On Turning Pro

I pretty much turned pro for this winter, mind you no abbra kadabra and VOILA! a big P on my chest just, the ongoing grind of trying to get a consortium of parties to pay for my climbing. Mind you this is no one-way street, any entity who provides material or fiscal support is then beset with a steady stream of seasoned advise, varied exposure for their product and above all a bona fide character to assure overwhelming visibility. Whether or not said benefactors desire such visibility is beyond my comprehension, even as a veterinarian I strive to treat sick and injured animals, should they get well or not is up to them.

There is always only so much each of us can do with regards to any transaction, personal or professional. On one torrid summer afternoon I was making love to a young woman her suntanned body ripe in my rather broad hands. Despite vigorous love-making we both became trapped in that nether-world of coital distraction, for all the sweat-wetted skin, intriguing scents and outstanding topography neither of us would orgasm. Lapsed into a space-time continuum of carnal rapture I displayed ample athletic endurance but perhaps less sensuous prowess than the situation called for, so I settled upon a plan, in breathy terms suggesting she resume egress on her hands and knees.

Naked women have had a habit of obeying such directives, she promptly went “doggy” with not inconsiderable zeal wherein I dutifully assumed my reciprocal posture. In light of my most privileged a if not extraordinary view I now felt suitably inspired going straight to work, although who could not wish for such a posting. Before long despite restrictive latex I was snort-rearing like the most amorous of stallions, better to just let go I always say.

Upon consulting with my panting paramour she informed me she had in fact not climaxed, but I had done all I could for her just the, I fell asleep.

And so it goes everyone is responsible for their own orgasm although some people construct whole lives upon the ensuing disappointment. It takes no soothsayer to see that the one-way trolley-ride of life offers little by way of second chances, seize the day or in any event the afternoon. In the past there had been the refrain of next year or next season even next girlfriend then the world began to change as did I, next year might bring radically differing realities and that’s putting it mildly.

Snow is falling again here, last week's tropical depression a distant memory although the bouldering at Rotary was a welcome reprieve from the monotony of the gym. Life develops patterns, you see the pattern as the norm then the pattern shifts, what constituted monotony you now sorely miss. I am getting better at seeing all this coming, I slow the fight down somewhat, now see that left-hook coming, whether I get out of the way or not is another matter.

But I digress, is life about making love or climbing boots, ropes, ice-tools? Both I suppose, summer gives way to sultry autumn, then one day the clouds sink down, wind howls over the scoured bluff at home, snow falls. Winter here is a love it or leave it affair, you either embrace the flying snow or it maddens you, November through April is a long stretch to hand-wring over awaiting the arrival of a few sparse tulips. So I sortie forth at the first sign of trouble, meet the threat as it were, even an inkling of ice at Loch Vale is enough to get me packed up puffing up the hard trail, and those first few sticks in nascent autumn ice, heaven.

Now there is doom, gloom, a nation ruined by the false idolatry of Wal-Mart Fundamentalism, a populace reeling from the crystal methamphetamine of Jesus n' Guns and wanting to burn gay folks at the stake. Times are tight, my bipolar employer whom I thought I was getting on famously with announced abruptly in November there would be no more work, she would no longer afford me. Suddenly a sponsor-provided rope was no longer just a rope, not having to pay for a rope meant money freed up for Lacrosse tuition for my son, a varsity swim-suit for my daughter.

And then there IS the climbing. New gear is, well, inspirational! No point heading up today looking like a bag-man, but new boots and a new rope, now THAT'S booty worth toting eh lads? Any excuse for a day on the hill, any excuse will do...

Photo: Rob Fullerton.

My Life As An Ice Climber: Prologue

January 23, 2009
It is now mid-winter a still, gray day, so I train with the garage door open. After all there are snowflakes blowing around, here on the dusty Front range a few snowflakes can summon a mind-vestige of long-ago winters, deep snow under interminable slate skies. Now is that odd time following the Ouray Ice Festival, that post-solstice nouveau-pagan fete where winter aficionados and other sundry weirdoes converge in early January to climb ice, soak their white flesh in hot water and drink beer, a measureless volume of beer.

Festiglace du Quebec, a sister festival in Canada had until several years ago dutifully followed in February, pale French-speaking cousin of Ouray. This time of winter was auspiciously reserved for recovering from Ouray and preparing for Quebec, until the Taliban stepped inopportunely in and event organizer Eric Declerc dutifully went off to Afghanistan with some organization called the King’s Rifles, so now no more Jello shots in the basement of the Pont Rouge Community Center whilst bumping half-naked to the techno beat.

Those Islamic Fundamentalists, they ruin everything.

Winter now presents an open-ended rune, what to do with the next two months of cold, snow and ice? Climb, of course, but where, with whom? To what end? Rumors abound of another festival in Alaska, an event with ice, possibly a competition and most importantly, a disco.

I work the plastic holds bolted up on plywood panels in the three-sided garage, the fourth and eastern aspect open to the sky. The cold means I wear what I would normally wear on the hill, the weight and confines of clothing add to the rigor of movement. Mind you I have climbed nude, much as winter calls for frightening days dry-mouthed sweating out last night’s plonk into over-ripe synthetic clothing, a hot mid-summer day calls for climbing over sun-heated sandstone, “as God intended.”

For I figure if you wouldn’t look good climbing nude, why bother? Maybe viewing all those strapping marble Gods in the collection of the Pope’s in Roma has made me vain. I once spent two hours photographing the “Dying Gaul” in Rome, circling this masterpiece in adoration, watching the light change on marble polished to loving perfection by some long-dead sculptor two-thousand years earlier.

Am I a Dying Gaul, fading warrior of a lost cause? In the mountains to the west great swaths of Lodge-pole pine stand brown, dead upon the slopes. Beneath these tragic sentinels the ever-thinning snowpack struggles to feed a bony river. Drums beat loud the inexorable march of climate change, man’s bastard product of unholy liaison with petrochemical gluttony. One year there will be no ice, I know this to be true.

Photo: Rob Fullerton>