I was approached by Hans the other day; he offered me a position for the next season. My response was simple, I know.  He wants me to manage the day to day operations of the yurt viewing and dog tours.  I knew that too and told him.  My only question for him was how much?  I knew in my heart of hearts he couldn’t afford me and it would not get any better here.  I would be responsible for everything and unable to fix any of it.

I entertained the idea enough and we went about our day.  There are good moments each day at the lot, but they do not outweigh the latter.  A man will only do so much with the motivation he is given.  I had none, no pay, no tips, long hours, lousy housing conditions, and meals on my jetboil.  There were a thousand reasons to leave and one to stay.  I was stuck and was going to stick it out till my next place was ready to start.  He eventually took notice of my attitude and grabbed me one night.

After our conversation he explained he hated coming down on me.  That’s the problem with Hans, he is a good person and a wonderful friend, just a terrible person to work for.  Making it so much harder to say fuck it and walk.  With Ramon’s arrival the tensions eased as with the work load.  The days are bleeding into one another, getting up at 8 and working till 5, then going back in from 9pm to 1 am.  It’s taking a toll on my ability to do anything.  I find that any free time I have I spend trying to come down from the day.

There is one resource that we can never get back, never hold on to.  It isn’t money, friends, food, happiness; it’s more abstract than that.  Time, once it’s gone we can never get it back.  It slips through our fingers like grains of sand, melting away like the beautiful single snowflake we try to catch.  I had questions all of time.  Was I wasting mine?  What was my time worth?  How much money was I losing per day working with Hans?  In not having any, I was unable to see anything other than the dog lot and the hostel.  Am I wasting my young years?