Monthly Archives: January 2010
One Big Smile
I woke up two mornings ago, and for the first time in a very long while, I knew I had everything in my life I needed. The sensation of nearly total completeness is a new thing for me; a new level of happiness. I have a beautiful young woman in my life who’s perfect for me, and now I know we have equally intense feelings for one another. We’ve spent the last two days together climbing in the sunshine, and they’ve been as good as any two days I can remember.
I’m ticking off goals and aspirations at an alarming rate these days. I’m becoming an almost decent rock climber. My contact strength (aka finger strength) is surprising me. Yesterday I was pulling hard on horribly small and crimpy pockets, doing things that I would have never imagined my body being capable of doing. The confidence in my movements has made me more capable on the sharp end of the rope, which is a pretty big deal for someone as afraid of heights as I am.
And I’ve gotten to a point where I can help others become better climbers too. I dodged going into work, and C and I took a handful of friends out this past Sunday, teaching them the basics and walking them through the proper movements. I love teaching people how to climb, sharing my little passion with others. I’d like to do it for a living.
I with I knew how to explain it better. I feel like all my stars have aligned for the time being.
Found it
It’s funny how some things just seem to click into place all at once. Yesterday was one of those days. C and I were on the road early in the morning, doing some work stuff around Buda before driving out to Reimer’s Ranch to climb the day away. We hit the park around 11am, and it was already warm outside. 70s without a cloud in the sky. Absolutely perfect conditions. And we had the entire place to ourselves.
The climbing was so amazing. We floated up the rock at our own pace, warming up on Dead Cat’s, onsighting a new route at Dead Cat’s Annex, then wandering over to Prototype Wall. C wanted to jump on Prototype before we tired ourselves out for the day. She tied in and put up the first two bolts with some very impressive acrobatics. The next sequence of moves gets pretty tough, so with the sketchy part protected, I nervously took over the sharp end of the rope. And then the route went. I moved over the bouldery start with an easiness that surprised me, and worked through each sequence after that to the chains. 5.10d. My hardest route on lead yet.
Yesterday was the personal progression in my climbing I’d been working to see for quite a while. Somehow, for some reason, I think most it had to do with the person holding the rope. She puts a lot of confidence in me.
The day could have ended at 6pm and it would have been perfect, but things just kept getting better and better. After a quick trip to Whole Foods for a few ingredients and Black Butte Porters, we went back to my house and cooked up the spinach quiche of all quiches. Fighting the temptation to just dig into it on the spot, we drove over to John’s house to serve it alongside his fantastic tortilla soup and a few other friends. It was a perfect ending to a perfect day.
If you noticed how my last post ended here, you’d see this was exactly the feeling I was shooting for. I found it.
Drinks
Last night I found happiness inside the walls of a martini glass. I’m making an effort to expand my cocktail drinking/mixing knowledge. And to that end, with Austin being such a hotspot for trendy mixologists at cool spots right now, I’m going to try to sample a new fancy drink and establishment once a week. Last night after work, I ended up at Eastside Showroom, on E. 6th Street. Very cool place. Dimly lit, sweet decor, with a huge rack of bottles dominating the space over the bar. The two guys behind the bar were shaking, juicing, measuring, sampling, and serving passionately made drinks all night. Really fun to watch. I had their Medina Martini, which was simple and amazing. Lots of great flavors bouncing around the tongue at once.
I’m feeling a very, very strong pull to find a new job again. Unfortunately I’m also experiencing an equally strong feeling of not knowing what on earth I want to do. It’s such a strange contradiction. So right now, I’m just looking at everything I can, seeing if something special jumps out at me. I guess all I really want is meaningful employment, something I can be proud of at the end of the day.
I’ve been riding again. There’s a lovely new saddle on my road bike, and I really have nothing else getting in the way. It’s been good to feel the wind on my face again. This afternoon I squeezed in a solid three hours, and I hope I can get in another good ride early tomorrow morning with C. I mistimed my grocery shopping today though, and came home to an empty kitchen. A quick trip to HEB, and a huge plate full of breakfast taco goodness later, my balance was restored. I was feeling a lot of restlessness before, but riding calms my mind and body like nothing else.
And I’m still climbing, just not as much as I should be… C and I try to make it out together at least once a week, but work and travel schedules make it difficult. We were at Reimer’s Ranch this past Sunday, and had a fantastic time with some new friends of ours. With Rami and Ryan both too busy and/or incapacitated, my climbing partners have become a bit more dynamic, but I like it regardless.
Maybe it was the bike ride, or maybe it’s just me right now, but I’m feeling a little low. Almost like the things I want most are just out of my reach, and there’s not anything I can do to bring them towards me. I know that if I let go though, and found something else to chase after, I’d be leaving something almost perfect. It’s almost that’s killing me right now, because I feel like perfect is so, so close.
Chowder!
I cooked last night, on another one of my inspired food missions. For some reason, I was thinking about clam chowder, then I fell asleep and started to dream about clam chowder. I was left with one option: hungry and almost out of energy, I made the trek to Whole Foods, filled up the messenger bag, and pedaled myself back home. An hour later, the house smelled wonderful, and I was enjoying the product of my labor. With the leftovers going into my freezer soon, hopefully I’ll be enjoying it for a long time too…
I’ve had almost three days off in a row, not counting the late night inventory gig on Sunday night. The extra time to myself has been nice. I’ve decorated my room a little bit, re-organized the black hole that was growing in the corner of my closet, and spent a little bit of time with C yesterday.
The closet was probably my proudest accomplishment. I allow one box of clutter in my home, where things without a definitive place or purpose live; and that box has been living in the corner of my closet since I moved into my current house. Through laziness and carelessness, it was almost over-flowing. Something had to be done. The biggest offender was my camping equipment, so I re-located and reorganized all of that. Then I threw a lot of stuff out, cutting the box down to a manageable size. A simple act can create so much clarity for me – it’s like releasing a little pressure valve in my mind.
My new bike saddle shipped yesterday. Good news. A new saddle makes my bike ridable for more than two hours. Still waiting on new components to come into stock, but I’m in no hurry. Fancy components are just extra motivation to ride. I don’t need extra motivation – I’m really itching to get out and do long miles right now.
I go to court this afternoon, to meet with the city for that ticket I got almost two months ago. Hopefully it won’t take long… All I’m looking for is equal and proper treatment for bicycles in Austin under the eyes of the law, nothing combative. I’ll go to an actual trial if I need to, but hopefully I won’t need to waste anymore time on all of this.
Projects
I woke up this morning wanting to write, but now that I’m here, I can’t think of anything to say. Strange how it works out that way. The start of 2010 has been good to me, and I’m paging through a lot of neat projects right now. That being said, I feel like I’ve disconnected a bit from the hyper-social December month; the past month I’ve been reading a bit more, and spending most of my free time alone. The quiet has been nice. It can probably be attributed to the cold snap – the thought of riding in 20 degree weather is enough to keep me inside.
Project #1 excites me most: rebuilding my road bike. I have a new saddle on the way, and as soon as BTI gets a rear derailleur in stock, I’ll have new components on the way as well. Gore cables and Phil Wood bearings will keep it all buttery smooth. It’s a bit of an investment, but you can’t really put a price on physical fitness and mental sanity. I’m hoping it will all be finished by the end of the month.
Project #2: finally getting the tattoo I’ve been thinking about for the last two years. I’m still kind of conceptualizing the final design, so I won’t give anything away yet… But, thanks to a strong recommendation from a friend of mine, I do think I’ve found an artist. I’ll work on getting everything sorted out tomorrow, but I’m pretty excited about getting the ball rolling.
Project #3: new job. Yeah.
I’m working late this evening, helping out with our annual inventory count of everything in the store. Oddly enough, I’ve actually been enjoying my days at REI recently. I work with a great group of people, and with the holiday rush finally settling down, things have been pretty chill. That, and I finally have enough money in the bank to take advantage of our best perk. I won’t give away numbers, but project #1 is going for an insanely low price…
Ok, it’s cold outside, but the sun is shining. I’m going to play in it.
Welcoming 2010
My alarm started ringing at 7:00am this morning. It was cold enough outside of my down cocoon that I tried to ignore it and wait for it to turn off. But it just kept ringing. I managed to get an arm out, then another, and finally extinguished the source of the noise. C and I scrunched up close together, as close as our sleeping bags would allow at least, and drifted away for another hour of troubled sleep. Everything was cold – the kind of cold that entices you to put on more clothes, if only your clothes could be accessed without exposure to the air.
Go back 24 hours. Early on New Year’s Day we’re driving out to Reimer’s Ranch, after having avoided excessive NYE craziness. First car in the park! It was ridiculously cold. Pulling on limestone felt like pulling on icicles. Sharp and painful pins and needles shooting through your fingers and toes. We laughed and climbed through it, stalling a little while we waited for the sun to peek over the side of the cliff. We climbed on prototype, then hiked over to dead cats looking for sunshine. We met up with my new friends Jens and Hanne, from Denmark, climbed a little more, and shared a few more laughs.
Around 3:30pm we left Reimer’s, taking a scenic shortcut towards Lake Travis and Pace Bend Park. We wanted to find a site and get camp set up before dark. Overlooking Giles Cove, we found a perfect spot perched next to the cliff, right over the water. After a quick foray for firewood, and two matches later, our home for the evening was well established. We peeled and chopped potatoes, onions, a beautiful butternut squash, and prepped a beautiful orange bell pepper for roasting – all on the open fire. I liked showing C a few of the skills from my slightly less orthodox upbringing… We sat close to the fire, looking at the stars, and watching the moon peek over the horizon, climbing higher and higher into the sky.
It was getting colder outside, and soon we opted for warm sleeping bags instead of our dwindling fire. We laughed and talked about little things for a while, wishing we were in a smaller and warmer tent, then drifter into a cold and fitful sleep. Around 8:00am, when we had finally had enough, I emerged from relative warmth and shimmied into cold clothes. I grabbed my shoe – the toe sticking out from under the tent, and we laughed for a while when we saw it was covered in frost. The entire rain fly, inside and out, was covered with a nice layer of ice. We stepped outside into a frosty mess, the lake next to us looking like a scene from Scotland, with a thick fog blowing over it. It got down to 25 degrees; no wonder we were cold. Our plans for climbing that morning changed before we got out of the sleeping bags, but at least they became sensible when we stepped outside.
I’m realizing special things each day, and I realized a few during our short New Year’s trip, but the best thing I’ve come to terms with is how lucky I am to be in the company of such a fantastic person. All of my friends are great people, but few have ever gotten through to me like she does. 2010 is going to be a big year for me. I’m going to transform a small garden into a forest. I’m going to take this life and run with it. And the inspiration and support to do so isn’t just in me this time. Happy New Year everyone.
