171-Characterization of the Senator

 The Senator: John Blackwell

Age: 52

Physical Attributes: Soft, out of shape, puffy, drinks too much, overbearing, demeaning and abrasive.

Inherited wealth and expects the world to bend to his needs and wants.

The Senator has to be lovable in a sick way. If you cannot Love the Senator than it will be impossible to Hate him. He wants to control the entire Dillon Valley up to the Continental Divide. Although it is National Forest Property he wants to be able to strip mine Loveland Pass and the Arapahoe Basin for Molybdenum. He wants to be able to sell his mined minerals to foreign actors and will use his connections to change the status of the National Forest to mineable land. Needs to be characterized as dastardly.

Maha Mantra, Krishna Das, (Hare Krishna)

164;Uncle Albert's Mountain, (The Lure of the Mountain King) Chapter XXXI; The Senator Is Foiled

 

     “They’re in Meeting Room Three, but you can’t go in,” the secretary looked up at the young man. He ignored the last part of the warning, and ran down the hall.

     “Joe! Joe!, “Tom called hoping it wasn’t too late. There were no numbers on the doors, so he had to get their attention the hard way.

     “Joe! Dillon here!”

     “What’s going on?” The door to his left swung open and Joe’s lawyer stepped into the hallway and shut the door behind him.

     “We’re in the middle of an important meeting. You can’t barge in like this,” he looked at Tom. “Miss Buxly! Miss Buxly! Would you show this man the door?” He grabbed Tom by the arm to lead him out. Tom pulled away from his grasp, pushed him aside, reached for the door handle and entered the room.

     “Excuse me Gentleman. Can I see you in private, Mr. Jacobason. It’ll only be a moment.”

     “Pardon me,” Joe rose up from his seat. “ My accountant’s here.”

     They went out into the hall, and over to an empty room. Tom closed the door behind them and shuffled Joe into a chair. He slid the papers out of the envelope, and spread them across the table. Taking a pen out of his pocket, he slapped it down on top and stood back.

     “Sign on the dotted line,” he said with a broad grin.

     “What’s this?”

     Tom sat down in a big leather chair at the head of the table. He leaned back, crossed his fingers in front of him, and smiled a large radiant smile. “It’s a season’s pass,”

     “How on God’s green earth did you manage this,”Joe was occupied scrutinizing the policy.

     “You can thank the King of Insurance, David Randall.” Tom stood and walked around beside Joe. He bent over and pointed to the date on the policy.

     “Effective yesterday!” he let out a hearty guffaw, unable to control his elation.

     “Unbelievable!” Joe shook his head from side to side.

     “It was really very easy,” Tom strutted around the room. “I gave D.R. a call the day you told me about the cancellation. He knew what was going on. How the Senator had the Insurance Company in his pocket. The problems were not your fault and he would underwrite a new policy. He told me what he needed and I got him the information. I didn’t say anything because he wasn’t sure his company would go along with it, on such short notice….”

     “I’ll be damned,” Joe clicked the pen, and put his signature on his new lease on life.

     “We almost didn’t make it, but Mr.Randall came through.”

     Joe stood up and collected the documents. “Shall we give them the good news?” He motioned to the door.

     To say there was a celebration was an understatement. Everyone they could possibly get a hold of was at the Jaw. The party lasted well into the night. No one wanted the revelry to end. The joy this family felt was shared by all, it was just a battle. It was enough to end this season and hopefully keep them going for another year, and it was all that mattered to them.

Sierra-Boz Scaggs

159; Uncle Albert's Mountain,(The Lure;) Chapter XXVI; March-Tom's Return

     

     It had been several weeks since Tom had left the Basin. Toby was on the mountain skiing the headwall. It was a black diamond trail with a steep pitch that left absolutely no room for any error. He was feeling a winning attitude in his heart for his sport. The thrill of the speed, the rush of the wind, the glimmer and sparkle of the ivory crystals in his eyes, he was warmed by the intensity of the sun at twelve thousand feet in elevation. He felt at one with himself and the world around him. It was this inner piece that kept him coming back to the mountain year after year. Not knowing why, he simply felt good, it was great to let go and float through the endless ecstasy of powder.

     Rushing down the steep grade of the cornice above the headwall, he knew Coach and Tom were right. There was something magical, primal about the mountain, it was a humbling mentor and lover. The serenity and silence disturbed only by the deafening roar of unstable powder in the backcountry. He hit the bottom of the transition, compressed and shot up the steep slope that would drop him over into the front-side. Skirting the evergreens alongside the trails he could catch Grizzly Road to International and the Lodge.

     Heading down International out of the corner of his eye, he caught a flash of  sunlight down in the parking lot. He was several hundred yards above it and could see people milling about. From the direction of the flash, he noticed the unmistakeable and familiar black cowboy hat bobbing up and down from the far left of the parking lot toward the lodge. It was Tom's silver dollar centerpiece.

     Toby started through the pines that dotted the lower slope. Gathering momentum he would shoot through the trees and come up on the lower end of the lot. The trail would lead Toby to the lower moguls and the number three lift station. Approaching the station, he looked up to see Lance, far off to the right, standing waving his arms in the air. He was motioning Toby to go back. Toby stopped abruptly, next to the number three station.

     “Go Back! Go Back!” was the last thing Toby heard before the explosion and the enveloping blackness.

     Lance was the first to reach him, followed by Tom and a few seconds later, Joe.

     “Don’t be dead! Don’t be dead! Please! Please! Please! Don’t be Dead,” he sat cradling Toby’s blood stained head and torso. Toby’s legs were sticking out from his body at odd angles. A bone protruded from the calf of his right leg. His left arm was pinned grotesquely behind his upper torso. Lance rested his head against Toby’s, his body convulsed with sobs. Toby’s skis were scattered twenty feet away along with debris from the building that once was the number three lift station. Smoke was rising as pieces of burning wood melted the snow where it had fallen.

     “Get Away!” Joe commanded, throwing Lance to the side. He had come running to join Tom at the sound of the explosion.

     “He’s barely breathing. Call an ambulance! Joe straddled Toby and began performing CPR. “Toby, Hold On! Come On Son! Just Hold On! Joe looked at Toby, and then back at Lance.

     “What the hell is going on here Lance?”

Tom dropped his pack and lunged at Lance grabbing him by his jacket.

     “You did this? Didn’t Ya! Didn’t Ya Lance?” He screamed at him, hitting him, over and over. Lance staggered backwards and made no attempt to defend him-self.

Several onlookers grabbed Tom and pulled him away. Lance stood there just staring at Toby. Tom broke free from his restraint and confronted Lance again.

     “You did this! You did this! How could you?”

     “No!” Lance held his jaw.

     “What?” Tom cried.

     “Joe did this! He sold out to the Senator” Lance was backing up, pointing and shaking his finger, hysterically at Joe. “It’s all your fault you sold out to the multi-nationals, you sold out the country!” Lance was raving, and crying wildly as the ambulance pulled into the parking lot.

     “Jesus! What happened here?” The attendant asked the crowd.

     No one answered as the medics took over CPR and Toby’s vitals. The mountain silence was deafening as they worked to get him on the backboard and load him on the stretcher and start for the Unimog.

     “Is he going to be alright? Will he live? Tom questioned.

Joe and Tom both watched as the medics worked on Toby frantically. Tom looked into Joe’s eyes as the door was closing and they could see the medic shake his head back and forth.

   The crowd stood back to allow the Summit County Sheriff’s Patrol access to the scene.

     “It’s Lance, Burt, over there, it was him” Joe pointed.

Lance stood looking at the ground as Burt walked over and pulled his arms behind him and began reading him his rights.

     Tom stood motionless, and in deep shock. “This is insanity. What is the mountain and the Senator doing to all of us? They have us at each other’s throats. Violence is never the answer. It’s killing us. It doesn’t have to be this way. It doesn’t have to happen. If I hadn’t left, none of this would have happened. What have I done?”

     Joe reached over and put his arm around Tom. Everything they both believed in was driving away in the ambulance. Life, their lives as they knew them, would never be the same, when the Basin, like Toby was gone. They would have many loves in their lives and many losses, none would ever rival the great love and immeasurable loss they would know for this Majestic Basin.

From The Beginning; Greg Lake

157; Uncle Albert's Mountain,(The Lure, )Chapter XXIV; Tom's Sojourn

  

     It's always further than it looks. It's always taller than it looks. And it's always harder than it looks.  Reinhold Messner- The first man in History to climb all fourteen eight-thoudsanders without oxygen. My life at the Limit (Legends and Lore)

      The Colorado ranch houses flashed past Tom’s eyes in a colored blur as he gazed out the window. The golden sun burned brightly and dipped into the white fields. Across the expanse of the snowbound wooden wind -breaks the evening sky was illuminated by a full silver grey moon, the darkness stealing, silently, stubbornly over the northwestern peaks. He closed his eyes, his head resting wearily against the window in an effort to sleep. It was no use, his mind was spinning and reeling in an endless succession of feelings. He seemed to be in the middle of everyone’s problems, and full of his own insecurities.

     “Everyone wants a piece of something from me,” he lamented to himself. He tapped his boney fingers on the arm-rest. “I got nothing more to give.”

     He stared through his reflection in the tinted glass. It was starring back through him. He was watching his own thoughts as they formed in his mind and boiled to the surface.

     “If only I could see the whole picture, I might find the answer.”

With that thought, his Uncle’s words flooded to his thoughts. “Everyone has their own answers Tom, and you’ve got to search to find your own happiness.”

     Tom knew that until he found his, he would always be a lonely drifter. A rolling tumbleweed, always bouncing, always shifting, never stable. He took off his hat and laid it on the seat next to him. Running his fingers through his matted hair, he thought of Sara. He found that he was continually thinking of Sara. Tom had been wrong to say those awful things to her, things, he could never take back, she was the warmest loving person he had ever known. It seemed as if his own insecurities had driven him to go out of his way to alienate her. He feared he had lost her for good, and was dying inside without her. She had given him more than he ever knew that he wanted, never feeling that close to a woman before. In the short time they were together, they had become intimate lovers, and close friends. How easy it would be to give his life to her, what little he had to give…. he had just lost everything without her.

      The mountains were his life. How could he throw away the only true meaning he had ever found, the only serenity his heart had ever known? All his life he had risen above the everyday tedious routine. He had observed all the mediocrity all around him. Somewhere out beyond the, “work until you have enough to retire, world.” His grandparents had done that, and died before they had a chance to enjoy it. There was more than just jobs, more than just pensions, more than golf at the country club on the weekend. True freedom lies not in getting all you can, but in giving all you can away.

     He drifted o . ff into that half conscious world, the world between sleep and waking. Images floated in and out of his mind. Sara, Toby, Davis, Joe, The Senator, rose up into his thoughts, they haunted him as his own past did. He felt like he had deserted his own family, the real family that had deserted him so long ago. He never knew the true story because he was afraid to ask, afraid that it had been his fault.

     “Come on son, hey son, let’s go, it’s the end of the line,” the driver shook Tom. He took a breath and grabbed his hat and knapsack. He groggily made his way down the isle toward the front of the bus, thinking about his friends. Good friends, he never knew meant so much to him…… until now

The Tide Rushes In, The Moody Blues

118-Uncle Albert's Mountain,( The Lure Of The Mountain King ; )The Senator; Chapter VII

 

                                                               VII

 

                                                         The Senator

 

 

     Jilly slid her silk robe across her thighs. She inhaled deeply on her cigarette and let

the smoke billowed out. She stubbed the remainder out in the ashtray.

 

     “You know I am a baby. Don’t I always take care of you? I’ll see you on Sunday. We’ll make up for lost time. I promise you. I’ll be extra sweet to you.”

She leaned back on her sofa and looked across the room. Beneath a brass light hung a large aerial photo of A-Basin. Along the face of the mountain a pair of red dotted lines extended across it. They signified a proposed high speed Vista Bahn. The lower left hand corner had a large red circle drawn in a portion of the parking lot.

 

     “No one suspects a thing. I have the pictures just like you asked. Yes, you’re absolutely correct, it would be a perfect place for a Helipad. The only thing is we are going to have to move fast. If we don’t they are going to ruin everything. They? The klutzy Olympian and his ski bum sidekick.  They have been counseling Joe on ways to block the takeover and are always off skiing instead of taking care of the mountain. The place will be in shambles by the time we get our hands on it.”

She stood up and walked across the room and reached down on a portable glass bar.  Raising her wine glass. She twirled it gently around and pressed her lips to the

receiver.

 

     “Here’s to the start of a profitable partnership Senator,” she whispered.

 

                                                         * * *                                                                                                                   

    

      Senator John Blackwell walked to the door of the Keystone Condominium penthouse and opened the French doors that looked out onto the slopes. Taking a long drink of brandy, tasting the warmth, he swallowed and felt the smoothness make its way down to his sizable belly. This would be the year. He had introduced legislation that would allow drilling and mining on National Forest Lands under the guise of National Security Interests. The White River National Forest above Arapahoe Basin Ski Area had large deposits of Molybdenum and the lease would soon be his. He would have it all, he would own or control all the lands and businesses from the I-70 corridor at Eisenhower Tunnel most of the town of Dillon, the Reservoir, all the way to Frisco and the Valley from the water to the Continental Divide including the Ski Areas of Keystone and Arapahoe Basin The material contracts alone for the nuclear submarines were worth more than most countries defense budgets and would make him the new breed of multi billionaire businessmen. He had plans to join the space race once he had finished extracting the metals from the mountains. There was nothing that was going to stop him, certainly not some old mountain man and a group of societal misfits bent on singing Kumbaya, My Lord and playing patty cake in powder snow. He was anointed to be a mover and a shaker, born to wealth, and privilege. There were those that were destined to rule and those destined to serve, John Blackwell served no one but John Blackwell.

 

     Jilly quietly let herself into the penthouse and walked across the room to where the Senator was standing, staring out the window at the slopes of Keystone. She quickly slid her hands around his waist and surprised him as she hugged him tightly.

 

     “I didn’t think the morning would ever end. The lawyers were going on and on about the difficulty of mineral rights on National Lands and the sale of precious metals even if it was to the government. How it might be construed as a conflict of interest. Honestly, it was so boring. All I could think about was spending the afternoon here with you.”

 

     “So, it was agreed on, if I posses the lease to the ski area I also have the rights to the

minerals underneath the mountain.”

 

     “Yes, they are all yours. I have locked that in, all that is left is the meeting at your office in Denver for the signing over of the contracts. I spoke with the Insurance Underwriter and it is all taking care of. They will loose there Insurance next week. There is no way out for them. The Mountain is yours, Baby.”

 

     “When this is completed and my divorce is final I am going to take you to Paris. I love Paris in the Spring!”

     “I can’t wait for you to be rid of her, the old witch. She has been so unreasonable. If she wasn’t such an old washed up hack, I might feel sorry for her. Her and those unwanted waifs she calls children. We can have it all. You have the money and power and I will get you the missing piece, the Mountain. I told you the first night we spent together that I would deliver the Old Man and the Mountain to you. They are about to be ours, I promise you, we will spend our days on the Riviera and Entertaining the Elites.”

 

     “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I have learned from my time in the Senate that it isn’t “Over Until It’s Over. You have done well, you are destined to be a mover and a shaker.”