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| Pictured: The author at a climbing gym |
I want to talk about rock climbing and getting older and the
stories we tell ourselves and letting physics do its job. I’m hoping that first
sentence will make sense by the time we get to the end.
Back in a former life, when I was young and single, I spent
a fair amount of time rock climbing. I have fond memories of those times.
Camping in my Honda Element. The way the dust would billow in front of my shoes
on the hike to the walls. The sound of carabiners jangling on my harness as I
tied into the rope. The way different rocks had different textures and shapes
that felt like different personalities. The raw feeling of my fingertips after
a weekend of climbing. The adventure of it all.
In the intervening decades, I got married and had a few
kids. With limited free time, I had to be more selective with my hobbies, and
riding my bicycle won because I only need to roll out of my garage to start. My
rock climbing these days comes once every year or three on business trips. Rock
climbing gyms are a poor substitute for actual
rock in the wilderness, but climbing on plastic holds bolted to plywood walls
is significantly better than sitting in my hotel room watching YouTube videos
and feeling lonely.
If you’re not familiar with the sport of rock climbing,
there are a bunch of categories of climbing ranging from multipitch climbs up
thousand-foot walls to bouldering. The sub-sport of bouldering involves finding
boulders and climbing up them without a rope. It’s not a complicated concept. Bouldering
in a gym is ideal for the common solo business traveler for the simple
reason that you don’t need a partner to hold the other end of the rope because
you don’t use a rope at all.
Boulder problems in America are graded for difficulty on a V-scale.
A V0 is like a ladder while a V15 can only be climbed by a few elite climbers.
The “V” in the V-scale does not stand for “vertical.” It stands for “Verm” and
is named after a man called “the Verm” which is probably not his given name but
climbers are weird so maybe. Back when I was climbing regularly, I could climb
the occasionally V5 and the even more occasional V6. That put me in the category
of intermediate climber. Better than a beginner, but not good enough to develop
delusions of traveling around the country in a van and supporting myself by my climbing
prowess. That sounds like a weird thing to be concerned about, but any amateur climber
of sufficient skill is at risk of falling for the siren’s call of van life.
I give you this background into the world of bouldering
difficulty grades because I want you to have
some reference when I tell you that my current goal in any bouldering
session is to climb a V4. It’s not as good as I was, but it’s close. It allows
me to dust the chalk off my hands, smile wryly, and think, “I’ve still got it.”
The need to “still have it” becomes more important the longer the period of
time “still” is being used to describe.
I was bouldering on my most recent business trip, and I was feeling
heavy and weak. The tendons in my fingers whined as I tried to pull myself up
the wall. My fingertips, having grown soft from years of typing, complained at
the rough texture of the holds. My shoulders popped, my elbows creaked, and I
felt like some sort of rusted-out farm machine being forced out of a barn after
years of quiet deterioration. But I climbed anyway. I started with the V0s and
then worked my way up the grades until I fell off a V3.
“You’re old and weak, Tom,” I told myself. This did not make
me feel better.
I tried again and made it.
I saw a V4 that looked doable from the ground. Two moves in,
and I knew that I took the wrong approach. Bouldering is like a puzzle you
solve with your whole body, and the solution I was trying was the wrong one.
“There is no way you’re going to make this.”
I fell.
I sat on a bench and stared at the climb. I saw where I fell,
and I saw what I needed to do in order to complete the climb. As I sat, I felt
heavier and weaker. Like gravity was pulling me harder than it had a right to.
I shook off the feeling and tried again.
Halfway up, my foot slipped and I swung out from the wall, holding
on by fingertips and a toe.
“You’re never going to make it.”
I was annoyed at the voice, and I replied, “Not with that
attitude I’m not. Get it together, Tom.” I dropped off the wall to mentally
regroup.
I don’t know if other people talk to themselves in their
head like that, but I did in that moment. And the other me, the negative me,
shut up. I got back on the wall, and I finished the climb. I got my V4. I
proved to myself that I still had it. And, most importantly, I was able to
quiet the voice of unreasonable doubt.
I say “unreasonable” because sometimes the voice of doubt is
what keeps me safe. I cannot fly, and thinking so while jumping off a cliff
will not make it so. I cannot climb a V10, and no amount of positive self-talk
will get me there. I am too heavy and too weak to do the moves necessary.* In
other words, I am limited by physics. And that’s okay. We’re all limited by
physics. But I can climb a V4 if I don’t let my inner dialogue artificially
limit my abilities.
I hope your inner voice doesn’t stop you from still having
it, whatever that means for you.
*As a forty-something-year old husband and father of two
with a full-time job, I have zero desire to devote the time and training
necessary to get good enough to do a V10. It’s a lifestyle commitment. To be
frank, I’d rather spend that time with my wife and kids. They are a delight to
be around.
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