Thursday, June 12, 2008

Pulling Out Like I'm Catholic

There are two large grey plastic bins, a clear bin, a milk crate full of food, a haulbag, a backpack, my Chrome messenger bag, a sleeping bag, a pillow, a thermarest, and an assortment of pens, sunglasses, and maps stuffed into the back of my Saturn. On top of it all, I shoved my bike into the mix. I finished my last final this morning at 10:30. I broke down my tent, my home for 3 1/2 of my 4 years at college, and shoveled all my gear into my car. I pulled into berkeley around 1, scored a free lunch from Jupiter's, where my doppelganger bartends and am bound for Yosemite. Unfortunately, I'll only be in the park for six days and I'll probably be in Toulumne for most of that time. I'm bummed that I didn't send anything this spring season. No El Cap. No Half Dome. No nothing. I squandered my time. It was a lowsy season.
"At least you had a season," Mandi told me. She's right. I should be pysched I got to climb so much this spring. But who's satisified with what they've got? Certainly not me. Tommy Caldwell recently freed Magic Mushroom on El Cap and went back to try it in a day. He came up short. He tried again and managed to stick it in 20:02. Caldwell wasn't satisified with just freeing El Cap. That shit's old hat for him. He stepped it up. I'd like to be doing the same sort of thing. Maybe not on the Tommy Caldwell level. More on the lines of the crippled James Lucas level.
Jens and I are driving to Washington on the 18th or 19 of this month. Max and Ryan have a place and Jens recently moved from the couch to the backyard so there's free room in the house! I'm really excited to go live with these guys as they're some of the original monkeys. Hopefully, I'll be climbing a lot. I'm starting to get a little pudgy. I managed to shed a decent amount of weight this spring but the past week or so I haven't been climbing much. I haven't pulled on my climbing shoes in 4 days! That's the longest I've gone without climbing in maybe 2 years. Yikes!
Anyway, I'm done with school. I guess I graduated although I have to find out if I passed my classes. I didn't have much of a spring season but at least I sent school, which was a major life goal for me. Now that I have a college degree and a bunch more debt, I can focus on getting my life together. I'll start with climbing in Toulumne.

1 comment:

Mandi said...

do you get cell reception in tuolumne? maybe I'll come up there. what day are you leaving tuolumne?