“We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm and adventure. There is no end to the adventures we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open.” — Jawaharal Nehru
Climbing consistently teaches me more about who I am and how I fit in the world. No matter where I’m at mentally/physically/emotionally/spiritually, I can expect to experience more than I expected. This year’s (now annual) trip to Joshua Tree confirms as much.
I’ll admit, I was skeptical and cynical about Jtree’s magic. Last year’s trip was epic. Most attendees would agree there was a life-changing element in that gathering. It sent me into a days-long reentry funk, and taught me about friends and life and love and climbing. It still does.
This year I was excited to see friends, but I wasn’t feeling it. The magic, I mean. I could say it’s because I “haven’t been climbing as much” or because I “haven’t been on Twitter as much” but whatever the reason, I didn’t have great expectations.
But you don’t always get what you’re expecting, now do you?
People sometimes surprise me. First, there was David. The first night of campfire, I thought to my travel-weary self “I don’t have the patience for this guy. He’s loud and brash and this just isn’t going to go well.” What’s funny is that somewhere in there the thought crossed my mind that somehow he’d end up being one of my favorite new friends. And you know what? I wasn’t wrong. There’s something refreshing and endearing about friends like him.
And then Laurel. Over the weekend, Laurel intimidated me with her confidence. She has such a depth to her that I’m sad I only got four days to get to know. She’s funny and smart but doesn’t demand attention. I respect that so much. I can’t wait to climb with her more, to absorb some of her strength of passion and will.
Aleya and Patrick, you cracked me up. You brought so much purity of joy into my experience in Jtree this year. You’re both so gutsy and fun and creative and intelligent.
In the interest of not having this post be 3000 words long, I’m going to stop there, but know that I have special memories and a great affection for all of my Jtree counterparts.
I don’t sleep well when I’m cold. I love sleeping on the ground. It doesn’t bother me one bit, even with my out-of-whack spine and generally broad and bony shoulders. But if I’m cold, I don’t stand a chance. Thankfully, generous friends like Patrick and Adrienne and George exist who will lend you things like bag liners and wool blankets. With the addition of a couple hot water bottles, that’s a recipe for a good night’s sleep if I ever heard one. Even if my bedtime routine did take 40 minutes…but that’s another story for another day. Makes me wonder if I’ll ever survive my dreams of expeditioning.
Personal victories have little to do with grades or things that look good on paper. At least for me. You see, on the second climbing day, one of my friends decided to lead a slabby runout sport climb. Three bolts in, the headiness of exposure was too much. The timing was just right with my own lead head, and it didn’t take much convincing to get me onto the sharp end to finish the climb. We agreed I’d have two followers and that the second would trail a rope so we could rappel the long line instead of walk off. I hate walk offs…being unroped scares the ever living out of me. More on that later.
Anyways…my second arrived at the anchor trailing a rope as planned, which I used to belay up our third climber. This was Rick’s first pitch of outdoor climbing. Which meant that out of the three of us, I had the most experience in setting raps. No one else was going to be there to help me plan our descent. Neither of my climbers showed up with personal anchor systems, either, which meant I had to improvise with very little gear…more for my peace of mind than theirs. We were pretty safe up on the generous belay ledge.
Both Dave and Rick were awesome. They trusted me to make safe decisions and to get us all back down safely. Their confidence helped my own…it’s not that I didn’t know what to do, it’s that it was by far the most complex and bare-minimum-of-gear rappel I’d ever done. It took all my shivery nerves to get it done, but soon we were back on the dirt, pulling ropes.
I felt like a rockstar, and it had nothing to do with the grade of the climb. It was a routine rappel, but to me it was something meaningful. I did it. I was scared, but I did it.
Failure and fear are okay, even if it means going to pieces on a late-night boulder scramble. The final night in camp, I agreed to join the nightly headlamp-lit scramble up the rock formation near our campsite. Towards the top, I lost it. Something about the ropeless exposure set my mental alarms screaming and just short of the summit boulder I had to stop and sit, trying to pass off my sniffling as a result of the chilly wind instead of the panicky tears I was fighting. I managed to fend off a full-blown panic attack, but not without feeling defeated and incapable. I’m not proud of my fear…though I get better at accepting it.
My climbing life is still just beginning. Jtree reminds me of special places and people in it, though. This year I passed up toproping Touch and Go, explaining to Eileen in so many words that the significance of following one of my heroes up that climb last year makes it a pretty special one that I’m not ready to do again until I can lead it. Then there’s Heart and Sole, which aptly describes the climber I associate most strongly with the route. Rick taught me to multipitch and to trad climb, and his heart for climbing is something I always admire.
Spending time on Gunsmoke, this time with different company, was sweetly familiar. It reminded me that no matter the people, places like Jtree and trips like this one are kind of magical. I can move on through the hurts and weaknesses that occasionally punctuate my climbing life. I can have strong, new moments alongside the old, precious ones.
Joshua Tree wasn’t what I expected. Re-entry has been unpredictable. I miss my friends and I miss the simplicity of camp life. I sometimes wonder if I’ve learned in a way to protect my passions, to temper them so that I don’t have to ride out the inevitable lows that follow the highs I love about living an adventurous life. No matter what though, I still plan to seek adventure with my eyes wide open.
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
I wasn’t aware that you were feeling that way on the manure pile. I would have liked to have been more supportive. You deserve a ton of credit for getting up there in spite of your fears. :)
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Katie Reply:
November 18th, 2010 at 10:10 am
Thanks, David. I’m still not very good at accepting that fear, and kind of jealous of people who don’t have it.
You were great at coaching me as far as you did…plenty supportive and there’s nothing more I could or would have asked! Thank you.
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Speaking for myself, the fear is still there, but it’s become like a noise in one’s home. Unless I focus in on it, it’s just part of the background.
Fear is important, without fear and the feelings it causes (to whatever degree,) we are not fully prepared to embark on whatever journey we are undertaking. Without fear, I would never have cared to learn as much about climbing safety as I have.
The fear of getting in over my head, which is to this day very much alive in me, both prevents me from climbing at my limit and causes me to seek out instruction and knowledge on how to mitigate the risks involved.
I think after a certain amount of time, fear subsides into respect. I’m not afraid of heights anymore, but I definitely respect them. Maybe it’s like two sides of the same coin.
Rambling. Interesting discussion but I haven’t pondered it enough to be completely coherent.
-D
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Katie Reply:
November 18th, 2010 at 10:47 am
That makes me feel hopeful. I think I should never desire to conquer my fear. I do want it to be a tool, though, and not a barrier.
Mitigating risk is what we do. It’s what we do every time we rope up or place that crash pad. It’s saying if I fail, I’ve prepared the situation so I can accept the outcome.
I guess the problem is that without those protections that I trust, I sometimes don’t trust my self. My footing, my skills…something. What do you think?
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The things you don’t trust are the things you have the best chance at improving, which is a great thing. I can’t make a better ATC or rope, but I can increase my stamina, get better at balance, and find self-confidence.
Self doubt is a really tough thing. No amount of external encouragement can overcome it, and quite often can become annoying, adding to the negative environment one has already put themselves in. I find that ignoring that little voice, while difficult, can lead you to many small successes. Added up, it starts to shift the momentum in a positive direction.
What I love about climbing is that it forces me to empty myself to succeed. I’m a very “busy” person, vocally as well as in thought process. Climbing clears my mind. To use a nerdy analogy, it’s like when Luke is upside down with Yoda on his feet, balancing rocks. As long as he’s concentrating, he succeeds, but once that self-doubt creeps in, everything topples.
A book that might help you out with the mental stuff is The Rock Warrior’s Way by Arno Ilgner. http://warriorsway.com/
It’s a bit out there if you’re not into new-agey philosophy, but Arno believes what he preaches, and it really helps. His clinics are well worth it, he helped me get past the fear of falling, and his exercises aren’t the “climb 1500 5.3 routes with a 40 lb weigh belt” type. His exercises can help in your larger life as well.
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Katie Reply:
November 18th, 2010 at 11:11 am
It’s like slacklining then. When I think about falling, and I prepare my body to fall, I fall. Simple as that.
I understand the “busy”…and the quietness of climbing is one of the things that draws me to it as well. It’s one of the reasons I skydive, too…because I’m better at quieting my mind there and on the rock.
I think you’re totally right, and I appreciate how you can say what you do in a way that is challenging but not minimizing.
I have Ilgner’s book. I read a couple chapters some time ago, and between you and Tiffany, it might be time to pick it up again.
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Hey Katie B, thanks for the kind words, you are quite a fantastic person as well and hope to climb many more times with you. :-)
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Katie Reply:
November 18th, 2010 at 1:09 pm
Thanks, Patrick! I look so forward to our next adventures. :)
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Aww, thanks for all the nice stuff you said ;). We should definitely climb together again (jtree again next month? I already bought plane tickets..).
The cold thing can be dealt with, even/especially on an expedition. Just spend more money or carry more weight and you can have a warmer sleeping system :) (and on an expedition you’re going to be running a jetboil or white gas stove that’ll boil your hot water bottle in about 4 minutes, and you’ll be sitting in your tent vestibule and continuously melting snow while you enjoy your rehydrated meal and after dinner hot cocoa).
The mitigating risk thing works even when you’re scrambling unroped.
There’s that old three-points-of-contact thing — it doesn’t make sense for when the rope is your backup, but when you’re unroped the backup for your foothold is your other foothold/handholds. So the same thought process works works — eg. if you’re roped up you can ask yourself “What if I fall?”, and answer “I’ll weight the TR, no big deal” or maybe “5 foot lead fall into clean air, no big deal”. If you’re scrambling you can ask “What if my left foot slips?”, and answer “I’ll be standing on my good right foothold and maybe have to catch myself with my two good handholds to keep my balance”.
To take a higher level view — questioning yourself and thinking about what can go wrong is essential to climbing. A lot of us start out with our fear voice being too loud and getting in the way and we have to learn how to have a nice reasonable conversation with it instead of a shouting match.
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Aleya Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 12:59 pm
You got plane tickets?!? I want to go too! When will you be there?? (I’ll be in SF in Dec… so close, yet so far…)
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Katie Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 1:24 pm
when and where will you be in SF? if I’m at my parents’ house, you’ll be about 1.5 hrs from me. :)
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Laurel Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 2:02 pm
Dec 9 to 13, are you coming? You’re all invited!
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Aleya Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 5:45 pm
For serious we need to coordinate. I’ll be there the 11-19th. Busy the 12th, but the rest of the week it’s only day time. And I think I have monday off…
OMG KATIE!! I so quit right where you did on the manure pile. Same reasons. Patrick had to help me back down. Same with the “walk off” on The Swift. I HATE that. I hate fighting the fear too. Some day though, some day… I miss you guys SO much! Can’t wait till we meet again :-D
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Katie Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 1:26 pm
Aleya, do you know how much that makes me feel less crazy? Like, whoa. Because then I see you doing something (like trad leading a heady route) and I go “okay, you can get over this. you can get better and stronger, see?”
I miss you lots and lots.
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Laurel Reply:
November 21st, 2010 at 4:05 pm
More people didn’t go to the top of the manure pile than did, the name probably reflects how worth-it some people think it is :)
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