What's In A Name

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In order to see much one must learn to look away from oneself - every mountain climber needs this hardness. You must climb above yourself - up and beyond - until you have even your stars under you. Yes! To look down upon myself and even upon my stars: that alone would I call my summit, that has remained for me my ultimate summit.

Friedrich Neitzsche


There are times when I don’t have to be Chris if I don’t want to. Times when I can take on a new persona, a new name. My other name was chosen for me somewhat as a joke several years ago, but for some reason has stuck. I can do anything as this individual; I am not bound by the constraints that often follow Chris around. I am Supe, hear me roar.

Perhaps I should retrace my steps a bit and explain myself further. During the summer of 2004, I had the opportunity to go to Philmont Scout Ranch. This is pretty much an extended backpacking trip on well-worn trails, but it was and still is an important part of my life, especially as far as outdoor pursuits go. I was the trip leader of our little band of boys trying to be men and men trying to boys. I thought that maybe we could all meet somewhere in the middle. To that effect, we came up with alternate identities for ourselves. For those brief two weeks, Chris, Adam, Jeff, Alan, Justin, Ben, Peter, Tom, Greg, Hank, and Tom ceased to exist. Supe, Speedy, Steve, Tony, Jerry, Rock, Chuck, Snake, P-Daddy, H, and Doc were born and shared an experience to last a lifetime. Several of those identities were determined to stay around long after we had stepped off of the trail. More specifically, Supe and Speedy wouldn’t die.

They were dormant for nearly a year though, and didn’t resurface until March of 2005. Speedy and myself (this is Supe now by the way) decided we were going to try to fast-pack a 60 mile trail during the first weekend of our spring break. For those of you who don’t know, fast-packing is hiking at a normal pace but with very very minimal breaks. We completed the trail in a little over 40 hours, and holy crap did we hurt. Turns out that we didn’t prepare for it properly, and we paid for it for the next month.

Time passes and people learn and grow. We were able to think about that first fast-pack and decide that it did in fact have potential. Maybe, just maybe, we could do it right...

More time passes, until March of 2007. We decide we are going to fast-pack that very same trail once again, using our recently acquired knowledge. A third hiker joined our little party. This third up until that point had been Chris’s younger brother, but he couldn’t be that on the trail. Chris didn’t even exist on the trail, and neither could his younger brother. Eventually, Stick stepped forward to fill the void, and set out to fast-pack with Supe and Speedy. We stopped after 30 miles due to abnormally cold weather, but none of us hurt at all. Our plan had worked, we had learned how to fast-pack right. As for me, I know that the saga of Supe, Speedy, and Stick is not over, and as we have more adventures and meet more people (possibly even new members of our party), I, Supe, will keep everybody out there up to date. This is Supe, signing off.

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