Hi Frank,
your query of "what causes..." made me think about an interaction that I had just today. A close friend of mine has a son who lives at least two thousand miles away, and all he can think about is coming to Ca to hike Whitney. I exploded about a lot of places that are far more beautiful...blah blah blah. The wise father responded that I had the luxury of close proximity, thus, my opinion was sharply skewed by experience. The boy was only going to get to pick ONE place in time, and Whitney was HIS choice, so bee a sport and help him with his goal.
I had the luxury of close proximity & experience
You will notice that some of the harshest critics are those with accessablity & experience; such is the combination that can turn the nicest person into the harshest critic-cum-know-it-all. All too often experience forces us to retain the worst of possibilities and forget the encouraging optimistic words of delight.
I do not believe that in his heart of hearts Bob meant to rain on people's parades for a self-serving motivation, rather the memories of those times when unbridled determination rendered unfortunate outcomes still loom large -- especially for a former SAR team member(Bob) dispatched to clean up the results.
