Reunited

I never went to my college graduation. I got out of Jersey as fast as I could back then, got out and went west to where my new life was waiting for me with all of the mountains and rock faces and sage brushes I could find. I skipped out of the east a full month before I was supposed to sit through a commencement ceremony, and told myself I was making a logical choice. But I’ve regretted it since. Each time I have thought about college I have this confusing pang of feelings that is impossible to decipher. So I went back, last week, for my tenth reunion to figure it out.

Turns out I made good choices ten years ago. As much as I wanted or thought I might have missed something back then, I’m either still missing it now, or figured out I didn’t need it. It was good to go back. To see friends, to see a space, to sit as myself in that space, and to realize that it was as much me as anything is me. Which means I didn’t really figure it out, or decided I did not need to.

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Consistent Humbling

I did my first lead climbs at the Gunks, in New York. Back then I was feisty, eager, and adamant that I could pull anything off. After my first lead tying off trees for pro, I decided I was ready for more, hopped on a climb, placed two pieces, and took one of the biggest whippers of my life. On a climb called Baby. The Gunks never really got to be more for during my time out east. It was where I constantly got schooled, while in school in New Jersey. My friend Andrew and I would roam the carriage road looking for a likely two-pitch 5.6 on which to spend the majority of our day. We would toggle the guidebook to our harness, appraise the route, and often times come down with elaborate rappels before even getting to the top.

Last weekend I was back at the Gunks for the first time in twelve years. It was just like I remembered it. It kicked my butt. I didn’t really expect anything different, and in fact I might have been disappointed if it had seemed easy. What then would I have thought of my younger self?

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Normal People

Identity crises are never pleasant, especially when they happen 200’ up a frozen chunk of ice. Ideally, this would be different. But that’s never my luck. Do normal people have the same? Here’s the situation: It seems I’m constantly asking if I like something, or if I want to like something. And that’s not totally true because I really don’t do that anywhere else in my life except in climbing. I would love to proclaim totally and utter continuous happiness and bliss while going vertical, but often times this is the opposite. And then there is all the time that surrounds climbing. It’s hard to rationalize the endeavor constantly but that is exactly what this sport/pastime/obsession mandates. Because you have to want it, and you will be tested again and again to see how badly.

I’m in New Hampshire ice climbing and surprising myself with how much I like it. This should not be surprising, but it staggers me as I smile into falling chunks of ice and wet snow and through a 50-minute belay in -20 windchill. I’m happy in this. And that happiness is like a balm soothing something I didn’t know was rough and scratchy inside me.

In an ideal world, if we were normal—if I were normal, I think I would just move forward. I would go, strive, do—and not always evaluate. But I’m one of those people who likes to wiggle a loose tooth because it hurts and feels good at the same time. So when I get those moments of balance, when I know that what I want to do, what I want to want to do, and what I am doing all line up, then—I stop. Note it.

New Hamshire Gone South

When I was fifteen I was obsessed with trying to figure out if I liked certain things, or if I liked to like those things. This is not en efficient way of thinking, but I always go back to the conundrum when I'm alone, in the dark, on windy roads. This time it's in New Hampshire. Or, really, Maine first and then New Hampshire. My directions don't make sense, it's pitch black, snowing, and I forgot a map. The last time I did this was in South Africa and though the travel took three times as long and I was driving on the other side of the road, this trip is now starting to feel the same.

Maybe all we need to encourage reflection is some time in the dark on windy roads. Maybe this is how we find ourselves in modern day. Invent an objective. Drive to it? Is it the same as earning it with human power? Can it be? My drive was not anything important. I contemplated if travel was worth it, why I do it, what it means to be alone with no one waiting for you on either end of a journey, and why I keep making sure I have exactly all of these things line up so often. What I know is that I arrived in North Conway pleased with myself.  As if finding a major city in New Hampshire was some sort of achievement. What if the beauty of over-thinking is that you get some personal success in the end? Then I suppose I, and all of my writing friends, are going to be OK.