Frustration

Bouldering is punctuated frustration.
Next time someone asks what bouldering is I'll say this: At times, there is a moment of strong, brief, indescribable joy, but more often than not bouldering means hours, days, even years of falling, failing and becoming annoyed and disheartened.

At Nine this past weekend, the only thing that was on my mind (and had been all winter) was a problem called Thorazine - V8, that I had come tantalizingly close on last winter, only to be shut down by freak snow that carpeted the top, and my dreams. I was unhappy, but I had all winter to think about my prize, and when spring came around I would no doubt tick this one off my list.

Spring is here, and an empty box still remains next to Thorazine. While trying moves on the boulder last Saturday I did feel stronger, and I did still think it could go, but I allowed the slightest bit of doubt to creep into my mind, and from that point on my goes got worse and worse. I tried the top-out, something I hadn't done before... and I fell... I couldn't do it... the nail in the coffin.

Spooky sent Thorazine, and I couldn't have been more happy for him, but it's human nature to get a little jealous. He had been just as close as me last winter, if not closer, and it was a really good send for him. Ultimately, I gave up, walked away, but I didn't leave empty handed because I realized something.

Out there, in the middle of the woods on a nearly perfect early spring day, with 2 of my best friends, I realized that the only thing better than succeeding and sending that monster that had haunted my dreams all winter, was being able to walk away without finishing it and still enjoying the rest of the day.

No, I didn't send Thorazine, or anything else of note for that matter, but I climbed some moderates at the cave wall, I got soaked hunting for rock where the guidebook stopped, and I left early, happy with whatever I had just done.

Bouldering is a huge mental test that everyone will fail. It directly reflects and can teach us so much about life. No matter what there will always be struggle and disappointment, and don't ever think you can be "the best". However, the only way to succeed and stay sane is to not take it so seriously. Whether it be climbing or any other sport. We're just a bunch of souped up monkeys playing with nature, and falling off the top-out of some rock with a name that 99% of the world has never heard of is certainly not the end of the world...

... unless you fall off the boulder onto a button that begins a nuclear war with Iran, in which case you shouldn't have been climbing above that button anyway. I mean, who puts a button like that in the woods, or even makes a button like that in the first place?
...but... I digress.

When I get a chance, I'll post a video of Adam on Thorazine and some stuff from Lincoln Woods, as well as whatever footage I get this weekend.

Less than two weeks till the south.

Congrats to Michael Penn for sending is long-long-term project China Beach - 5.14b

Stay happy.

-WB