Everest

Drunk off coffee, so let’s see where she takes us today. I see a ladder that reaches higher than one can see. I see a long ways to climb, and a hard journey awaiting. People are gathered all around pointing up and talking about what they were looking at. Scratching their heads as they try to figure out the best plan to climb it. The unknown makes them nervous, and the height alone can literally make your knees shake before the climb even starts. While others talk and strategize, you began to climb. Pull and step with your eyes closed and don’t look down. You’re all alone on the ladder even though people are rooting for you down below. Keep climbing and don’t think, please don’t think.

The nights are cold and painful as you try to sleep. Your body hurts from the climb, so you must sleep to gain energy for the next day. You are woken up from others climbing down the ladder. They have seen too much and can’t take the climb, so they quit. They are nice about trying to get by you on their climb down because they are worried about what you think about them. Fuck em, you have to be selfish in this climb, you must use all your energy for yourself, and you mustn’t worry about the weak. Climbers like us don’t care about pain, we are not scared of hard, and we welcome the challenge. We have dedicated our lives to climbing, and “they” want to take the fucken elevator. Weak minded people don’t have a place in the nation, we cant be around them, they are cancer that could possibly spread behind our fortress walls. The Nation must work together to fight off the zombies.

My dad use to give me snicker bars before soccer games and tell me to kill everyone....I was 6, and I loved it. I would run up and down that soccer field like forest Gump. I wouldn’t ever pass the ball because I wanted the ball, I wanted to score. I would get thrown out of games from pushing a kid down because he pushed one of my team mates down. My dad would reward me for things like that. I know some might think that’s bad, and maybe it was, but I will tell you one thing, it made me a fighter, it made me fight for what I believed in. He would get thrown out of games from yelling at the refs in the middle of the field, "you’re out of here sir, and so is your damn kid"! Let’s go son, way to fight. Thanks dad, did I do good? Yes son I am proud of you, you really fought hard today. But dad other parents were talking about me not passing the ball, and how bad it was I pushed that kid down, why? Don’t worry about what people think of you son, you just be you and keep fighting every day. I love you, I love you to dad. Now let’s go get some beer and Buffalo wings, ok dad.

I have seen so many people in my life quit this sport, I feel I have been to war and I have lost many men. Every part of the gym reminds me of different people, different jokes and PR’s they would achieve. I miss them, I really do. They were good people, and even some I called my friends. But they all seem to slowly vanish in the cloudy chalk like a magic trick. I wonder where they went, and why they stopped. I love watching people train and get better, but I guess the word "better" has different meaning's to some. Some might not get a PR for a while, but there technique improves a ton and vice versa. Some might become much more consistent and comfortable with the weight, but there squat will go down and the three misses in training put them in a world of negativity and anger. I never under stood this. I would tell them "its ok, you only have been lifting for a few months, it takes time." But they don’t want to hear this, they want results and fast. They want to take the elevator, not the ladder. The next day a "no show", just memories of them on the old broken platform lifting weights while I cheer them on. The hardest part of being a coach is having to wipe away their names and PR'S from the white board, I hate it. I care, I really do. I want them to succeed; I want them to taste victory. Only if they knew how close they were to getting to level 2, then 3, then four and so on. I wish them the best of luck and hope they find something they love.

The Attitude Nation salutes all the fallen weightlifters. But we must move on. Goodbye to the weak, and onward the NATION MARCHES! Grab your snicker bars my friends, because there are many battles ahead of us!!!

ATTITUDE FUCKEN NATION 2012 !!!!!!!!!!!!!