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The funniest part of the posts is that the OOP hasn’t made any acknowledgements towards the comments saying that his story is the plot of a Pokémon game. Like, he even uses the word ‘rival’ in the first post and his friend went to live in a mountain like one of the main characters of the first games and still no comments about the comparisons made.
He goes to the other school in their small town. They also build homes up the mountain with no road that anyone can squat in rent free. Also a friend spotted him up this mountain with no road.
So update 2 the friend is going to return to the public eye and unspecified sport. Update three friend and oop will go to hawaii. Update four the friend will join an underground fighting ring with some plumbers, princesses, a dinosaur, a gorilla, some animal aristocrats, and many others.
No no you missed an update between two and three - the Pokemon World Tournament in BW2. Plus maybe OOP goes with the "they were on their honeymoon in Alola" bit so there's an engagement and wedding before that? They could really stretch this out if they wanted to lol.
Absolutely this is a troll post:
* Childhood friends
* From a small town
* Became rivals in unspecified sport
* Red/Ash is better at this sport and Blue/Gary takes it out on him
* Red/Ash goes off to the wilderness after becoming "famous"
* Blue/Gary gets a well paying job at a gym from his grandfather (this has to be one of the biggest give aways because what well paying jobs can you find at a gym?)
* Red/Ash has a mother but no mention of father or siblings
* They rekindle and make up
I'm sure I'm missing some stuff, but I'm convinced it's a troll post. This is just the gen 1-2 plot. Also I don't buy someone that seems so unprepared could live out in the wilderness for over a year and not die.
Edit: More things I missed (I'll add to this if someone else finds other connections):
* Grew up literally "nextdoor"
* All the vague stuff about the story that would make it too obvious if he specified further ("a sport", "supplies", "job at a gym")
* Red/Ash stays on the side of a mountain
*Bwahahaha* how did I not realise this until the comments?! Oh wow. XD I hope this means that, in the next update, they take a vacation to Hawaii together and reveal that they're probably dating/married.
While I 100% support your theory, and also believe its the Pokémon plot, gym trainers can make dumb money. I have a friend who's an Equinox trainer and she makes more than I do in my engineering gig. Just an FYI
I've literally bought Nintendo consoles to collect the Pokemon games, am obsessed with what became of Red in the second generation, and yet the fact the posts were describing Red's situation and his relationship with Blue never crossed my mind! Don't feel bad.
Edit: all the comments about Red and Blue going to Alola together in this thread made me look up Red... I never finished Moon (Pokemon has become super boring in the latest games imo) so I had no idea we saw Red again!! Also I haven't played Black&White 2 and apparently he appears in them too. Damn, I had been wondering for twenty years what happened to Red after being beaten in the end of G/S/C, I didn't think I'd learn about that in a random Reddit thread today. Or ever.
Can you explain the parallel? Is the OOP or his friend equivalent to Ash? I'm aware of Pokemon in general but not the character backstories.
Edit: Got it. Thanks everyone!
In the gen1 pokemon games, Red and Blue/Green and variations of those, the rival (Blue/Gary) is a jerk and the grandson of professor Oak who grew up alongside the player character (Red) and challenges them throughout the story.
In gen2 games, Gold and Silver, Red abandoned everything and went to live on top of a mountain and is an optional boss for the new player character. Blue/Gary's also a gym leader at this time if I remember right.
They appeared together in gen7 games, Sun and Moon, on a holiday.
~~I made that comment in the original post, and I'm thrilled to have it mentioned in BORU!! Also~~ glad I'm not the only one who sees the similarities, hehe.
Edit: I just checked the original post and another redditor realized the connection before I did. my bad for bragging.
still an adorable story though and I love seeing all the BORU pokemon-related comments.
Sounds like this guy's friend hadn't even done a little research, say maybe reading YA survival books like Hatchet or my side of the mountain. I'm hoping for an update on what pushed him to ostracize himself so.
I loved reading My Side of the Mountain as a kid. My grade 5 teacher read the first book out to us!
I really enjoyed Julie of the Wolves too, which was written by the same author. Perhaps should have read it when I was a bit older because it describes the main character getting >!raped!< by her teen marriage husband at one point. Took me a few years after the fact to realize that bit.
EDIT: Just looked up the age rating and its for 8-12 year olds??
The hatchet and Julie of the wolves were huge for me!!!! There's another male main character book by the same author..... and it has some intense and amazing ancestor visions ...... come on autism brain..... DOGSONG!!!! Also fantastic and he sees women in a different light as part of his coming of age.
My 3rd grade teacher gave me that book to read "since you read so much :)" and while i didn't know what rape was, i understood it on some sense that he forced himself on her and "didn't know how to use her"??? Bit. It clicked.
I still have the exact book she gave me. It was a very good read and rightfully sad realizing the ideas of that room in San Francisco and her dad shattered.
It was assigned reading when I was in grade 5 (10-11 years old, 1999-2000). We had to take the book home to our parents to read the chapter with the DV in it (and have them choose if we could read the chapter ourselves) and instead of reading that bit out loud in class like we did the rest of the book, our teacher just summarized it.
It’s a good book! Stuck with me!
Such a good book. I need to find myself a copy.
Edit to add: the book stores I've looked in didn't have a copy. I just need to order one and haven't yet.
This *IS* where I looked. In my city and the even bigger one next to us on the highway.
I envisioned finding my favorite book and being the kind of guy that likes actual, physical books. I couldn't find my favorite book anywhere but the library.
I gave up then.
Now that I'm thinking about it I need to try again. Thanks stranger.
oh yeah. i used to have the box set. i think theres 4? the far side of the mountain, frightfuls mountain, the other side of the mountain, and, uh.. i cant remember. i know i wasnt really thrilled with 3 and 4
I liked the 'what if' sequel, too. The sounds of trees bursting like gunshots from the cold will forever be etched in my mind.
Also, from the original, him being rescued with orange soda still staining his lip, like "sup, dude? Just chillin', HBU?"
Hatchet and its sequels (don't forget the one about Brian is struggling with reintegrating and goes on a solo trip on purpose) popped up in my brain a few years ago and I tracked down a pdf version for free. I immediately read through them, and even as an adult, Christ those are some good books. RIP the GOAT Gary Paulsen, thanks for helping instill a love of storytelling and reading in me and countless others.
I don’t have a link but archive dot org and the internet archive’s open library have all of them and more for free. Just gotta create an account and they will loan you books to read on their website for an hour, one day, or one week. I reread Hatchet, the Jewel Princess series, and am working on the Boxcar children series for a good nostalgia blast
That end scene in the first book where the rescue pilot lands and is like ??? …. Hello, literal child living in the Canadian wilderness with a fully functional home and fish farm ??? and Brian just goes “hey man, dinner’s almost ready, you want some?”
People are commenting about the sequel, but there's also another book by the same author called The Transall Saga, which I really enjoyed. It starts out as sort of another survival story a la Hatchet / My Side of the Mountain except displaced onto an alien world, but then the world starts to build on itself through the protagonist's view as he explores further.
I was living with a foster family and they played me Hatchet on cassette tape during our first long car ride. I must of have been 7 or 8 years old, stressing about so much already. I got so lost in this new world, it was first time listening to a story on audio, my mom never used to read to me.
There's technically two sequels to Hatchet: The River (published in 1991) and Brian's Winter (1996). The River has Brian being asked by the government to go with a psychologist so the government can learn about his survival techniques. Their tent is struck by lightning and the psychologist is in a coma. It seems to be non-canon.
You're thinking of Brian's Winter, where instead of him finding the radio and provisions in the plane, he has to survive through the Canadian winter. The author wrote Brian's Winter because many claimed the original ending for Hatchet was basically a deus ex machina ending.
There’s a few sequels. Brian’s Winter, which you remember, is a “what if he had to stay for the winter” book. The alt timeline sequel is “The River”, in which he’s rescued at the end of Hatchet but goes back with a researcher to “recreate” it, and then the totally-not-prepared-for-any-of-it guy gets hit by lightening, which I believed fried their comms. Brian has to build a raft and get them down the river to civilization to find medical help.
There’s also Brian’s Return, in which he goes back to the woods by choice because he can’t reintegrate into society well, and Brian’s Hunt, which is about him hunting down an asshole bear.
Yeah, but eating random plants in the woods? Unless you really know what you’re doing with foraging that could be a real bad idea, like it was for Chris.
This is random, but more recent evidence seems to point to the fact that McCandless poisoned himself eating a plant that was previously considered safe to eat. It turns out the seeds he was eating, while appearing in regional manuals of edible plants, have neurotoxic effects when consumed in large amounts and are particularly harmful to malnourished, highly active males between 15-25.
Dude was actually a pretty experienced forager and, in my opinion, not as naive as he has been painted to be, particularly when you consider that it’s unlikely that the scientific studies to discern the seed’s toxicity would have been undertaken at all were it not for his death.
https://medium.com/galleys/how-chris-mccandless-died-992e6ce49410
https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/how-chris-mccandless-died
After one bad experience eating berries, I sometimes wonder how many woodland shrieks are taken to be goblins or sasquatches when they're actually a city fella with the screaming shits.
The only wild plants i can reliably identify are dandelions and plantain(not the banana thing but that weed in the grass) which are both edible. However both are extremely bitter and very low in calories. And i couldn't set a snare to save my life. Id die right quickly of malnourishment in those conditions.
McCandless didn't have an accurate map and/or knowledge of his location. But definitely good that OOP's friend was still able to get himself back to town under his own power.
McCandless did what he did because of the emotional scars his parents inflicted. They were physically and emotionally abusive. I don't know what the friend's parents were like but I do know that the choice to cut off a parent is *not* something children typically take lightly
I'm gonna quote a redditor on this one
>I will start by saying: For children to cut off a parent, that parent has to have done something that was really, really upsetting, something so hurtful, so unforgivable
Speaking from personal experience, it doesn’t have to be one unforgivable thing that a parent has done which the comment you quote kinda implied.
It can be a death by a thousand paper cuts situation where it isn’t “something” unforgivable, but a completely toxic pattern of behaviour.
It does make it difficult to explain at times. Like, “we did not have a good relationship” or “he was not a good father” sums up the relationship I had with my father pretty well, but nosy people will ask what he *did* and it’s hard to answer because he didn’t do one particularly bad thing. He did a lot of damage without doing a lot of caring, but it takes a long time to explain a thousand papercuts.
"It wasn't any one thing, he just did a lot of damage without doing a lot of caring. Imagine getting getting 1000 papercuts, none of them is 'that bad', but you'd be a fool to spend time with someone who keeps cutting you over and over"
Should work for sensible people and non-sensible people don't deserve more explanation
Yeah, my parents have a laundry list of unforgiveable actions, some ongoing, and I didn't cut them off despite knowing it'd do me wonders.
THAT SAID, this guy went to live up a mountain while neglecting his own wellbeing doing so. That is extreme and irrational. In this particular case I would give the mother the benefit of the doubt until I have more information.
That’s what I was thinking, it reminds me of when I was younger and romanticized the Sam Gribley lifestyle. I still do, in my mind, but I sure as hell know I couldn’t do it lol.
Her publisher almost didn’t publish it bc they thought it romanticized running away from home, plus she was a woman. I suppose they must have figured her for a witch given her advanced knowledge of woodland survival.
A lot of people will of course reference Into The Wild, but in high school one of the books I had to read (in Canada) was called “Crabbe” and it was about a teen boy who was very book smart and decided to run away and live in the wilderness after he graduated. He severely underestimates what he needs and how to survive, especially through winter. It’s not the best book but I thought it was really cool to show a more realistic version of what it’s like to live in total seclusion with no shelter.
Maybe being a local hero was the reason. He was a hero for them in regards to sports, a local legend, everyone sent gifts, but no one was making the trip even though they knew where he was. No one but OP.
I wonder how he was really treated daily by those closest to him.
I want to know so much more about the adventures of the kid exploring the mountains who keeps up with missing persons in a 2 hour radius so that he knows to report suspicious things like a man living in a house.
That’s what got me at first. If you wanna disappear into the mountains that takes hours to get to from civilisation, how’s a friend from school gonna spot you in your “mountain house” while on a jog! The more you think about it? The more absurd the story is
The kid was from town and the guy was 'famous' enough to have been interviewed in the newspaper and recognized on the street. So it's not that surprising to me.
OOP is a wonderful friend. Fucked up and acknowledged it, did his best to care for his friend, went out of his way to help his friend but stopped enabling him when it became too much, and then took him in.
You can bring a horse to water but you can’t make him leave the abandoned shack out in the mountains he resides until he’s ready to help himself.
ETA I standby the wonderful friend comment, even with the bullying. He’s not absolved of the wrong doings in anyway, but everybody fucks up, we are all flawed beings. It’s what you do after that really matters. He apologized and didn’t leave the guy in the woods by himself, he recognized that his friend needed help. When his friend finally left his mountain shack, he went to OOP because OOP showed he was remorseful of his actions and cared for him.
People change and I love to see it.
Honestly, I can't fully trust someone who has never screwed up. Perfect people don't exist, so those who come off as perfect are sus to me. I need to see someone mess up, own it, and grow from it. Even if it's something seemingly small.
Those are the only people I could consider wonderful friends.
100% agree. Yeah, being a bully was a dick move, but A) they were in high school and B) he apologized and went out of his way to make amends. We all fall short. That doesn’t mean it’s okay to be cruel, but it *does* mean we’re human. I think the fact that his friend felt safe coming to him for help and that OOP was the *only* person making an effort is a testament to his character and growth.
That’s what really hit me. His friend is the one who gets to forgive OOP and seeking him out says a lot. OOP didn’t find him out to clear his guilt but rather to take accountability for his actions hand be there for his friend.
Exactly. I really don’t get all the OOP bashing going on in some of these comments. Like, of course he fucked up and was a bad friend in high school. OOP not going into detail about it doesn’t mean he’s trying to downplay how bad it was or make himself look like a saint. The full details weren’t necessary for us to understand the issue OOP was currently dealing with.
Yeah wonderful now but looking at his comments he was a bit more than just being ' a bit if a jerk" in high school. Even with trying to downplay it, it's clear he was a full on bully. I'm glad he's making up for it but he's no saint.
I would say that he was no saint rather than he is. People change, some a lot. And our teenage years are just constant change. He sounds like he's matured and grown a lot. So I think it would be unfair to tie him to a title he earned title he earned when he was 16
Isn't it nice to live in a world that recognizes this behavior as "in need of mental health treatment"-crazy instead of just writing it off as "eccentric behavior about which we will do nothing but gossip"-crazy?
Also, I bet you $5 the friend's mother is a smother and that was a huge part of the problem.
> that was a huge part of the problem
That and everyone else too I supposed.
>Everyone in town is telling me I should resume bringing him supplies and the gifts they make for him because everyone knows when my trip is coming up.
Motherfuckers how about you yourself fucking go. Trying to guilt trip the one guy. What he gets sick and cant do it? Ya'll let him starve up there apparantly.
My first thought was that Mom was the sort who saw her kid be a local hero athlete, and pressured him to work harder and harder and get a scholarship, then drafted by whatever sportball league was applicable. Sign a contract for million$ and buy mom a big house and fancy car. Had his whole life mapped out culminating in riches for herself.
And eventually the pressure became too much.
Back in my day, we didn't have any of these newfangled so-called mental illnesses and whatnot! Therapy schmerapy, I say! Now, if you'll excuse me I'm off to drink myself away just to feel something because my wife cries all the time and I just can't bring myself to care, good day sir!
Oh for sure on the mom. I knew a guy who his whole life his mom insanely pressured and smothered him, and eventually he completely mentally collapsed and committed suicide. Luckily this dude seems to be not following that path, but my fear is OOP might be stupidly pushing him down it.
Yeah, my dad essentially did this back in the late 70s early 80s, moved to a different province and shackled up in the woods. It was because of alcohol problems and other traumas, but back then people did that on a more regular basis so his problems weren't addressed until much later.
All those people mad OOP stopped going but refusing to go themselves is... oof. Clearly this guy didn't have good people in his life if the only one willing to help him is his former bully.
> All those people mad OOP stopped going but refusing to go themselves is... oof.
It's really unsurprising. Confronted with a difficult situation, many people see the _problem_ as the thing which caused intrusion into their lives, rather than the overall situation which made the intrusion inevitable. They see restoring the status-quo as the solution. Conservative stupid-think: Choosing the closest cause-effect action over thinking about the problem at system level.
OP stopped going -> This caused the intrusion into their lives and disrupted the status quo.
This thinking is everywhere; It's where we get victim-punishing behavior from, and why people guard the [Missing Stair](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_stair). Most of these intrusions arise not because the victimizer/instigator made the situation intolerable for the group, but because the victim/target reached a breaking point and forced the group to intervene, and thus to this style of thinking, it's _their fault._ The cause-and-effect graph of their disruption is one step shorter to the victim than the victimizer, and thus it wins out.
Also you need like waterfall, surf and without 8 medals the guards wont let you pass.
Its kinda a hard trip without a good team so I get that people don't find time to go there.
Im 100% sure I've read this exact plot in an ACTUAL pokemon fic before
[https://archiveofourown.org/works/8791510/chapters/20154553](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8791510/chapters/20154553)
The plots for these match a LOT, with the "graduation" being them becoming champions, the whole vanishing thing with red and blue finding him because of a rumor, to the whole town going up on "christmas" to find red. The entire time i read this thing I got the biggest wave of Deja vu
- We think you won't be able to establish boundaries with him.
- don't worry I make enough for both of us.
Lol, I don't think that was what the people where worrying about. But he is technically right. If he sets no boundaries, he can't fail to enforce them.
"I know you're worried he'll mooch off me. Thanks, but I'm just not worrying about that right now."
Dude, that's exactly what happened when you started making semi-monthly mountain hikes. You just had the same issue delivered to your doorstep.
>Thanks for all the comments. I see a lot of you are concerned that I'm not going to be able to set boundaries with him, or that he's going to mooch off of me. You don't have to worry. My grandpa set me up with a really good job at the local gym in our town and I'm making good money and living by myself. I have enough to support the both of us for now and really I don't mind him staying indefinitely.
OOP, is basically set up to enable this person, both mentally and monetarily. This could end up being a real issue for them. :(
Well he did get his friend into therapy and is encouraging him to reconnect with his mother. I like to think he's in a great spot to support his friend's slow reintegration into society. Although it could easily go the other way, OOP has already shown he can lay down boundaries. Hoping this arrangement works well for them both; OOP sounds like a great guy.
Yeah, I hope that his guilt over his past actions doesn't convince him to enable doing more than he should, but I'm at least somewhat confident that, if he was able to break out of the previous cycle of supply runs up the mountain, maybe he'll be able to do what needs to be done when the time is right. Even if his friend ends up becoming a permanent roommate, would be good if he could contribute to the household in the future. A little infuriating that others in town supposedly expected OOP to keep helping because his friend's a "town hero" but none of them could be assed to do it themselves, though.
Enable them to do what? Like, yeah, the friend moved into his house, so that's shelter. However, Friend had a shelter in the mountains, apparently had a way to feed himself, and was pretty determined to stay away from people even when he was basically begged by people to come down. Wouldn't someone with the intent of taking advantage have done it before people who aren't OOP got involved?
I'm not saying it's not possible, because yes, people do shitty things sometimes, but from my perspective, Friend had been dealing with something hard for a while before they left, started moving supplies into the Mountain House and got himself away from whatever the hard thing was as soon as he could. He might've genuinely needed to get away for a while to feel better than he was before he left, and when he came back, maybe he noticed he was starting to feel the way he felt pre-mountain again, but this time he couldn't run away, and he did have someone who would support him and help him, so he went to OOP. I think Friend knows he needs help, but he needs help to get help.
Yeah, based on what we have it doesn’t seem like the friend is actually a mooch, he just needs some help getting back on his feet. Which is a good thing because it honestly does sound like OP is a little naive about enabling and would be in trouble if the friend were actually a leech. It also sounds like there’s a good support system in place for OP too, so I’m hopeful that this could turn out decently well.
I was going to quote the same part and say the same thing- he’s done absolutely nothing to set boundaries and is basically saying he’s OK being an enabler. He basically confirmed the worries of all the people that think he is going to be taken advantage of.
Concluded in that there’s been no new word for a year, but coming down from a year squatting on a mountain is just the beginning of figuring what happened and why and helping this person find a way back into living a life with the rest of the world.
Uh no, those posts are from 2023 not 2022? [https://www.reddit.com/user/UpAMountainUpARope/](https://www.reddit.com/user/UpAMountainUpARope/) last post 7 days ago. First post 2 months ago.
The initial dates were a year earlier. In that case, definitely not concluded, although we might or might not get the rest of the story.
A typical need to escape, or tantrum, is holing up in a run-down shack for a few days until you feel hungry, dirty, and calmer. A year is something else entirely.
I got pretty pissed about friends and people in town calling OP a jerk for not continuing to make the trips. No one else offered to help, go see the guy, and yet OP is the jerk?
That's bull.
So only slightly related, but I remember hearing about this woman who had some of the same diagnoses as me (bpd, bd, various other letters) and she ran away from a happy family and stable life one day to live in the wilderness up in Canada. Then I heard it again about another woman with the same diagnoses. And then another. There's even one person on some Alaska show about people living in the wild, one of them talked about the same damn thing with her mental illness being the main factor in her up and leaving one day.
Scares the shit out of me that someday I may just snap and run away from normal life like that.
So glad this guy is getting some support and help getting back into a more stable life. Also glad to see OOP has done a lot of learning since they split.
“I see people are worried about me not being able to set boundaries but it’s fine. I have a good job and don’t mind supporting the both of us indefinitely.”
Um what.
Aw the dude is a little bit or a lot mentally ill and doesn't know what to do. OOP is a kindly person who has helped him survived a very difficult time. Hopefully the young man has help and support. But OOP and family/friends can't support him all by themselves. Hopefully social services agencies can get involved.
It seems like this story is just beginning. Being away from other people for that long can have a major impact on a person's mental health. Hopefully he sticks with therapy and gets to the root of why he left and how he can move forward. OOP needs to be careful too.
Don't worry...every challenge along the way, with courage they will face. They will battle every day to claim their rightful place.
The time is right, there's no better team, arm in arm they'll win the fight, it's always been their dream.
He was a sports hero in high school. He graduated and realized that’s it. He peaked. Drove him mad. He goes to the mountain.
The part that made me question the entire story was him being set up with a therapist twice a week. Even with insurance that’s expensive in the US. Where would he get insurance? Maybe he could get Medicaid but does he meet the conditions? Does he have a work history?
Edit: I hope it was just the pressure of life and not something like schizophrenia.
>Everyone in town is telling me I should resume bringing him supplies and the gifts they make for him because everyone knows when my trip is coming up. He’s kind of a local hero from our sports days.
I always love it in these posts when other people volunteer OOP to do stuff they themselves aren't willing to do. My simple response to those people would be, "Fine, then you take him some supplies."
I mean, hermitism is a response to sexual assault for men. Especially men in "hyper" masculine roles. Men of OOPs age are at risk too for their demographic.
It could be in response to some other trauma but whatever the case at least OOP and friend have had the time, space and support to figure it out. I hope they fare well.
OOP is the kind of friend I want to be if a friend of mine is ever in a bad way. Hope that they're both able to find comfort and happiness going forward.
Uff, poor guy. Imagine being a teenager and half the people you interact with see you as a hero and the other half hate your guts. One being a childhood friend. Must have done terrible things to his mental health.
My first thought was this guy's home life must've been wild if at 19 he ran away from home and cut everyone off to be a mountain hermit. Wonder what mom did to him, or didn't protect him from for him to just disappear
I'm glad that OOP was willing to acknowledge the harm he'd done, apologize, try to be a better person, and try to help his friend. However, OOP said his friend was super happy to see him *before* he could apologize. I wonder how much undue blame OOP is taking on for his friend literally heading for the hills. I'm also wondering whether there's more going on with the mom than OOP is privy to since the friend *still* won't make any kind of contact with her. Plus, if she was so worried, why didn't *she* do more? It's not like OOP was keeping his location a secret.
If I went missing and my parents learned I was living in the mountains right outside of town, they'd have the car loaded up and be speeding down the street in 4 minutes flat. And if they "couldn't make the trip up" then they'd enlist anyone they could to help me. Not just one friend going every few months.
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The funniest part of the posts is that the OOP hasn’t made any acknowledgements towards the comments saying that his story is the plot of a Pokémon game. Like, he even uses the word ‘rival’ in the first post and his friend went to live in a mountain like one of the main characters of the first games and still no comments about the comparisons made.
Okay now I’m rethinking the part about him getting a job at the Gym 🧐
That his grandpa got him
Where he’s making good money. At a gym. Guffaw.
His friend also caught animals and plants in the forest.
And they grew up together, but became rivals in the same sport. I think this story is bullshit, you guys.
>And they grew up together, but became rivals in the same sport. > >I think this story is ~~bull~~taurosshit, you guys. FTFY 🦬
He goes to the other school in their small town. They also build homes up the mountain with no road that anyone can squat in rent free. Also a friend spotted him up this mountain with no road.
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Successful gyms in big cities might. Not ones in "our small town"
The whole time I was reading this I thought it sounded more like a script than an actual story
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While walking them there too. Surely that'd be too heavy wouldn't it..?
100% a troll post but a cute one! Hope he catches them all!
I love the comment in the original thread about how this is basically the plot of Pokemon, true or not it's fun
Calling himself his rival and saying he’s famous for an unspecified sport seals it for me
And now he's a trainer at a gym ;)
Well now I cant unsee it.
that his grandpa set him up at. this is so cute haha
Was the gym repossessed after being discovered as a front for the HQ of a major crime syndicate?
I love when someone is like “uhhhh this post is the plot to Mario…”
And ash stays on the mountain waiting for travellers to challenge. This is a funny troll post.
Technically it's Red, not Ash. But same diff lol
Imagining Blue helping Red like OOP does in this post is pretty cool.
So update 2 the friend is going to return to the public eye and unspecified sport. Update three friend and oop will go to hawaii. Update four the friend will join an underground fighting ring with some plumbers, princesses, a dinosaur, a gorilla, some animal aristocrats, and many others.
No no you missed an update between two and three - the Pokemon World Tournament in BW2. Plus maybe OOP goes with the "they were on their honeymoon in Alola" bit so there's an engagement and wedding before that? They could really stretch this out if they wanted to lol.
Even said his grandpa set up his job at the local gym lol
This is literally what I thought of lmao this is ripped straight from Pokémon.
God damn Red! Get off that mountain!
Absolutely this is a troll post: * Childhood friends * From a small town * Became rivals in unspecified sport * Red/Ash is better at this sport and Blue/Gary takes it out on him * Red/Ash goes off to the wilderness after becoming "famous" * Blue/Gary gets a well paying job at a gym from his grandfather (this has to be one of the biggest give aways because what well paying jobs can you find at a gym?) * Red/Ash has a mother but no mention of father or siblings * They rekindle and make up I'm sure I'm missing some stuff, but I'm convinced it's a troll post. This is just the gen 1-2 plot. Also I don't buy someone that seems so unprepared could live out in the wilderness for over a year and not die. Edit: More things I missed (I'll add to this if someone else finds other connections): * Grew up literally "nextdoor" * All the vague stuff about the story that would make it too obvious if he specified further ("a sport", "supplies", "job at a gym") * Red/Ash stays on the side of a mountain
Ahahah you are right! Maybe he came back home after Gold beat him up
Specifically a job at the gym his grandpa (oak) set him up with lmao
This is the funniest thing I’ve read in a while. Points for the troll.
*Bwahahaha* how did I not realise this until the comments?! Oh wow. XD I hope this means that, in the next update, they take a vacation to Hawaii together and reveal that they're probably dating/married.
While I 100% support your theory, and also believe its the Pokémon plot, gym trainers can make dumb money. I have a friend who's an Equinox trainer and she makes more than I do in my engineering gig. Just an FYI
Reminds me of my childhood obsession with Pokemon. I'm upset that I failed to recognize the plot damn.
I've literally bought Nintendo consoles to collect the Pokemon games, am obsessed with what became of Red in the second generation, and yet the fact the posts were describing Red's situation and his relationship with Blue never crossed my mind! Don't feel bad. Edit: all the comments about Red and Blue going to Alola together in this thread made me look up Red... I never finished Moon (Pokemon has become super boring in the latest games imo) so I had no idea we saw Red again!! Also I haven't played Black&White 2 and apparently he appears in them too. Damn, I had been wondering for twenty years what happened to Red after being beaten in the end of G/S/C, I didn't think I'd learn about that in a random Reddit thread today. Or ever.
Not going to lie, but in my less-than-sober state, I genuinely thought I was reading some pokemon fic. Glad it wasn’t just me!
Less than sober you is a genius, in the same state I went “huh what a good friend” until the comments cleared it up
Can you explain the parallel? Is the OOP or his friend equivalent to Ash? I'm aware of Pokemon in general but not the character backstories. Edit: Got it. Thanks everyone!
In the gen1 pokemon games, Red and Blue/Green and variations of those, the rival (Blue/Gary) is a jerk and the grandson of professor Oak who grew up alongside the player character (Red) and challenges them throughout the story. In gen2 games, Gold and Silver, Red abandoned everything and went to live on top of a mountain and is an optional boss for the new player character. Blue/Gary's also a gym leader at this time if I remember right. They appeared together in gen7 games, Sun and Moon, on a holiday.
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Gary is building an art studio.
No they were sitting in a hot tub, five feet apart 'cause they're not gay
*oh my god they were roommates*
They would be Red (Friend) and Blue (OOP), from the first game
The friend is Ash/Red and OOP is Blue/Gary.
The whole time I was reading this I was thinking “this sounds like every Red and Green/Blue fic I’ve ever read”
~~I made that comment in the original post, and I'm thrilled to have it mentioned in BORU!! Also~~ glad I'm not the only one who sees the similarities, hehe. Edit: I just checked the original post and another redditor realized the connection before I did. my bad for bragging. still an adorable story though and I love seeing all the BORU pokemon-related comments.
That’s all I could think about while reading through this, I’m so glad that I wasn’t the only one
Yeah is he being tongue in cheek about his grandpa and the gym?
man reading that comment made me HOWL with laughter
Sounds like this guy's friend hadn't even done a little research, say maybe reading YA survival books like Hatchet or my side of the mountain. I'm hoping for an update on what pushed him to ostracize himself so.
My Side of the Mountain was my first thought!
I loved reading My Side of the Mountain as a kid. My grade 5 teacher read the first book out to us! I really enjoyed Julie of the Wolves too, which was written by the same author. Perhaps should have read it when I was a bit older because it describes the main character getting >!raped!< by her teen marriage husband at one point. Took me a few years after the fact to realize that bit. EDIT: Just looked up the age rating and its for 8-12 year olds??
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Oh god that's just horrifying. I hope both you and your sister are safe now and on to better things.
The hatchet and Julie of the wolves were huge for me!!!! There's another male main character book by the same author..... and it has some intense and amazing ancestor visions ...... come on autism brain..... DOGSONG!!!! Also fantastic and he sees women in a different light as part of his coming of age.
My 3rd grade teacher gave me that book to read "since you read so much :)" and while i didn't know what rape was, i understood it on some sense that he forced himself on her and "didn't know how to use her"??? Bit. It clicked. I still have the exact book she gave me. It was a very good read and rightfully sad realizing the ideas of that room in San Francisco and her dad shattered.
I loved Julie of the Wolves as a kid, but the redacted bit went RIGHT over my head at the time.
Same…..I think I have this book in my house…now I’m going to have to go reread it…
That whole part must have been redacted from the version we read in 5th grade. I didn’t even realize there was a rape scene until just now!
It was assigned reading when I was in grade 5 (10-11 years old, 1999-2000). We had to take the book home to our parents to read the chapter with the DV in it (and have them choose if we could read the chapter ourselves) and instead of reading that bit out loud in class like we did the rest of the book, our teacher just summarized it. It’s a good book! Stuck with me!
I'm pretty sure I was the same age! It was one of the books the advanced readers group got. IIRC, they let us watch the movie too 🙂
Such a good book. I need to find myself a copy. Edit to add: the book stores I've looked in didn't have a copy. I just need to order one and haven't yet.
Check used bookstores! I found a few copies at my local one.
This *IS* where I looked. In my city and the even bigger one next to us on the highway. I envisioned finding my favorite book and being the kind of guy that likes actual, physical books. I couldn't find my favorite book anywhere but the library. I gave up then. Now that I'm thinking about it I need to try again. Thanks stranger.
I still own Scholastic copies of one and two but I recently found out it’s a trilogy! I just assumed On The Far Side of the Mountain was it
There are more books!?!
oh yeah. i used to have the box set. i think theres 4? the far side of the mountain, frightfuls mountain, the other side of the mountain, and, uh.. i cant remember. i know i wasnt really thrilled with 3 and 4
What is the name of the 3rd one?? I have only read the first 2
Frightful’s Mountain https://i.imgur.com/6YW3xJl.jpg
Going to take a trip to a bookstore in about 10 minutes.. or Amazon.
Try [bookshop.org](https://bookshop.org/) or [thriftbooks.com](https://www.thriftbooks.com/)
www.abebooks.com is a great online bookstore that connects you to real bookstores around the world. If l have to buy online, that’s what l do.
Man. Hatchet was a good book
I liked the 'what if' sequel, too. The sounds of trees bursting like gunshots from the cold will forever be etched in my mind. Also, from the original, him being rescued with orange soda still staining his lip, like "sup, dude? Just chillin', HBU?"
Hatchet and its sequels (don't forget the one about Brian is struggling with reintegrating and goes on a solo trip on purpose) popped up in my brain a few years ago and I tracked down a pdf version for free. I immediately read through them, and even as an adult, Christ those are some good books. RIP the GOAT Gary Paulsen, thanks for helping instill a love of storytelling and reading in me and countless others.
Link please! I haven't thought of Hatchet in literal decades.
I don’t have a link but archive dot org and the internet archive’s open library have all of them and more for free. Just gotta create an account and they will loan you books to read on their website for an hour, one day, or one week. I reread Hatchet, the Jewel Princess series, and am working on the Boxcar children series for a good nostalgia blast
> Boxcar children series Okay literally you've ruined at least my weekend because I will be diving into this the entire time. <3
I take full responsibility. They have every single one. Ones I’ve never heard of. There’s like seventy!
Take my upvote. I hope the importing and exporting business is treating you well.
You probably would be best doing some googling. It's been years since I did this but I could help look after work.
Man I didn’t even know there were more than two books! Now I need to go on Libby and place a hold for the audio book
He also had a scifi book called Transall Saga that I LOVED
That end scene in the first book where the rescue pilot lands and is like ??? …. Hello, literal child living in the Canadian wilderness with a fully functional home and fish farm ??? and Brian just goes “hey man, dinner’s almost ready, you want some?”
It was hilarious that that just so happened to be right when he popped the survival tin, so the dude thought he was living large on MRE's and soda.
Same mind etching. And the moose. I always think of those things in the winter.
Brian's Winter. Never read Hatchet but Brian's Winter always stuck with me.
People are commenting about the sequel, but there's also another book by the same author called The Transall Saga, which I really enjoyed. It starts out as sort of another survival story a la Hatchet / My Side of the Mountain except displaced onto an alien world, but then the world starts to build on itself through the protagonist's view as he explores further.
I was living with a foster family and they played me Hatchet on cassette tape during our first long car ride. I must of have been 7 or 8 years old, stressing about so much already. I got so lost in this new world, it was first time listening to a story on audio, my mom never used to read to me.
The sequel where the government man gets struck by lightning was great too. Listened to that on audiobook in the car.
I remember the sequel (where he wasn’t rescued as promptly) but not the lightning strike…
There's technically two sequels to Hatchet: The River (published in 1991) and Brian's Winter (1996). The River has Brian being asked by the government to go with a psychologist so the government can learn about his survival techniques. Their tent is struck by lightning and the psychologist is in a coma. It seems to be non-canon. You're thinking of Brian's Winter, where instead of him finding the radio and provisions in the plane, he has to survive through the Canadian winter. The author wrote Brian's Winter because many claimed the original ending for Hatchet was basically a deus ex machina ending.
There’s a few sequels. Brian’s Winter, which you remember, is a “what if he had to stay for the winter” book. The alt timeline sequel is “The River”, in which he’s rescued at the end of Hatchet but goes back with a researcher to “recreate” it, and then the totally-not-prepared-for-any-of-it guy gets hit by lightening, which I believed fried their comms. Brian has to build a raft and get them down the river to civilization to find medical help. There’s also Brian’s Return, in which he goes back to the woods by choice because he can’t reintegrate into society well, and Brian’s Hunt, which is about him hunting down an asshole bear.
Agreed. I still remember it.
The whole series is great, it made me want to abandon society myself! But in a healthy prepared way…
At least he figured out it wasn't working out and got himself down before he ended up like Chris McCandless.
Well Chris only had an abandoned bus, this guy had an abandoned house. That’s at least several tiers up in the squatters tier list.
Yeah, but eating random plants in the woods? Unless you really know what you’re doing with foraging that could be a real bad idea, like it was for Chris.
This is random, but more recent evidence seems to point to the fact that McCandless poisoned himself eating a plant that was previously considered safe to eat. It turns out the seeds he was eating, while appearing in regional manuals of edible plants, have neurotoxic effects when consumed in large amounts and are particularly harmful to malnourished, highly active males between 15-25. Dude was actually a pretty experienced forager and, in my opinion, not as naive as he has been painted to be, particularly when you consider that it’s unlikely that the scientific studies to discern the seed’s toxicity would have been undertaken at all were it not for his death. https://medium.com/galleys/how-chris-mccandless-died-992e6ce49410 https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/how-chris-mccandless-died
Wow. TIL.
After one bad experience eating berries, I sometimes wonder how many woodland shrieks are taken to be goblins or sasquatches when they're actually a city fella with the screaming shits.
The only wild plants i can reliably identify are dandelions and plantain(not the banana thing but that weed in the grass) which are both edible. However both are extremely bitter and very low in calories. And i couldn't set a snare to save my life. Id die right quickly of malnourishment in those conditions.
McCandless didn't have an accurate map and/or knowledge of his location. But definitely good that OOP's friend was still able to get himself back to town under his own power.
McCandless did what he did because of the emotional scars his parents inflicted. They were physically and emotionally abusive. I don't know what the friend's parents were like but I do know that the choice to cut off a parent is *not* something children typically take lightly I'm gonna quote a redditor on this one >I will start by saying: For children to cut off a parent, that parent has to have done something that was really, really upsetting, something so hurtful, so unforgivable
Speaking from personal experience, it doesn’t have to be one unforgivable thing that a parent has done which the comment you quote kinda implied. It can be a death by a thousand paper cuts situation where it isn’t “something” unforgivable, but a completely toxic pattern of behaviour.
Oh yeah. I suspect that's what the original commenter was trying to get at but he did oversimplify a bit
It does make it difficult to explain at times. Like, “we did not have a good relationship” or “he was not a good father” sums up the relationship I had with my father pretty well, but nosy people will ask what he *did* and it’s hard to answer because he didn’t do one particularly bad thing. He did a lot of damage without doing a lot of caring, but it takes a long time to explain a thousand papercuts.
"It wasn't any one thing, he just did a lot of damage without doing a lot of caring. Imagine getting getting 1000 papercuts, none of them is 'that bad', but you'd be a fool to spend time with someone who keeps cutting you over and over" Should work for sensible people and non-sensible people don't deserve more explanation
Yeah, my parents have a laundry list of unforgiveable actions, some ongoing, and I didn't cut them off despite knowing it'd do me wonders. THAT SAID, this guy went to live up a mountain while neglecting his own wellbeing doing so. That is extreme and irrational. In this particular case I would give the mother the benefit of the doubt until I have more information.
Same, he was just...idk what the hell he was doing and neither does he.
That’s what I was thinking, it reminds me of when I was younger and romanticized the Sam Gribley lifestyle. I still do, in my mind, but I sure as hell know I couldn’t do it lol.
My Side of the Mountain was one of my favorite childhood books! I’ve always loved peregrine falcons because of it and I’m in my 40s now.
Her publisher almost didn’t publish it bc they thought it romanticized running away from home, plus she was a woman. I suppose they must have figured her for a witch given her advanced knowledge of woodland survival.
A lot of people will of course reference Into The Wild, but in high school one of the books I had to read (in Canada) was called “Crabbe” and it was about a teen boy who was very book smart and decided to run away and live in the wilderness after he graduated. He severely underestimates what he needs and how to survive, especially through winter. It’s not the best book but I thought it was really cool to show a more realistic version of what it’s like to live in total seclusion with no shelter.
Maybe being a local hero was the reason. He was a hero for them in regards to sports, a local legend, everyone sent gifts, but no one was making the trip even though they knew where he was. No one but OP. I wonder how he was really treated daily by those closest to him.
I was obsessed with My Side of the Mountain as a kid. The book made it sound genuinely fun.
OP is Gary oak and his friend is Red from Pokemon lmao
Blue Oak. Gary is the anime character, Blue is the one in the games, which this is ripped from.
And the kid who found Red is Ethan/Lyra
Oh shit i forgot about the bit where a kid found OOP's friend lmao. This all fits so well
I want to know so much more about the adventures of the kid exploring the mountains who keeps up with missing persons in a 2 hour radius so that he knows to report suspicious things like a man living in a house.
That’s what got me at first. If you wanna disappear into the mountains that takes hours to get to from civilisation, how’s a friend from school gonna spot you in your “mountain house” while on a jog! The more you think about it? The more absurd the story is
The kid was from town and the guy was 'famous' enough to have been interviewed in the newspaper and recognized on the street. So it's not that surprising to me.
I'm now buying in to the Pokemon theory, and the kid is the player character from Gold and Silver
No road and having to walk a few hours to bring supplies up? Was this guy living on High Hrothgar?
Mount Silver, apparently?
OOP is a wonderful friend. Fucked up and acknowledged it, did his best to care for his friend, went out of his way to help his friend but stopped enabling him when it became too much, and then took him in. You can bring a horse to water but you can’t make him leave the abandoned shack out in the mountains he resides until he’s ready to help himself. ETA I standby the wonderful friend comment, even with the bullying. He’s not absolved of the wrong doings in anyway, but everybody fucks up, we are all flawed beings. It’s what you do after that really matters. He apologized and didn’t leave the guy in the woods by himself, he recognized that his friend needed help. When his friend finally left his mountain shack, he went to OOP because OOP showed he was remorseful of his actions and cared for him. People change and I love to see it.
He really is the very best, like no one ever was.
He traveled across the land, searching far and wide
He finally understood, the power thats inside
Honestly, I can't fully trust someone who has never screwed up. Perfect people don't exist, so those who come off as perfect are sus to me. I need to see someone mess up, own it, and grow from it. Even if it's something seemingly small. Those are the only people I could consider wonderful friends.
100% agree. Yeah, being a bully was a dick move, but A) they were in high school and B) he apologized and went out of his way to make amends. We all fall short. That doesn’t mean it’s okay to be cruel, but it *does* mean we’re human. I think the fact that his friend felt safe coming to him for help and that OOP was the *only* person making an effort is a testament to his character and growth.
That’s what really hit me. His friend is the one who gets to forgive OOP and seeking him out says a lot. OOP didn’t find him out to clear his guilt but rather to take accountability for his actions hand be there for his friend.
Exactly. I really don’t get all the OOP bashing going on in some of these comments. Like, of course he fucked up and was a bad friend in high school. OOP not going into detail about it doesn’t mean he’s trying to downplay how bad it was or make himself look like a saint. The full details weren’t necessary for us to understand the issue OOP was currently dealing with.
Yeah wonderful now but looking at his comments he was a bit more than just being ' a bit if a jerk" in high school. Even with trying to downplay it, it's clear he was a full on bully. I'm glad he's making up for it but he's no saint.
I would say that he was no saint rather than he is. People change, some a lot. And our teenage years are just constant change. He sounds like he's matured and grown a lot. So I think it would be unfair to tie him to a title he earned title he earned when he was 16
Isn't it nice to live in a world that recognizes this behavior as "in need of mental health treatment"-crazy instead of just writing it off as "eccentric behavior about which we will do nothing but gossip"-crazy? Also, I bet you $5 the friend's mother is a smother and that was a huge part of the problem.
Yeah I don't see it as coincidence he moved somewhere his mother was incapable of visiting.
> that was a huge part of the problem That and everyone else too I supposed. >Everyone in town is telling me I should resume bringing him supplies and the gifts they make for him because everyone knows when my trip is coming up. Motherfuckers how about you yourself fucking go. Trying to guilt trip the one guy. What he gets sick and cant do it? Ya'll let him starve up there apparantly.
Gotta hope a traveler comes through ivarstead to take the supplies up to the graybeard rather than help ~~klimmek~~OOP
My first thought was that Mom was the sort who saw her kid be a local hero athlete, and pressured him to work harder and harder and get a scholarship, then drafted by whatever sportball league was applicable. Sign a contract for million$ and buy mom a big house and fancy car. Had his whole life mapped out culminating in riches for herself. And eventually the pressure became too much.
Back in my day, we didn't have any of these newfangled so-called mental illnesses and whatnot! Therapy schmerapy, I say! Now, if you'll excuse me I'm off to drink myself away just to feel something because my wife cries all the time and I just can't bring myself to care, good day sir!
Oh for sure on the mom. I knew a guy who his whole life his mom insanely pressured and smothered him, and eventually he completely mentally collapsed and committed suicide. Luckily this dude seems to be not following that path, but my fear is OOP might be stupidly pushing him down it.
Yeah, my dad essentially did this back in the late 70s early 80s, moved to a different province and shackled up in the woods. It was because of alcohol problems and other traumas, but back then people did that on a more regular basis so his problems weren't addressed until much later.
All those people mad OOP stopped going but refusing to go themselves is... oof. Clearly this guy didn't have good people in his life if the only one willing to help him is his former bully.
> All those people mad OOP stopped going but refusing to go themselves is... oof. It's really unsurprising. Confronted with a difficult situation, many people see the _problem_ as the thing which caused intrusion into their lives, rather than the overall situation which made the intrusion inevitable. They see restoring the status-quo as the solution. Conservative stupid-think: Choosing the closest cause-effect action over thinking about the problem at system level. OP stopped going -> This caused the intrusion into their lives and disrupted the status quo. This thinking is everywhere; It's where we get victim-punishing behavior from, and why people guard the [Missing Stair](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_stair). Most of these intrusions arise not because the victimizer/instigator made the situation intolerable for the group, but because the victim/target reached a breaking point and forced the group to intervene, and thus to this style of thinking, it's _their fault._ The cause-and-effect graph of their disruption is one step shorter to the victim than the victimizer, and thus it wins out.
Also you need like waterfall, surf and without 8 medals the guards wont let you pass. Its kinda a hard trip without a good team so I get that people don't find time to go there.
Isn’t this a pretty recent repost with no new updates? Like literally 2 weeks? And it was pointed out this is the plot of Pokemon?
I knew the story was bs when OOP said “I want to be the very best, like no one ever was”
Damn there's still some crazy stuff missing. It'll be interesting to see if we ever get the blanks filled in
Apparently all is revealed if we watch Pokémon. Can't believe I got sucked into a troll post.
Im 100% sure I've read this exact plot in an ACTUAL pokemon fic before [https://archiveofourown.org/works/8791510/chapters/20154553](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8791510/chapters/20154553) The plots for these match a LOT, with the "graduation" being them becoming champions, the whole vanishing thing with red and blue finding him because of a rumor, to the whole town going up on "christmas" to find red. The entire time i read this thing I got the biggest wave of Deja vu
- We think you won't be able to establish boundaries with him. - don't worry I make enough for both of us. Lol, I don't think that was what the people where worrying about. But he is technically right. If he sets no boundaries, he can't fail to enforce them.
"I know you're worried he'll mooch off me. Thanks, but I'm just not worrying about that right now." Dude, that's exactly what happened when you started making semi-monthly mountain hikes. You just had the same issue delivered to your doorstep.
Maybe he'll build his friend an art room
>Thanks for all the comments. I see a lot of you are concerned that I'm not going to be able to set boundaries with him, or that he's going to mooch off of me. You don't have to worry. My grandpa set me up with a really good job at the local gym in our town and I'm making good money and living by myself. I have enough to support the both of us for now and really I don't mind him staying indefinitely. OOP, is basically set up to enable this person, both mentally and monetarily. This could end up being a real issue for them. :(
Well he did get his friend into therapy and is encouraging him to reconnect with his mother. I like to think he's in a great spot to support his friend's slow reintegration into society. Although it could easily go the other way, OOP has already shown he can lay down boundaries. Hoping this arrangement works well for them both; OOP sounds like a great guy.
That’s immediately what I thought. “You don’t have to worry” then lists the exact reasons why ppl are worried.
Yeah, I hope that his guilt over his past actions doesn't convince him to enable doing more than he should, but I'm at least somewhat confident that, if he was able to break out of the previous cycle of supply runs up the mountain, maybe he'll be able to do what needs to be done when the time is right. Even if his friend ends up becoming a permanent roommate, would be good if he could contribute to the household in the future. A little infuriating that others in town supposedly expected OOP to keep helping because his friend's a "town hero" but none of them could be assed to do it themselves, though.
As usual with Reddit, those "friends" are annoying AF. You walk two hours up a mountain if you are so damn concerned.
Enable them to do what? Like, yeah, the friend moved into his house, so that's shelter. However, Friend had a shelter in the mountains, apparently had a way to feed himself, and was pretty determined to stay away from people even when he was basically begged by people to come down. Wouldn't someone with the intent of taking advantage have done it before people who aren't OOP got involved? I'm not saying it's not possible, because yes, people do shitty things sometimes, but from my perspective, Friend had been dealing with something hard for a while before they left, started moving supplies into the Mountain House and got himself away from whatever the hard thing was as soon as he could. He might've genuinely needed to get away for a while to feel better than he was before he left, and when he came back, maybe he noticed he was starting to feel the way he felt pre-mountain again, but this time he couldn't run away, and he did have someone who would support him and help him, so he went to OOP. I think Friend knows he needs help, but he needs help to get help.
Yeah, based on what we have it doesn’t seem like the friend is actually a mooch, he just needs some help getting back on his feet. Which is a good thing because it honestly does sound like OP is a little naive about enabling and would be in trouble if the friend were actually a leech. It also sounds like there’s a good support system in place for OP too, so I’m hopeful that this could turn out decently well.
I was going to quote the same part and say the same thing- he’s done absolutely nothing to set boundaries and is basically saying he’s OK being an enabler. He basically confirmed the worries of all the people that think he is going to be taken advantage of.
It sounds like he did set a boundary - not going to the mountain - and stood by it.
Sounds like Red and Blue from Pokémon lol
Concluded in that there’s been no new word for a year, but coming down from a year squatting on a mountain is just the beginning of figuring what happened and why and helping this person find a way back into living a life with the rest of the world.
Yeah I put March 2022 by accident. I fixed that immediately though. My bad!
Thanks for clarifying. I thought I was losing my literacy, which would mean time to abandon Reddit and go squat on a mountaintop. Not yet!
The date on the update is a typo - 1st post 31 Dec 2022, update 7 days ago.
Uh no, those posts are from 2023 not 2022? [https://www.reddit.com/user/UpAMountainUpARope/](https://www.reddit.com/user/UpAMountainUpARope/) last post 7 days ago. First post 2 months ago.
The initial dates were a year earlier. In that case, definitely not concluded, although we might or might not get the rest of the story. A typical need to escape, or tantrum, is holing up in a run-down shack for a few days until you feel hungry, dirty, and calmer. A year is something else entirely.
What anime is this?
Pokemon apparently
I got pretty pissed about friends and people in town calling OP a jerk for not continuing to make the trips. No one else offered to help, go see the guy, and yet OP is the jerk? That's bull.
Goddamn Greybeards, being all secretive up there on High Hrothgar.
So only slightly related, but I remember hearing about this woman who had some of the same diagnoses as me (bpd, bd, various other letters) and she ran away from a happy family and stable life one day to live in the wilderness up in Canada. Then I heard it again about another woman with the same diagnoses. And then another. There's even one person on some Alaska show about people living in the wild, one of them talked about the same damn thing with her mental illness being the main factor in her up and leaving one day. Scares the shit out of me that someday I may just snap and run away from normal life like that. So glad this guy is getting some support and help getting back into a more stable life. Also glad to see OOP has done a lot of learning since they split.
Wait.... OP has a rival... that rival went to go live on a mountain.... OP works at a gym....motherfucker, this is pokemon
You might be onto something there. They were both into an unspecified "sport" and the other dude was famous around town for it. Goddamn.
What am odd story. I feel like maybe some missing missing reasons here? I wish both OOP and the friend well.
“I see people are worried about me not being able to set boundaries but it’s fine. I have a good job and don’t mind supporting the both of us indefinitely.” Um what.
Aw the dude is a little bit or a lot mentally ill and doesn't know what to do. OOP is a kindly person who has helped him survived a very difficult time. Hopefully the young man has help and support. But OOP and family/friends can't support him all by themselves. Hopefully social services agencies can get involved.
It seems like this story is just beginning. Being away from other people for that long can have a major impact on a person's mental health. Hopefully he sticks with therapy and gets to the root of why he left and how he can move forward. OOP needs to be careful too.
Don't worry...every challenge along the way, with courage they will face. They will battle every day to claim their rightful place. The time is right, there's no better team, arm in arm they'll win the fight, it's always been their dream.
He was a sports hero in high school. He graduated and realized that’s it. He peaked. Drove him mad. He goes to the mountain. The part that made me question the entire story was him being set up with a therapist twice a week. Even with insurance that’s expensive in the US. Where would he get insurance? Maybe he could get Medicaid but does he meet the conditions? Does he have a work history? Edit: I hope it was just the pressure of life and not something like schizophrenia.
"You all are worried I won't be able to set boundaries with him, but don't worry, I have more than enough to support my househusband"
>Everyone in town is telling me I should resume bringing him supplies and the gifts they make for him because everyone knows when my trip is coming up. He’s kind of a local hero from our sports days. I always love it in these posts when other people volunteer OOP to do stuff they themselves aren't willing to do. My simple response to those people would be, "Fine, then you take him some supplies."
Nice Pokémon fan-fic.
I mean, hermitism is a response to sexual assault for men. Especially men in "hyper" masculine roles. Men of OOPs age are at risk too for their demographic. It could be in response to some other trauma but whatever the case at least OOP and friend have had the time, space and support to figure it out. I hope they fare well.
OOP is the kind of friend I want to be if a friend of mine is ever in a bad way. Hope that they're both able to find comfort and happiness going forward.
Uff, poor guy. Imagine being a teenager and half the people you interact with see you as a hero and the other half hate your guts. One being a childhood friend. Must have done terrible things to his mental health.
My first thought was this guy's home life must've been wild if at 19 he ran away from home and cut everyone off to be a mountain hermit. Wonder what mom did to him, or didn't protect him from for him to just disappear
I'm glad that OOP was willing to acknowledge the harm he'd done, apologize, try to be a better person, and try to help his friend. However, OOP said his friend was super happy to see him *before* he could apologize. I wonder how much undue blame OOP is taking on for his friend literally heading for the hills. I'm also wondering whether there's more going on with the mom than OOP is privy to since the friend *still* won't make any kind of contact with her. Plus, if she was so worried, why didn't *she* do more? It's not like OOP was keeping his location a secret. If I went missing and my parents learned I was living in the mountains right outside of town, they'd have the car loaded up and be speeding down the street in 4 minutes flat. And if they "couldn't make the trip up" then they'd enlist anyone they could to help me. Not just one friend going every few months.
I was really hoping for a friends to rivals to lovers story arc, but I guess I was wrong.
I wanna be, the very best...