 30 mins for the marathon, I didn’t even know that they weren’t actually allowed to run marathons cos they were reckoned too weak! Those guys on the Olympic Fed obviously didn’t know my auntie Rosa. Hey it was long ago, we wore heavy red gaiters and unbelievable amounts of facial hair so we have an excuse right? So what I want to know is whatever happened to all those gaiters and facial hairs? Anyway, understand it was like the dark ages, and women wore things called mini skirts, so no rational thought was possible. When I was young there were no good female climbers, it’s true, don’t ask me why? I loved climbing but you know how can I put this, I like girls you know, so it was a troubling time for me, I don’t like boys, you know the way I mean. So I had to climb with smelly boys and attend art, poetry, and yoga classes for extra entertainment, even though I hated that poncy stuff. But sport and society changed slowly but surely, until now when I can’t really see the need for the differences in grades or abilities between men and women. To use a sexist term climbing has been so ‘emasculated’, mats, gear, safety, that we don’t need to be Hector and Hercules, all hersuit and bulging with muscles, we can be Helen and Heather in a sports bra, if we even need that.
 |
| Laurence snowboarding down a steep and icy 6500m |
