Letters: With a Song Through Our Heart

I will never forget the epic struggle to survive while being tortured by my own musical tail-chasing, Ç la Ian Frazier's February feature, "I See a Little Silhouetto of a Man (Scaramouche, Scaramouche, Will You Do the Fandango?)." A few decades ago, in a botched sailing race, my father and I managed to end up five miles off Catalina Island in a 22-foot open boat with no mainsail, a genoa with its sheets wrapped beneath the keel, a broken motor, and a 40-knot southwester with 15-foot breaking seas. The incessant, maddening song in my head? "The End," by The Doors, droning endlessly through a hypothermic haze. You know, I really hate that song.

Frazier's article brought back memories of pernicious tune-planting that took place seven summers ago as I worked on a trail maintenance crew in Mount Rainier National Park. As we started up the Tolmie Peak Trail, just at the point where breathing took priority over conversation, my coworker Dennis smirkingly advised, "Whatever you do, don't start thinking about that song from Gilligan's Island." One word of caution: In the process of infecting another, you're almost certain to get the insipid little tune stuck in your own head as well.

Six days crossing the Superstition Mountains, and not one of them free from "Do You Know the Way to San Jose." Oh, the evil of it all.

Beau Ideals

Let me get this straight. Mark Allen, aka the World's Fittest Man, espouses a no-fuss workout routine that leaves plenty of hours available for couching ("We Won't Let Him Hurt You," February). And this is the same Allen who, on your cover, looks like he could run down a few 18-wheelers out on Interstate 70, all without breaking a sweat? Well, if one gets you the other, sign me up.

At last, a fitness program I can truly live up to. Thanks to Mark Allen for reinforcing the fact that you don't have to be a slave to the gym to stay in lifelong shape.

Course Correction

Thanks for Craig Vetter's vivid account of recent sailing disasters in the Southern Ocean ("Godforsaken," January). It is incredible to me, however, that anyone could describe such ferocious seas without making mention of the greatest sailing feat in this region: Sir Ernest Shackleton's open-boat journey in the winter of 1916. Shackleton and his men camped for five months on dwindling ice floes before setting out in three small lifeboats on a nightmarish eight-day journey to Elephant Island. Knowing that no rescue vessel would ever come their way, they embarked on an 800-mile voyage to South Georgia in a 22-foot open boat. The crew battled hundred-foot waves under skies so overcast that the navigator was able to take only four sightings to establish their position. Their successful landing after 16 storm-racked days is regarded as the second-most-remarkable open-boat journey in maritime history (the first being Captain Bligh's journey after the scuttling of the Bounty). Dubois, the hero of Vetter's story, had an immersion suit, distress beacon, life raft, and ultimately the gift of a costly rescue mission. Dubois's ordeal was real, to be sure, but some perspective is needed.

Nearer to Your Fellow Man

Aside from a few technical differences, the dreariness and dysfunction of the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station as described by Sara Corbett ("Yes, It Is a Lovely Morning. Now Why Don't You Just Go to Hell," February) seems eerily reminiscent of my hometown, New York. The decision to "detach yourself from the rest of the world and throw your lot in with a bunch of possibly crazy strangers" is all too familiar for New Yorkers. I must say that for the sake of Gotham, I'm glad some of the Dastardly Dianas of the world have headed south.

Regarding the psychological brinkmanship described by Corbett in her unsettling-but amusing-piece, I offer one additional thought. Take a look at the people in your office. Now imagine being stuck with them for eight months in close quarters, no respite, no sex, no cable. Honestly, would everyone make it out alive?

Prime Florida Ranch Land Available

I have a few questions regarding David Rakoff's "The 1998 Outside Prognosticator" (January). Did Vogue do a shoot on the island of Montserrat? Did Tiggy Raines actually buy truckloads of volcanic ash to have them shipped to New York, and did they go cross-country skiing while on Montserrat? I'm wondering, is this article a spoof?

The editors reply: Yup.

Clarification: Given the response of some readers to a point raised in February's "We Won't Let Him Hurt You" about the so-called 40-30-30 diet plan, it seems a bit of elaboration is needed. While Mark Allen believes that people should not unduly worry about following the program to the letter, he is a staunch supporter of the theory and indeed follows it himself.

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