• About Who I am…

    So you were curious enough to actually check out this thread.  Of all the threads, you decided to see who I am.  Well I must say I’m flattered.  The answer to that question is, unfortunately, complicated and not entirely known to me.  Since you chose this thread I’ll give you something to read…

                                                                                                                     Me-El-Cap1

     

     My name is Chuck to those who know me even casually.  Charles to my former teachers – except my high school anatomy and physiology teacher and cross country coach.  To him I am Charlie.  Many of my Mexican associates know me as Charlos (a story for later).  I am from Michigan originally.  Somewhere north of Detroit where I waged war for about 3 months every year with the city snowplow driver, fed many future generations of mosquitoes every summer, and, in between rainy and cold days, I lived a life.  I am currently divorced and have two children – both girls (God please protect them from boys like me…).  My life has definately had its’ ups and downs but it is a good life.  I am a deeply happy man although my misadventures have given me an extremely cynical sense of humor – kind of a survival mechanism if I had to guess.  I am always light hearted, but if I’m smiling, it’s because I’m up to something, and you’d better be paying attention if you don’t want to be the butt of one of my jokes.  Just ask Bob…

    I started working on cars, like many others I know, when I was a teenager.  My memories are filled with the typical teen mechanic improvisation mechanisms that almost get people killed.  I remember my friend Nat and myself in his front yard puting an engine in my 1979 Chevy monte Carlo.  I had blown the hell out of the venerable old 305 cubic inch Chevy engine when I got stuck in some snow on my way to work.  I had tried to free it without success until I succumbed to my anger and decided I would just floor it until the snow gave way and I started to move.  What gave way was not the snow, it was the connecting rod bearing in the lower part of that engine.  A couple of weeks later I had found a partially assembled 350 Chevy engine (bigger and more powerful) and decided this would be an appropriate replacement for my 305.  Considering I was poor and could not afford an engine hoist, Nat and I (mostly I) built a shifty tripod out of 2×4’s from Builders Square and connected a come-along to the top to build a makeshift rig to lift the engine.  We were ready at about 3:15 in the morning and we had the whole front yard lit with lights.  This is relevent as Nat lived along a main road so we drew a lot of attention from those passing by in the wee hours of the morning.  Especially interested were the police.  That night, I was safer than the president himself.  We had more cops than a doughnut shop watching us.  I would like to think that they were interested in my safety, but the reality is they were waiting to bear witness to youthful idealism gone horribly awry.  Fortunately we never dropped the good engine but there is a divot in the concrete from where the legs slipped out from under the tripod while the old engine was still in the air.  I stayed a backyard mechanic until after the military when I went to work for a cousin of mine that owned a machine shop.  I then decided to get some school under my belt so I would understand the electronics and transmissions and I then turned a wrench professionally as an A.S.E. master mechanic for the next eighteen years.  This brings us back to Bob…

    Bob owns a shop called Drayton Auto Care.  Drayton Auto Care is a medium sized shop that used to be located in a small town called Drayton plains located about 2 miles north of Pontiac (Like the Grand Am).  Some county planners decided to up their real-estate value one day, pushed the official border of Pontiac back several miles, and called the new improved and now more expensive area Waterford.  What happened to Drayton Plains?  This is a good question.  Let me know if you find out.  Bob’s shop is one of the few vestiges to show it even existed.  Bob is proud of his Scottish ancestry which he has had to defend many times from being tarnished by countless jibes regarding lude and lacivious behavior involving sheep.  He is mild mannered and has a good sense of humor (Thank God).  His shop is always busy which speaks a lot for someone trying to make a living in the auto reapir industry (people are rarely happy to need a mechanic).  Bob for some cosmically unknown reason seems to invoke the most devious side of me.  I would work for DAYS to plan, set up, and execute the perfect prank at his expense.  He has been electrocuted, doused in water (several times in several different ways), blown up, run over, and downright scared out of his mind more times than I can count – all courtesy of yours truly.  In my most lucid moments when I think about it and I’m not giggling like a schoolgirl trying to keep quiet in the library, I almost feel bad for some of the things I’ve done to him.  God bless you Bob – you’re a better man than me.  I would have killed me several times over…

     I guess I’m what some would call an adventure junkie.  This was not always so.  I was brought up by conservative parents who thought a good life was working at one of the auto manufacturers for thirty plus years, getting married, buy a house, have two kids and take up bowling.  Sounds like something off of the old TV show Happy Days only much more disturbed.  My paternal grandparents lived in Michigan for a bit more than 30 years.  They were from the south originally and that’s where they returned to after my grandfather retired from GM after thirty years.  It is from this side of the family where I get my adventurous side.

     Although I never really knew him, my father was the kind of guy your mother warned you about.  He raced motorcycles, snowmobiles, and almost anything else he could get his hands on that had a motor.  He hunted and fished and loved to raise hell on the weekends and got in more than his fair share of fights.  He died unexpectedly when I was three and the rest of my family did what they could to try to keep me from following in his footsteps.  This was like trying to keep a porcupine from growing spines…  These days I like to call it an exercise in futility.  I was raising hell in one form or another from the time I could walk.  I was raised with four sisters and not another man in the house from 2 p.m. to 2 a.m. when my Dad was at work.  Three of these sisters were older and one younger.  My childhood was hell when one of them was upset.  I like to think that it was the punishment inflicted upon me during these formative years that later led to my somewhat warped sense of humor (see Bob – it’s not ALL my fault…).   My first friend went on to race motorcycles starting in his adolescent years (God rest you, Mike).  We used to sneak away and play in a large area of undeveloped land affectionately called “The Field” by the locals where we would find mischief – unchecked and unsupervised.  I was forbidden from going there by my Mother as there were allegedly bad people lurking in the trees waiting to steal away small boys with more curiousity than brains.  I was determined to find them and set them straight.  This should have been the first clue to those close to me that I would not be an easy child to raise.  Mike moved away when I was in the third grade.  Although we would run into each other from time to time, we never really had a chance to re-connect although we both intended to.  Life has a way of catching up with you from time to time.  Life caught up with Mike in the form of a car wreck the day my youngest daughter was born.  He died of his injuries two days later.

    Since I can remember I have tried to find something to do that fills the hole in my soul that yearns for something different – something exciting.  It was not until I moved to Arizona in 2002 and met Beth that all that began to change.  I had come to AZ for the first time to visit a childhood friend that I am very close to.  I’ve known Nat since the sixth grade when his mother decided he needed a friend.  So, being a well intentioned mother with a fourth grade son and a second grade daughter, she figured since her daughter and my sister were friends, she would drop him off at my house and see if we hit it off.  I still remember sitting outside on a picnic table with my Friend Gabe on a warm and breezy sunny day.  I watched as a pale yelloy station wagon with wood grain paneled doors rolled up and a small for his age ten year old skinny kid hopped out of the car and literally trotted up to me and introduced himself as Nat.  Our friendship remains  tribute to one of the only smart things his mother did during his upbringing.

     I met Beth at a Sport Chalet grand opening.  Sport Chalet is a different kind of sporting goods store located mostly in California but has since grown to AZ NV and UT.  It is one of the few with a really technical backpacking and climbing section and they even boast a SCUBA shop – the only big box sporting goods store that can make this claim.  My friend Jim had moved down here about two years after me (after only minor prodding) and we were looking for something different.  He is a kindred spirit and has been sky diving, SCUBA diving, as well as some shadowy “urban exploration” that I had joined in for on a couple of occasions (affectionately known as “The Tunnels”).  We had played with offroading in 4×4’s, I had gotten SCUBA certified and we were looking to find someplace to learn canyoneering.  I was not much of a rock climber but Jim had shown me a website regarding canyoneering and I was immediately fascinated by it.  The American Canyoneering Association was going to be having classes the following summer in AZ but we really didn’t want to wait that long.  It was just by chance we ran into Beth from Alpine Training Services at a Sport Chalet.

    Beth, when I met her, was in her mid twenties and had a can-do attitude that infected everyone around her.  Talking with her about canyoneering was like giving crystal meth to someone with ADHD – you were really excited to do SOMETHING – NOW…!  I was hooked.  I started canyoneering the following February where I met Darren and Travis who are now very good friends of mine.  This fueled my cravings for adventure and exploration with nitro-glycerin and napalm.  Like a heroin addict, I am always looking for my next fix – the next opportunity to get out and do something exciting and new.  To date, I have run twenty-eight different canyons.  Most of them many times.  I have several first descents under my belt here in Arizona but I have yet to strike gold and find one that is truly fantastic.

    My life is varied and spontaneous.  I have also been wreck diving in the Pacific, white water rafting in Utah, rock climbing in California and Arizona, backpacking all over the mid-west and soutwest, and I am still looking for the next great adventure.  I am certified by NOLS as a Wilderness First Responder as well as WCCM certified canyoneer and PADI certified Divemaster.  Bungee jumping is on the list (just to say I did it) as well as some serious world travel to South America, Asia, as well as wherever else life may take me.  I figure I’ll take up fishing when I’m too old to do the other more intense passions I have. 

    So if you are one of the two people that will ever read this post besides my Mom, say hi if you recognize me.  I’m always up for good conversation.  I hope you have a life less ordinary.