My efforts to add a little perspective to the ongoing debate on the position of men in society and the tropes and myths that have probably never really been examined in any depth.
Many years after my encounter with the old soldier from the Great War, around 1981; I found myself basking in the reflected glory of another form of ‘heroes among men’, albeit in a very niche area.
The wild North.
By the strangest of circumstances, I had ended up stranded in a pub in North Yorkshire during one of the most extreme weather events I had ever experienced.
A freak storm had unleashed a winter snowfall that was truly apocalyptic in nature, or so it seemed to me, a naïve youth from the more climatically benign East Midlands.
Locals assured me that this was no big deal, but six-foot snow drifts and violent driving flurries with snowflakes the size of teacups told me otherwise.
How I ended up in this situation is a story on its own; not necessarily one to be recounted here, because it will take me away from my main theme.
Nevertheless…
Room at the Inn.
The pub nestled in the middle of a village seemingly protected from the far exposed moorland and drift-covered drystone walls. As the snow swirled around and settled thick on parked vehicles, rutted roads quickly whited over, nothing moved. There were no cars venturing forth.
The last thing we’d seen moving was a cautious snowplough with its flashing amber lights, many miles earlier and we were happy to remain in its wake until we had to turn off and battle our way towards the relative safety of the village; our driver skilfully using his gearbox to prevent the wheels from free-planing on the compacted ice lurking beneath the snow covering.
When we finally got there, the pub was cosy and welcoming, with an open fire and food served from the kitchens; it was perfect.
Clearly, other people had decided to shelter there, but we found ourselves among a group who appeared to be regulars in the pub. This was an exclusively male gang clustered around one figure who seemed to be holding court. To my memory he had the same charisma as a minor pop star; in appearance a kind of cross between the young James Taylor and Cat Stevens, with a gruffty grizzled chin and a light in his eyes that clearly drew these people towards him.
It was explained to me that among his contemporaries this man was a celebrity.
A dangerous life.
These people were cavers, speleologists, explorers of the subterranean world, the places where man was not supposed to go; underground passages of high risk and real danger, but, nevertheless a popular activity in North Yorkshire. But here was a prince among men as he was one of the elite; he was an accomplished cave diver.
It was bad enough exploring the underground world in wetsuit, with lamps and helmets, but…
These were the people who ventured into the unknown, underwater caving; places so cramped and impossible that oxygen tanks were strapped to their legs rather than their backs. I was told at the time that cave diving was considered the most dangerous of all ‘sports,’ the fatalities were measured in weeks rather than years. And here he was… his audience seemed to be lapping up his tales of terror and adventure.
These subterranean explorers dived into impossible, unknown and unmapped underwater caverns and passageways; inky blackness made worse by murky disturbed silt that made it difficult to see your hand in front of your face.
This was entirely new to me, did such a thing really exist? (I have since seen the wonderful and terrifying Ron Howard movie, ‘Thirteen Lives’ the true story of the Tham Luang cave rescue in 2018, now THAT is cave diving).
My companions were keen to explain to me the horrors of cave diving and the things that can go tragically wrong. “Do you know why they always carry knives strapped to their ankles?” asked my gleeful friends, and then recounted stories where trapped divers had to kill their companions to steal their dwindling air supplies just to stand half a chance at survival. How true these were I have no idea.
I watched this young man with rapt fascination, he gave off a kind of glow, to me he was both feted and fated. Here was another kind of male fantasy figure, a Richard Francis Burton, a Percy Fawcett, a Lawrence of Arabia; clutching a pint in a pub in North Yorkshire.
Did his life continue beyond this point, or did he become just another statistic? I will never know. But it was the whole ‘aura’ thing and the response from his male audience, the way they just lapped it up; a kind of vicarious heroism; the energy of storytelling, the power of the ‘saga’. It belonged in an earlier age.
But did he deserve this celebrity, or was he just tripping on adrenalin to give some kind of meaning to his life? Was this the manifestation of a death wish, or just the thrill of playing Russian roulette? And, moreover, was he a model for wannabe adventurers to emulate, or was he just an embodied ‘cautionary tale’? Perhaps I am being unfair to him, maybe it’s just the ‘man against the environment’ thing? I honestly don’t know the answer to these questions.
Watch out for the third and final part of ‘The Middle Children of History’, titled, ‘The Quiet Man’.
Photo by James Thornton on Unsplash