In memory of Walker Storz (frozenborderline)

Rufous McKinney

Rufous McKinney

Senior Member
Messages
14,264
I was just thinking about him the other day. I thought I should send a message. But then I think I"m bothering somebody else.

This is very distressing. He was so intelligent and creative. Also frustrated by all this, understandably.

But I am grateful to know, hard as it is. Walker. Yes, I watched some of the Play his friends in Vermont put on.
 
cfs since 1998

cfs since 1998

Senior Member
Messages
850
I was away from the forum for awhile so we didn't cross paths but this is very sad. Only 30 years old. I appreciate the family explaining his situation in his obituary.

Usually ME/CFS patients or their families are so embarrassed by having a condition called "chronic fatigue syndrome" they don't mention it. Which is also sad.
 
Artemisia

Artemisia

Senior Member
Messages
484
I'm very sorry to hear this. I liked his podcasts and his writing here and had been wondering how he was doing.

Walker's creations gave me food for thought the past few years. It was because of Walker I started listening to Nico's solo albums based on a blog post he wrote about her. I also loved the song "Frozen Warnings" --where he got his username from.

I am sorry for the loss his family and friends are suffering.

What a cruel illness.

"Friar hermit stumbles over
The cloudy borderline
Frozen warnings close to mine
Close to the frozen borderline

Into numberless reflections
Rises a smile from your eyes into mine
Frozen warnings close to mine
Close to the frozen borderline

Over railroad station tracks
Faintly flickers a modest cry
From without a thousand cycles
A thousand cycles to come
A thousand times to win
A thousand ways to run the world
In a similar reply

Friar hermit stumbles over
The cloudy borderline
Frozen warnings close to mine
Close to the frozen borderline"

 
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Artemisia

Artemisia

Senior Member
Messages
484
Some favorites of Walker's writing


I am rejecting survival in favor of life in its fullness or death in its open promises. I am rejecting the “world” in favor of the earth, and in favor of the potential worlds that don’t marginalize me.

while I may not follow many of Christianity’s tenets, the worldliness that may have been worth defending against its asceticism, and the vibrant, healthy bodies that may have been opposed rhetorically by Christianity, may no longer exist . We may not, for very long, have a world left to defend. all that’s left then, is the perpendicularity of the cross.

when you drive west out of the city of las Vegas into the desert at night, it feels like dropping off the face of the earth. The city’s glimmering lights quickly drop away and one drives into what seems at first to be a vast emptiness. when your eyes adjust, you find yourself in a new world.
Click to expand...
 
Artemisia

Artemisia

Senior Member
Messages
484
"A few years after my initial MCAS diagnosis, my sister brought me on a bed in the back of a minivan across the country in search of extremely pure air. Anecdotal evidence and other citizen scientists had led me to believe that this would potentially cure me, or at the very least alleviate some of my symptoms. We camped at 7,000-foot altitude in a forest in southern Nevada, a sort of verdant island of cooler air and shade that rose above the surrounding desert. I began to see improvements to my condition. But, as is the case with many treatments, they were sometimes frustratingly slow.

"The mountain where we camped reminded me of Dante’s mountain of purgatory because it occupied a liminal space between two realms. In one realm, there was the decay of our current industrial civilization and the pain and hopelessness of my incurable illness; in the other, a refuge of ancient wilds which held the tantalizing promise of deep healing and potentially a full remission. Viewing First Reformed in this setting, on a cracked phone screen in the wilderness rather than in a movie theater, led me to understand that this work was overflowing with meaning, and that it reached me in my crisis through no accident.

"My experience is not unique; there are untold number of people enduring health issues because of environmental toxicity. At its root, the problem is a spiritual one: we have lost our conception of “sacred space” and replaced it with a homogenous, interchangeable “profane space.” The notion that an old-growth forest is a collection of unprocessed lumber which is fungible with capital is one example of how a profane, secular notion of space leads to ecological destruction; instead, the forest should be seen as valuable in a way that cannot be reduced to exchange value. A sacred notion of the cosmos as a living, unified space leads to less ecological destruction because man is seen as integrated; if he defiles nature, he is harming himself and inviting pollution, spiritual disorder, and the wrath of God (or the gods, depending on his religious inclinations).

"“Growth for the sake of growth is the ‘ideology’ of the cancer cell,” Edward Abbey once wrote. The quote makes me think of a moment I had when riding from Los Angeles towards the San Bernardino Mountains, passing through palm desert and the surrounding area, seeing pieces of pristine desert followed by strip malls and suburban developments popping up like monstrous growths. It felt like witnessing something sacred defiled. In traditional religions, humans participate in creation of the world and repeat this creation in their rituals. Until we readopt such a worldview, and shift our fixation on economic profit above all other concerns to something more holistic and integrated, we will continue to inflict undue harm on ourselves as a species. "
 
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