Bear, the Launchpad for hire.

Nicolas Sawyer
Period # 2
12/17/09
The Self Esteem of Hunter Thompson

        Hunter Thompson (July 18, 1937 – February 20, 2005) was a man who helped created a taste in the developing era of a nationwide counterculture that would be embedded in the subconscious of the developing Western society. His participation as a outspoken supporter of drug legalization and collector of sundry high powered firearms, a reflector of the darker side of 'the American Dream', one who sought to write about and understand the motorcycle gang “Hell's Angels”and forerunner of 'Gonzo journalism'; journalism that is written in the first person where the journalist is a first hand participant of the story, would all spawn a man of wit, skill in writing, understanding of human nature and last but definitely most importantly: a man of skewed self esteem.
        If self esteem in the Nathaniel Branden sense is being happy with who you are and thinking that your existence has meaning, than Hunter, who “would feel real trapped if he didn't know that he could commit suicide at any moment” was a man with an issue. He participated largely in alcohol and psychedelic drug use throughout his life, which formed and expressed himself simultaneously and quoted saying "I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence or insanity to anyone, but they've always worked for me". In the Nathanial Branden sense this was a man of zero self esteem, but he was undoubtedly a man who contributed to a culture against government corruption, for personal liberty and a gold-covered hero on the front of artistic expression in both writing(being an author his entire life) and photography. Hunter Thompson's involvement in political affairs and writing during the 1965-1975 will be my discussion focus as it portrays the main involvement of self esteem in my perspective of Hunter Thompson's personal ideation of himself and the human condition with its involvement to self value. If my understanding of Hunter Thompson's persona is off the target, it doesn't entirely matter because I aim to shoot for the culture that he represented, and its relationship to self esteem.
        Drug use is a widely viewed as connotative of desperation, death but of life and enlightenment. Whether for recreational use or medical use, the spectrum of either positive or negative connotations exist all across recreational/medical paradigms. Some drugs, like psychedelics have more thought provoking entities than more hedonistic drugs like alcohol or cocaine. We may try and safely assume that this is why psychedelics may have been preferred by Hunter Thompson in his strong and broad support of personal freedom and participation in politics. But: mixing both of these drug's meanings within humans existence(as thinking beings that gain their value and being through thinking) as elements that change human thinking, and thus, human existence and Hunter Thompson's belief that human existence was either fatalistic or existential, both forms of drugs were vastly important but not necessary in existence for the reason of existing and understanding existence. That aspect is the step ladder essence for understanding Hunter Thompson's persona in self esteem.
        With regards to self esteem, we have learned several things by analyzing the aforementioned view that Hunter Thompson holds: 1.) Death was not something of serious value personally because it was a fact of life that people will steal, cheat, kill and have “Fear”*. 2.) When death is not valued or worried about, than neither is life. Although he didn't just give up and pass away in a stupor of valuelessness, he said he struggled with his kind of parallel-self that he used constantly to write with using a first-person form. You may even consider it a split personality of sorts. This person is best caricatured as a self-proclaimed drug fiend who was that stupor of insanity, hedonism and the human failure for value in a world of chaos. In conclusion, this personal bout and fight with value that flickered in Hunter Thompson as a dial on a speedometer of a crashing drag racer in a video being constantly fast forwarded and rewound. With the use of drugs and thinking; Hunter Thompson provided both lucidity and escape from a life-filled of torment and bliss of seeking to understand human value through an ego-centered human mind.

        * The “Fear and Loathing in America “, the “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas”, and the “Kingdom of Fear” all talk about the irony behind The American Dream. This 'Fear' that Hunter Thompson is so famous for, again outlines himself and I think is a inverted perspective of Nathaniel Branden's self esteem that follows the same principles but with black-opposed-to-white results.The dream of freedom and value that all American's seek is just a box that government, society and consciousness put people in. That “Fear” is a persons fear of doing things outside that box. That fear is caring for personal safety, morality, following the law and most importantly, the “American Dream” of consumerism that had pervaded the culture of the time of Hunter Thompson's flourishing. Ridding yourself of this “Fear” is contenting yourself with who you are, separate of external influences, just like Nathaniel Branden's self esteem, but at the same time, filling your head with mescaline, LSD and alcohol while asserting life through a lens of introspection.

Dear diary,
      Someone threatened me with a gun today. Let me explain. Me and a few of my friends have been looking for a couch for about a month and half. What for, you ask? To place in out hang-out/club house spot that we wanted to start, deep down in an Everglades forest, out of everybody's way. Almost like a tree house kind of thing, but on the ground. Typical kid's stuff. So we had the couch up on the roof of the car and parked at the place we were going to enter the forest. Here's where the trouble came. A family that lives in a house right next to where we parked came out to investigate our doings as we were taking the couch down from the roof of our car. All of the time and energy that we'd spent trying to get that silly couch on top of that silly car was wasted after hearing the family's we've-called-the-police, and I-wrote-down-your-license-tag threats. And when I say family, I mean like entire friggin' extended family. To get us to leave, they all pulled out their phones, dialing the police, and started taking pictures on their digital cameras of us and our car; from over 150 feet away. My response? To wave and smile for the camera.
     So we had this couch back up on our car all secured and fit and the families were all back in their house, except for a single 25 year old man that waited patiently for us to leave. As we were pulling away, we tried to be mature about the whole situation and offered an apology. Trey stuck his head out the window and said, "I'm sorry if we've caused you any trouble", and we rode off into the night to return the couch to where we found it. Around five slightly annoyed minutes later, we were driving down an empty road when a white Acura TSX comes barreling down the road behind us and slows down to our speed next to us. To no surprise, the window is rolled down and we hear, "YOU LOOKING FOR TROUBLE, EH?" We were a little freaked out and sped up a little even though the couch was still on top of the car. After yelling at us a few more times, the car decided that he was in the mood for a little face to face confrontation. So he speeds up really fast and pulls quickly into our lane. We stop fast, barely inches from slamming into the side of his lovely little car.  "YOU LOOKING FOR TROUBLE YOU LEETLE BEESH?" And the man proceeds to call Dennis (who was driving at the time) names and talk about how much trouble we are in if we do anything to his car. What had ended up happening was that he had thought that we had said something along the lines of 'Are you looking for trouble?' as we were pulling away and not 'I'm sorry for causing trouble'. We tried to tell him about the miscommunication, to which he responded with reaching under his shirt and threatening to 'cap us all with his 9mm' and pounding on the back seat window with his fist. After a little more of his five-year old ranting, he took pictures of our license plate and then got in his car and backed away.
    The story ends with us promptly returning the couch to the place we got it and going home. Tomorrow, I am going to write a letter expressing my deepest apologies and a request for a copy of the pictures they took of us. Especially the one with me waving. Good night diary.

     After taking the FCAT, I have lots of time to just sit there and do nothing. So what do I do when I do nothing? Sleep! What do I do when I sleep? Think! What happens when I think?
     I write compulsively. Specifically, I've been working on something that can act as sort of a signature for me. Something that is short, summarizes my reasons for life, and is incredibly well written. So to be accurate, I've just started writing tons of stuff and looking for where that leads me.
     Here is some of the things that I've come up with.

Just random blabber-

Oceans fill to the brim with life blue-green.
Forests are a'hum with birds and their song.
Cities are covered with their cold gray sheen.
Though the mass always point and say it's all wrong,
these men are a part of this worldly canvas.
No thing's apart from this flamboyant collab'rate.

There may be a man who decided to plan this,
but there's no way to tell so make love elaborate.
All parts need belong to create democracy
All things needs belong to create all I see.

After that warm up, my final little quatrain (I've decided to make the quatrain the structure of my little signature)-

I heard of a man who decided to plan this,
that you don't hear to hear and see to see.
But there's no way to tell so nothing's amiss.
So while we're here, let's be to be.

Of course, my 'perfect little life poem/signature thing' won't ever stop changing. But I think it does a well enough job to depict me as I am. But art is imperfect so anyway.

I was walking around on a beach-lake-thing at around 11PM when I wrote this. The lake is behind my mom's house. I started out describing the night then built a story around it.

 "The stillness of the air,
maybe a slight breeze.
The whispers in my hair,
and songs in the trees.

It's a dark night,
cold sand at my feet,
one without plight
Listen, take a seat.

By the water side,
I step without worry.
You will not find,
anyone in a hurry.

It's not like a cozy,
warm fuzzy night
Not  a cold dozy,
moon without light.

One in the middle,
'tween scare and joy.
One without fiddle.
One without toy.

There walks a man
who knows of this night.
Under he is sand.
Under cloak, his might.

And in his mind,
oh what a sight.
His forehead is lined.
I think he might.

He walks with a goal
he will soon achieve.
Listen to my soul,
and try to believe.

He has been hurt,
and needs to find shelter.
Relief he'll assert,
and means to have felt her.

Inside of others he'll find it,
the reliefs he seek.
I swear here as I sit,
he will not just peek.'"

      The idea of 'nodding to the masked man' is something that I've been fooling around with for a while. The approving of a death sentence. Been trying to find something dark and confusing to match with it. Involved some fire.
     The 'it's part of my plan' is another thing I've been working with. Trying to get that sense of deceit and control and stuff. Here's a try.


The stream to my mind and the torch to my pyre.
You're the one to blame, nod to the masked man.
They'll not know my name, they'll call me a liar.
As bad as this is, it's part of my plan.

I am the restorative element water that is responsible for quiet deaths and is life giving.

Except I'm not very restorative or life giving.

     This was a project for World History that I totally over achieved on. Please for your constructive criticisms. Thanks.

Almanzo Curlette, the life of a knight during the Crusades

In a secluded monastery outside the French city of Rouen, there lives an old monk with a face that regrets what he has seen and hands that bears what the face has remembered. As he sits in his seclusion and silence, bearing the crosses of his past in the final times of his life, he recounts his fading memories of a time in this world when it was at it's darkest but not seen by eyes blinded by a false light. This is his story.

Almanzo Curlette, 1246 years after the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ,

      Born into a lesser noble house around Paris, I was an only child and, by my parents standards, most fortunate to have taken up a knight's apprenticeship. I'd always been the curious type and always more ready to have taken up arms against the vast hordes of the Franks single-handedly than study the gospels of John. I bore the rigors of squirehood by day and sang with drunk veterans in taverns by night. I had never experienced the heat of battle, but was well along enough with a sword to not have to rely entirely on the good Lord's grace to save me from his premature visit.

      I knew my scriptures well, but nothing could sober up my lifelong curiosity like the sight of the towers of Acre on the horizon. My captain would yell orders through the torrent of wind and rain as our ship would teeter precariously over and through the edges of the watery blades as we neared out destination. The Kingdom of Jerusalem lay ahead and all I had at my back was a promise that the more heads I brought home, the greater my prize at the time of Reckoning. I took a swig of ale and crossed myself before sitting down to sharpen my sword.

      The chaos of battle is both a horrific and beautiful thing. The euphoria of the fight and the feeling of indomitably that accompanies it is a spirit unmatched by anything this Earthly world has been able to conjure. Whether it was pure adrenaline and liquor or all the Lord's angels guiding the steeling of my blade, I had survived the final hours of the conquest of Constantinople, sending many to judgment. As much as I am pained by the horrors I committed antecedently, nothing prepared me for the blood craze that proceeded the enemy's retreat. Women and children, the old, all died defenseless by my hand. This was all followed by the conflagration of grand buildings and robbery of precious gold trinkets of infinite value to those who now lay lifeless beneath my feet. I had been told all my life that it was God's gold, but the memory of the pained faces of the dead humbles those ideals. But I did not see until I had joined the ranks of the wounded and the forgotten. A man who had been brought down by a flurry of arrows found the strength to raise a spear high enough to pierce through my back as I was trying to open a chest I had discovered in his house, dropping my guard in my greedy. As I lay convulsing on the floor by the chest, life leaving me in a flood of crimson, I understood the kind of pain I had caused these people. The needless pain that was administered out of greedy and fear.

      I believe God himself strengthened the arm of the man who dealt that life changing blow to me that day. I woke up in a cot in a hospital merely miles of where I sit right now. I opened my eyes to a new life that day. I sold all my possessions and loot from that day in Constantinople and I took up a life of endless servitude to the Lord to recompense for the horrors of that time.