Thank God I'm Back

Finally I’m back to normal, waking early, feeling great and motivated, ready to take on the day. Two days of tummy trouble certainly don’t do anything for anyone – not my climbing, not my coworkers, not my roommates, who had to listen to my barfing…it was ugly. Mainly everyone had to listen to my bellyaching about my bellyache, two things they weren’t used to. I like to think they’re not used to me complaining all the time, anyway.

I’ve been thinking of so many things over the last couple of days and have been without motivation to perform. It’s been a week since I’ve blogged – yikes! – two days since I’ve run, four days since I committed to make changes starting in small increments. My first change is to become a daily runner, starting with half hour runs every day for a week and increasing from there.

My new commitment: small, simple changes leading to a larger whole. One step at a time; building blocks to my success. Beginning with running a little every day; half an hour, hardly enough to break a sweat (I don’t even have to shower afterwards) for a week, until it feels easy.

Road trip itinerary: Leave Thursday morning, packed up and ready to go in the van with Esther and Buck. Head out to Smith, have a day of Gorge climbing (maybe in the morning?) try out my new TradMasters (said in game-show extravaganza voice) and set up camp at the Grasslands that night. Supposedly it’s to be a VW convention, of which I’m not really a part, more of a hanger’s on, but I feel privileged to be included by proxy and have the opportunity to get to know the Grasslands dirtbags, the real climbing bums all climbers aspire to be like. Three days and nights at the Park, then head back to Bend for the Widgi bash on April 1^st; time to say goodbye to all my COR buds, see many of my climbing partners come together once again for the annual bouldering ‘n beer bash before heading out, hungover and driveworthy, to Indian Creek, crack climbing Mecca. (Especially built for girls, I hear. The irony is this: many of the first ascentionists were men, with fat, man-hands, which equate to easy hand-crack ascents but harder off-hands, fingers and tip routes that scale down to women’s sizes so much better. Thus, Indian Creek is a female climber’s dream, and I cannot wait to kick ass and get my ass kicked, take photos, fall in love, and explore ancient rock art in between climbing days, even in between climbs.)

After that, Zion. Beautiful, wonderful, delicious, sensuous Zion, and I am ready for that change. It’s not that I don’t like, even love Bend, and all my great friends here but I feel too comfortable here, too young, and I’m not quite ready to settle down when there’s still so much exploring to do, so much dirtbagging and scratching at the bottom of the barrel before I can appreciate the amenities I take for granted here in Bend, like good coffee and beer, a solid (if dedade-older-than-me) climbing community, beautiful weather nine months out of the year, world-class climbing 45 minutes away, a community constantly in flux, an economy on the rise and open to new business ideas – the list goes on.

What’s not to like?

Bend is too nice, too cookie-cutter Pilsbury Playland and I’m not ready to conform! Obviously my life hasn’t had enough struggle yet; I need more layers of hard experience before I’m ready for easy living.

So, small changes. I’m off for a quick run, not even enough to break a sweat.