The final countdown

Friday 7/25/25

The Monument will be closed today on account of the heat. Thought this would be a good time to take stock. Ran ten more circuits in the Monument yesterday--and walked three miles and did 100 push-ups--and am at the final countdown now with this lofty goal I had set of doing 400 circuits in three months, which would bring me to 1000 in a year. I'm at 380 and 980 presently, and have until August 15 to get the final twenty. There's a chance I could be done by Sunday, but that failing, it should be next week.

As I've noted, the 400 in three months goal came about by mistake; I thought I had four months rather than three, and then once I had begun and realized my error, I decided to try and go for it in the shorter amount of time because I'd already been going pretty hard.

You really do see so much about people, human nature, this country, and where the world is at every single day in the Monument. All of that comes to you within the narrow space of those granite walls.

People were mostly pleasant yesterday. I wouldn't say that's the norm, but it's been the case these last two times. The rangers are always pleasant and friendly. There are seven or eight of them I interact with regularly. One guy likes to give me a fist bump on both my way in and out. Gave him a wave yesterday afterwards when I was on the other side of the Monument having stood for a couple minutes in the mist shower and he was going up the hill on his way to work.

Inside of the Monument yesterday there was one of those dads who you can tell coaches his son in everything. He's probably the coach of the baseball team, the soccer team, the hockey team if the boy plays hockey. He coaches in the backyard, in the driveway. Has the look, the attire. The body type in this guy's case of the weekend warrior who stills wishes he was out there but has to settle for playing in a softball league.

He was with his son in the Monument and sort of coaching him there. Not in a dick-ish way. An upbeat, positive way. And he coached me, in effect. Each time I passed them. "You're working hard, keep working hard!" he'd say, and the boy would join in, too, with "Good job!"

I have no fixed or determinate age to people. Like the "young punk" guy. But this did not bother me. And it was a good reminder--you are working hard going up and down the stairs of the Monument. There is no workout in the world like it. I could say that with utter confidence if everything I ever wanted and deserved was dependent on me being correct with that statement.

Incidentally: I've never mentioned this, but the stairs in the Monument are eight inches high. Challenging, right? Deep stairs. In more ways than one.

Speaking of hard: On my fourth trip up yesterday, a woman said to me, "You're making this look easy," as I neared the top.

Well, that may have been true. But it's also true that never has this been easy. The nature of the Monument is that no matter how often you do it, not so much as a single circuit--with a good, steady pace--is easy. It can get easier, yes. But that's not the same as easy.

This is how the Monument tests your character, your will, your strength. How much do you want the thing you want? How much do you believe in the thing you're doing in the larger sense that is far bigger than this daily challenge of up and down, up and down, up and down?

I'm the only person who does this singular activity. Who has done this consistently within this obelisk that has stood at this spot since 1843. And I think in order to be that person who does this, you have to be motivated by something bigger, greater. Because otherwise you wouldn't be doing it. It's too hard. It would ask more of you than you'd be able to give. And more of you than you had in you.

I smiled and gave a friendly little laugh. But I was thinking, "This has never been easy."

There was this guy who saw me fast upon him again and said, "Clear the way! Elite athlete coming through!" He was very friendly. A different woman leaned to close to me and said, "You're making us all look bad, you know."

Then there were these two guys, both of whom were probably like five years older than I am, but who each looked like they could have been my father. And of course I went past them twice or however many times. You have to realize: I look the part. I look like I'm doing what I'm doing. That I am someone who is working out within this space. In every way. Physically, aqueously you could say, with the sweat, and in terms of attire.

But people can't put anything together. Further, they are going to think you must be like them on account of how 1. Stupid and 2. Narcissistic most people are now. There's no deducing. No drawing of reasonable conclusions. No putting together. People usually simply can't do it here in 2025. And they relate everything back to themselves, which is what they start and end everything with.

These two guys were at the top in what I guess you could call the observation chamber, and as I was approaching--this was before they could see me--one of them says, "I hear you coming," on account of my breathing. Meaning: I'm a fellow struggler, a member of the "Why did we want to do this?"/whining fat load club har har har.

By the way: It's not size or shape that bothers me. It's laziness. Sloth. And someone who is lazy in one regard is apt to be lazy across the board of existence. And that makes things worse for society, for culture, for humanity, and for me.

People want to talk. And to hear themselves talk. And to make others hear them talk. No one wants to listen. Or think. Or take in. Talk, talk, talk. Babble, babble, babble. It's talking for the sake of talking. Not for communicating.

Most people now live their lives like they're someone who has you cornered at the shittiest party in the world--which is what the world in effect is--and won't let you free if they can help it. They think, "It's my time to shine!" and they just motormouth it, babble style. In person, social media, wherever, whatever. On platforms, the world of punditry. Babble, babble, babble for the sake of babble, babble, babble. And attention. It's just firing off sound and nonsense and meaningless words into the void that is the lives of these people--and the hole where once there was a human soul--that can never be filled.

You have this kind of unfolding of stupidity with people. It's not just one stupid thing and then they're done; there are parts to their stupidity.

Here we had the first part with this guy. He couldn't remember, or put together, that the person coming up might have--and surely was--the person who'd already gone past him in the workout clothes, with the sweat, the fitness.

I can definitely be breathing hard--or more like deeply--at the top. Depends. How many times have I done it? Am I running hard through those last fifty stairs?

But it's not some ragged, "I'm on the verge of death!" type of desperate, pained breathing. Further, that person--who this guy could hear--was clearly moving at a good, steady clip, which is not how it would have been with a guy like this guy and his gut that could have registered to vote.

And that's what it comes back to--people expect and demand you to be like them. People suck. They're ignorant, lazy, bereft of standards for themselves. Be this intellectually, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically.

What kind of look do you think I gave this guy as I appeared on the top step, perfectly composed, obviously not in duress? Friendly or not so friendly? That's right. I can't stand an idiot. I can stand a presumptive idiot even less.

He sees me in front of him, looking as I look in the photo below from a little while after, and says, "So much for that shower today, huh?"

Again: Because people are witless morons usually who have to talk to talk. Doesn't matter if no one cares and no one is listening. He still can't or won't put it together. In part--well, maybe--because he can't stop himself from flapping his gums.

I turn around immediately, as I always do--it's a case of one foot planted on the top step, then tapping that step with the toes of the other foot--and head back down so I can go up again, and he says, "I guess he didn't want to stay."

You encounter the likes of this guy much more often than you do the likes of the other people I mentioned here, who in part occasioned this entry given that it's rare to have two mostly pleasant days in a row, people-wise, in the Monument.

So: Will get the last of these circuits done soon, and then I'll start all over again.