And then we got bored…

Self Deception

This guy could be describing any one of my projects…

““What is really required is enough lack of common sense to start a project like this and think that you can pull it off. If we had any conception about how much work we would initially put in to it, we never would have started…but we had enough vision …or something…to keep on going. And that’s really what is required for a lot of things like this … a lot of self deception.”

The Last 30 Days

Today I had lunch with a man who dreams of climbing Mount Everest.  I’m not sure how long he’s had this dream, but it surfaced most tangibly several months ago after someone posed the question, “What would you do if you had only 30 days to live?”  His answer was immediate – “Climb Mount Everest.”  As serendipity goes, the next day the man began a new job as, among other things, my wife’s boss.  On his first day he quickly recognized Cate’s name, and a short time later we had lunch, as we tried to figure out a way to make his dream come true.

My uncle was recently asked the same question, by his oncologist, who estimated he had something more in the neighborhood of six months.  My uncle is a doctor as well, and was startled that the cancer which has so suddenly grown beyond possible treatment was not in existence ten months earlier, when the same tests were performed and returned negative.  Surprised and frustrated, he returned home and has spent his precious remaining days researching the illness to determine if there could be a genetic marker that could help the rest of our family detect and avoid the disease. 

The casual observer could try to draw conclusions about each man – perhaps the man who dreams of Everest is overly selfish, while the man who dreams of saving his family is truly selfless.  But perhaps the two dreams tell us more about how each man has lived, rather than how he will die.  The first man gave up many of his own dreams for those of his family.  He and his wife raised three children, and devoted all the time that remained to their careers, while their family prospered.  The second man travelled the world, read through countless libraries, and generally experienced all that the world has to offer.  It really can’t be any surprise that at the end, every man seeks what he hasn’t already fully obtained. 

As my wife and I discussed the same question at dinner tonight, we both had the same desires for our last thirty days – to bring our family around us and play a few games. 

We agreed that this year we would continue to relentlessly pursue our dreams while seeking out all the world has to offer, but resolved not forget about the test of those last thirty days, and take a little more time this year to pull our family closer and enjoy.

Training time in Charlotte, NC with James.

A New Perspective

Today we travelled to northeast Iowa to visit a farmer friend of ours outside of Cedar Falls.  Don Briggs isn’t your typical farmer – he farms ice!  Since 2000, Don and his buddies have been icing down concrete silos around northeast Iowa and growing an entire ice community from the local soil. 

Aiguille de Silo, Directissma Route (F.A. Don Briggs 2000)

Don came up with the idea in 2000 after plowing a friend’s fields one cold winter morning.  After turning off the tractor, Don approached his pal and said, “what do you think if we hose down that silo and climb it?”  The owner of the land took one look at him, set down his tools, and said “I’ve got a hose right here – let’s try it!”  Three days later, the ice was as thick as The Schoolyard in Ouray, and an entire new sport was born.  That was eight years ago, and Don now hosts weekend climbers from California to Texas on his Iowa ice silos.

Don Briggs, the ice farmer

So as we set off on this first full week of 2009, I’m trying to catch Don’s perspective and look at things in a different light.  If Don can turn an old Iowa silo into a climbing revolution, there have to be a few creative tricks to reaching my goals in 2009.  Hopefully we’ll uncover them as we go…

The sun always sets too soon when ice climbing...even on Don Brigg's Ice Silo in northeast Iowa.

The Edge (and the Phantom Lord)

“At what point, I try to ask myself objectively, do statistically hazardous, entirely elective pastimes become unethical?  Put another way: to what degree, if at all, do we owe our self-preservation to those whom we profess to love, to our emotional and financial dependents?  At what point does a dangerous pastime, through its mere practice, constitute betrayal?  The question has another half: at what point, through abstinence from highly rewarding but hazardous activities on grounds of social responsibility, do we betray ourselves?  If so, and most important: how do we find a balance?” 

   – Andrew Todhunter, Fall of the Phantom Lord.

It’s a fascinating question to anyone who doesn’t climb, but obviously circular to anyone who does.  For most climbers, self-preservation is the reason to climb, not the reason not to.  It is that Edge – the physical climbing act and the risk that accompanies it – which makes everything else in life possible and pleasant.

On the other hand, perhaps the “Phantom Lord” Dan Osman did take it a little too far…