Why I Want to Be a 'Punk

This post started as a reply to a comment in the last post, and had the added benefit of helping me earn my self-anointed crown of The Procrastinatrix. But it kept growing and growing, so I decided to make a whole other post about it, since it's stuff I've been thinking about for a while and have been trying to tease apart its threads since I got here.

The comment that started it all stated that Boulder and Denver were totally saturated with LAc's and trying to start a practice in either place was only for the punishment gluttons. I think Denver is still pretty wide open if you know where to go and you have a decent referral network in place. This is especially so with CA style practices, if you are willing to set up shop in some the the scrubbier places like the southwest or northeast.

Likewise with Boulder, only there you need an EXCELLENT and large referral network, otherwise, it's beyond annoying. Also, they have two community clinics now that apparently Mary and Sammhita are running separate shops or at least two locations of the same shop. Jen sent me an article last week titled "10 Things About Colorado You Thought Were Cool Until You Got Here", and Boulder is one of them. It's not even the yuppiness and priceyness I don't like. There's this very self-conscious and self-congratulatory awareness and identity of being awesome by virtue of living in Boulder and driving a Subaru and shopping at Whole Foods and doing yoga and having an outdoor lifestyle, whatever that means. Blearrgh.

Earnestness, or performed earnestness that calls attention to its authentic earnestness is obnoxiousness of the first order, I think. And I resemble this description a bit, I admit: I couldn't stand Whole Foods even before their libertarian asshat of a CEO opened his literary piehole in the WSJ and if I could find a yoga teacher who would just teach us the movements without narrating to me what kind of enlightenment I should be getting or how awesomely balanced my chakras were supposed to be becoming I might actually go more than once every two years. But maybe not--running free outside and alone holds a hell of a lot more appeal for me. But, I do drive a Saabaru which I freely chose because I liked it and I play outside a great deal. I guess the difference for me is that what I do isn't my "lifestyle", emphasis on style. It is, quite simply, my life. It's my culture and my orientation and my values and my redemption and my community and the only thing I've found ever that consistently puts me back into phase with myself so I can deal with the rest of the world. There's nothing decorative or "styled" about it. I really can't emphasize that enough.

Which is why I have no interest in people who (earnestly or not) feel the need to "work on themselves" like they'd work on restoring a classic car or model train set. Back a couple of years ago when some Cristo-type artist "stuck" the city of Portland with giant acupuncture needles after mapping out "meridians", and it was all controversial and shit, Skip put up a post about it. I do recommend clicking through and scrolling down the comments, particularly to Lisafer's discussion of what she calls "Hipster Chinoiserie", or the interest in Chinese medicine that is really just interest in it as decoration for something. Go ahead, I'll wait.


Done? Ok then. I'm as irritated by it as she is, and largely for the same reasons. I'm not a goddamn lifestyle and my work sure as fuck isn't about being someone's hobby of spiritual enlightenment. Without realizing it when I began writing, I think I've fleshed out that long-ago promised post on why I can't stand luxury spas and other trappings that deliberately convey exclusionary status by virtue of their cost, rarity and general ostentatious displays of excess. Because at the end of the day it's all a big, elaborate conceit. Because by the time you've gotten to that level, all the other things that go into a zen spa acupuncture treatment are worlds away from the acupuncture and completely about something else. Which is not to say there is no value in such things, and that if places and treatments (giving or receiving) like that really make your heart go pitter-pat, well that's valid.

Just please don't tell me that's all there is to what I do, or all there should be to what I do. If that were true, I wouldn't be an acupuncturist any more. All this time I've been laboring under the delusion propagated by the Marilyn Allen types of our establishment that value is connected to cost, and high cost equals high value, and that if people see that I live a high-cost "lifestyle" (see?!) then they will accord me more respect and value more greatly my work, which will be proven by the amount they are willing to pay for it and I will be a rich (which defines successful) acupuncturist who brings honor and prestige to the profession. I have also been laboring under the delusion that my unwillingness to participate this way means my self-esteem is for crap and I need to "work" on that so I can be a rich successful acupuncturist who brings honor and wealth and prestige to myself and my profession.

Don't get me wrong--I'm all for prestige and respect for my work and my fellow LAc's. We are some pretty amazing people and we do beautiful work in the world, no matter what the setting or patient base. The thing is for me, that prestige and respect and success and value, to me, have nothing to do with how much money I make or charge. Which is not to say I intend to take a vow of poverty, or that I think money is evil and loathsome and too dirty for my noble spirit to brook any truck with. It's just that it's only money. It's functional for me, and enables me to do what I want to do. And except for a few choice pieces of gear and technical clothing, what I want is pretty simple. Also, so. I value community, connection, family, friends, love, simplicity, integrity and kitty cats a lot more. I can't pretend for the life of me I don't.

So yeah, personal growth takes consciousness and discipline and reflection, but it also takes integration and the willingness to live it as you're doing the work. And if you have to advertise what you're doing so people will give you the cookies you think you deserve for being such a speshul widdle snowflake, then enlightenment: ur doin it wrong. Avoid nothing, face everything. As you live it. It really doesn't get more simple than that. And you by no means have to execute it perfectly--fucking up royally is part of the process. Art and activism are inseparable from life. I also have a lot of contempt for dogma, stereotype and cliché.

That being said, that's no reason for Absolute. seriousness. at all. times. Back in my halcyon Women's Studies days, my favorite inspirational quote was a saying attributed to Emma Goldman: "If I can't dance it's not my revolution." My medicine and my work and my approach to both are joyous, fluent, flexible, often unruly, possibly irreverent, probably humorous and generally sacred by being not at all sacred. Hmm. Sacred is another word with I have trouble with, but that's still another post. For now, my work is me and my work is of the world. It is humble and borne of love. It is my offering to the multiverse. No fanfare, no fuss.

Mental Aether Update 2

I almost don't know what to say, so much has happened since the last post. And I'm actually sleepy at a somewhat reasonable hour, which is a minor miracle. So I'll just sum up for now.

Loveland is out. Also, the practice purchase in Longmont is a no go. True, it has its problems, but I could have dealt with that if I knew I were totally in love with being her and committed to staying indefinitely. Or at least for the next 5 years. Which I'm not. Necessarily.

Practice is slow, for a number of reasons. The economy blows goats. No one here knows me. People who have heard of me are freaked out about losing their jobs, and even if they are not, $75 per tx is a tough sell when your patient base is what/where it is. Every time it seems to pick up it slows back down again.

I feel exactly like I felt on the JMT last year. Sitting on a rock at the base of Donahue Pass, miserable and hating myself for wanting to quit and knowing I was going to, even thought it was what I wanted and I knew it would make me happier. I really just want company.

So for some reason I picked up Lisa's book about Acupuncture is Like Noodles, and was instantly made happy and inspired again. A lot of it resonates with me, and themes I've been rassling with lately. Namely, privilege. Throughout my acupuncture education, there was absolutely no examination of privilege or intersectionality. There was no attempt to locate any of what we were learning in any kind of historical or cultural location that MIGHT just not be universal. There was not much attempt of any kind to be critical of anything at all. And it really gave me buttrash sometimes, especially when concepts like yin and yang got conflated with gender performance and what a woman or man was SUPPOSED to be or supposed to act like. It really made me want to yell at things.

The stuff about class was just as awesome as the stuff about gender and sexuality (and I'm reminded of Dorothy Parker's line about how heterosexuality isn't normal, just common). To wit, that if we really valued ourselves and our work we would charge expensive prices for it and if people couldn't pay then it meant they just didn't value their health or they weren't ready to get better. Because everyone can tell stories about poor black single mothers with elaborately braided hair and painted nails who buy groceries with food stamps. It boils down to the whole "Why you haz cell phone?" argument. But of course not all working class people are like that. Most of them aren't. And whether they are or are not, is not the point. As Lisa cogently notes, a person earning $25k a year pays about 7% of their monthly income for a $100 treatment. For a person earning $150k, $600 represents about 7% of their take home pay. No one morally scolds the professional earning $150k for balking at paying $600 for acupuncture, even though doing so would likely not jeopardize that person's ability to keep their utilities on.

I've been in tight spots too, and I have to say--that's just not accurate about people not valuing their health. It sounds a lot like blaming victims to me, like the concurrent obsession with mendacious fuckwittery like The Secret wherein if anything bad happens to you its your own damn fault for not thinking more positively. Ugh. These are people supposedly in the vocation of helping people with compassion. To me the class bigotry is unmistakable. Privileged people never tire of hearing the ways in which their own privilege is justified and makes the world as they experience it a just so story.

So I'm going back to my original passion of having a community style practice. It squares with just about everything I want to do, with all that drives me and gets me up in the morning. The only question is... where? Stay tuned.

14er Day!

See how windy it was?

Well, it happened. I spent a perfectly good Sunday clambering up and down Longs Peak, the highest 14er in the Front Range. It's a rite of passage, really, if you are a Coloradan. I mean, we have a few 14ers in California, but people don't keep little passports and check each peak off as they bag it. Perhaps because most Cali 14ers are somewhat technical, or at least a huge pain in the ass to access, even if you want to spend a weekend doing it.

So, I figured it was about time. I've heard about the legendary shitty weather. I was supposed to climb the Kieners route in June with my BMS class, but my need to spend a week on the San Juan (I'm so NOT sorry) negated that. This seems like the best time of year to go for a "hike" route, even though our weather has been unpredictable even by Colorado standards, which is saying something.

Jamie and I had tried to do Audobon the day before, but weather. It was cold,rainy and generally shitty from waking up in the morning, and it didn't get better until we were mostly back to the car, lolsob. As a few drops fell, and thunder rumbled languidly in the distance, we looked at each other, not wanting to turn back but... we said, we'll turn back if the graupel comes. Sure enough, right before we popped out above treeline the graupel hit--fortunately for us we had timed it perfectly and the hill plus trees provided the perfect lee if we hunkered down low. It passed, and we decided to go up to the top of the ridge and see what it looked like. It looked better, but then there was a huge, ugly black cloud moving fast from behind the summit, straight at us. The cold wind picked up and nearly knocked up sideways. It was painful, but we bagged it and started down. By the time we got to the car, it looked better at the peak, but... it's close, we'll do it another day.

So for Longs, I crashed at Bob's and we got up at 4, were out of the house before 4:30, and were walking by 5:05. The parking lot was FULL, so we found parking on the side of the road, which was also pretty full. And it was COLD--about 45º, less than I would have thought, even if it is 9400 feet. And it was windy--cold windy. Bob's headlamp died a sputtery death before we even got to the trailhead, so it was all on our little LED flashlight (I forgot mine too, duh). A harbinger of things to come? Sort of.

We stopped after about an hour when Bob announced he had to dig a cathole. He said something about, "You can go on if you want..." trailing off into the trees. But it wasn't settled, so I sat down to wait. And wait. And wait. I tried to take a 5 minute catnap, thinking surely he wouldn't miss me coming back to the trail. Weeeeell.
After 20 minutes or so I decided to go tell him I was going to start moving, because I was starting to shiver. But I couldn't find him. I shouted out, but nothing. So, do I assume he moved on, or? I picked up the trail and started walking, and asked the first party of people coming the other way if they'd seen a man meeting Bob's description. Sort of--they were positive they did, but then they also asked if he was wearing glasses and a turtleneck and trekking poles (he was wearing a short-sleeved crew, no glasses and no poles). Hmm. I made a note of the burnt snag at the side of the trail, checked my watch, and kept walking, in case I needed to find the spot again. After a few more minutes who should come hurrying down the trail, confused because he knew I wasn't as slow as some of the people out there but no way I could be that fast either. We resolved to wait for affirmation of communication from now on.

We peeled off onto the Jim Grove trail, and soon enough joined back up to the masses and found ourselves at the Boulder Field. We found ourselves some boulders to hide between and snack on last night's leftover pizza. This was where the fun part would start.

Boulder-hopping onto the north face, no big deal, just easily winded from out of shape and 13k feet. Then, the route crossed a snow field. The snow was rock hard and crusty. We had no axes or crampons. We opted to scramble up the exposed rock spine at the edge of the snow, and discovered that there was a net of ice, or verglas, strewn over lots of the rocks, which made placing hands and feet limited. We started up a crack that looked a little dicey but doable, until Bob, who was above me, said, "Let's not go this way." We downclimbed, traversed back across the snow and onto the proper crack.

But, we had no pro--and our only ropes were a cordelette and a 15ft length of 11mm rope someone had fashioned into rap sling which Bob retrieved on our way up, thinking it might come in handy. Ahem.

The crack route got icy, and there weren't super bomber handholds everywhere for starters. The cable has long since been taken down, although the fatty eyebolts are still there and frequently used as rap anchors. Thus, making sure your hands and feet weren't going to slip or otherwise make you lose your balance was super, SUPER important--because if you did, you were probably going for a tumble off the north corner of The Diamond, a huge, sheer cliff on the east face. It would be a recovery effort more than a rescue, likely. But we didn't let our brains go there until after we sat, shaky, at the top of that section saying, "Let's never do that again."

Fortunately, Bob is a better and taller climber than I, so he led us up. We fashioned a ridiculous belay for me with a loop of the rope around my wrist and him holding onto the other end and the rock with a death grip. Also fortunately, I'm good enough that I only needed the rope as a kind of aider for my left hand on the last pitch, where he could hitch it securely around one of those eyebolts.

All that was left was more scrambling to the top, where we popped out onto a huge, windy and cold football field at 14,265 ft, or something like that. Even tucked in behind a rock it was still cold. Bob grabbed his super sexy red GoLite down jacked for me, but packed only a thick fleece for his insulating layer. I admit, and so does he, the wind was unexpectedly cold that day. We finished the rest of our pizza, and headed back down the Keyhole route like everyone else that day--we had Cables all to ourselves. Still, it wasn't nearly as crowded as I thought it might be.

The route down was just long--seemed way longer than the way up, but then I guess it usually does.

Jamie and I are doing Elbert on Labor Day weekend. According to my sources, there is considerably less of a pucker factor on that one. Stay tuned!

More Women We Love

Finally, someone publicly debunks Uncle Pat's racism for the crustified, unreconstructed wankery that it is.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

How I Love Sarah Haskins

The next person to offer up patriarchal, crustified wankery dating advice like this bolus of writer's crap that appeared in my inbox yesterday is totally getting this link.



I do recommend clicking through to the Intent articles comments thought. The mind reels.

CU's PA Program is Officially Awesome

So I meant to put up a post when I got home on Friday and then things got away from me. I've officially begun the search for a good PA program and to organize the effort to get in! I've thought about it a lot over the past year or so, I've shadowed a couple of PA's (ones in family practice and one who does ortho surgery), I've talked to docs who've been in the profession long enough to sense which way the sands are shifting, and I'm pretty well there. I know from the message boards that PA's exist who hate their jobs because they would rather be docs, but those who thoughtfully weighed their decision between the two, evaluated the differences and came out on the side of PA are really, really happy.

On the MD side is my ego and the fear that maybe I am able to only work for myself. On the PA side is getting to do the part of the job I love the most (diagnose and treat) while not having to mess with the responsibility of a practice, of getting to work with a doc so there is someone to bounce difficult cases off of, 4-5 years of training as opposed to twice that, the ability to pick up and change specialties as easily as changing jobs instead of having to complete a whole new residency if I end up not liking what I'm doing, etc. etc. In short, it looks like it will fit into the life I want, instead of requiring me to dedicate and conform my life to it. Sure, there are specialties you can choose if you prefer to "dabble" in medicine: radiology or maybe physiatry, ER can be pretty flex too. But still. The more I learn the more excited I get, and I don't think I've felt this excited since I realized I needed to go to acupuncture school. Being a PA will, of course, mean that I will not only still be able to be an acupunk I will be able to get to people who would otherwise not think to try it in a million years. It will satisfy my need to integrate the two worlds. I can work with overseas and underserved populations that as an LAc are years away. And so on and so on.

So I visited my first program on Friday. Holy shit! The medical campus makes up for being in the middle of east Jesus nowhere by being all sparkly clean and new, and by having all kinds of cool stuff like a standardized patient program and high tech mannequins for practicing procedures and treatment scenarios. In the gross anatomy classes you only share your cadaver with 3 other students and you don't rotate--you get to do a full dissection. They have overseas rotations including India, Ghana, and a Spanish immersion in Costa Rica. You can put together your own rotations if there's someplace you'd like to work and they are open to it. You have the advantages of going to a school that also has a medical school, dental school, nursing, PT, etc. schools and all the professional resources that those provide. They work integratively with some of the other schools so you begin to get a sense of what it really means to work as a team.

Predictably, it is competitive. 600 applicants compete for about 100 interviews and about 40 of those get spots. I have my work cut out for me as I plan my prereq courses and start prepping to retake the GRE (sadly my awesome previous score is so 1998) early next year. It will be at least 2 years out, but I'm so excited sometimes it's hard to sleep at night. I am still a dork.

A very, excited and purpose-driven dork.

Why Health Shouldn't Equal Moral Rectitude

Amanda has a great post up over at Pandagon on the concern trolling of OMG Regina Benjamin is too fat to be surgeon general!!11! and the larger issue of moralizing health. If you guessed that all the fuss really isn't about Benjamin's weight or health status at all (last time anyone checked, there were no such requirements in order to be able to kick ass at the job), congratulations--you win a pony!

For instance:

It’s enough to know that most people strongly associate health and weight. So when disingenuous sexists start to bellyache about the dangers of letting fat women out in public, they get traction, because it’s becoming increasingly acceptable to suggest that not being perfectly healthy is a moral failing that should be punished with social disapproval, shaming, ostracism, and lowered access to society. Of course, we double down on fat people, and triple down on fat women, because of plain old prejudice, but this isn’t happening in a vacuum. Smokers, people who don’t eat right, and other people with poor health habits are also considered morally inadequate, if harder to judge because they’re harder to spot.

What is troubling about this is how it shapes policy: healthcare coverage is only for the deservedly healthy--if you have a poor outcome it's probably due to your irresponsibility and therefore you don't deserve help.

There is also an important discussion on the tactics of shaming in order to eliminate or modify people's behaviors:

People who see sex as a fraught, moral issue aren’t often in a good place to make healthy changes to their sexual habits. People who don’t view the status of your genitals as a judgment on your moral character are often in a lot better position to take care of themselves. For instance, if you get an STD and you think this means that you’re being punished for sin, you’re much more likely to be in denial, not get treatment, and pass it on. If you think it’s got no more moral implications than getting a cold, then you’re much more likely to get treatment.

I guess we need to make a choice, and sooner than later: do we really, truly care about helping people and having a healthier society full stop or do we care more about the smug, self-satisfied superiority we get from being moral scolds who other and punish?

On Food, Economics, Community and Development

This is EXACTLY what I was on about in my last I Write Letters post.

Having access to healthy food and an active lifestyle is, simply put, a matter of privilege. I grew up around towns like these and we'd see it all the time, although the industry was less agriculture and more logging/millwork since we were closer to the foothills.

Which is not to say there is nothing people in such circumstances or communities can't do about it--there are plenty of examples, from community gardens and CSA's out of vacant lots and school grounds to the group in the story that met with their city government to fix up their park so they could safely start a walking club. It's just to say that some people have to work a little bit harder, and it's not just about simply making "different" choices. As the story shows, plenty of people in the central valley would love to make different choices, but there are barriers preventing them from freely doing so.

The audio can be downloaded at the link above.

One More Future Post Note

I really, really need to explore why spas make my skin crawl. I just know there's lots to unpack in that knapsack, don't you?

I Write Letters

Dear Pitchers of Self-Righteous, Sanctimonious Victim-Blaming Health Woo:

You make me crazy with your assertions that people's poor health is totally, 100% their own fault for choosing to live "toxic" (conveniently ambiguously undefined!) lives how if we'd all just detox we could live in wellbeing and harmony and all fart rainbows. You piss me off for the same reason all the people still yammering about things like The Secret and the so-called Law of Attraction piss me off: that you are 100% responsible for everything that happens to you and that you are in 100% control, and if you don't have what you want or bad shit comes your way it's your own damn fault so just change it already and quit yer bitching and victim talk and take control problem solved thanks that will be 3 low, low, LOW payments of $29.95.

I want to say a lot more about this later, as it really deserves its own(additional) post, but for now, I want to get down that I understand the inclination to want to control your world. I do. I want it just as much as anyone else. But your assertions are patently ridiculous. And it reeks, reeks, REEKS of economic and class privilege to aver that this is categorically, uncritically so. It's like telling the poor to go and eat cake if they can't find bread to eat. Seriously.

So, for the article I read this morning (one in a series which I also hope to get to eventually--I've reached my critical bullshit breaking point) opining that health is up to the individual, I agree and disagree. Partly on the basis of the author's shaky at best "grasp" of the science of diseases like cancer, straight up. But also, even presupposing the author's premise that health is a choice and unhealthy people get cancer because they choose to live such a filthy, toxic lifestyle, I say your privilege is showing again.

I am a privileged person. I grew up in a white, middleclass, educated family, with two grandmothers who were so old school they were hippies before hippies existed. We ate almost exclusively homegrown fruits and vegetables, whole grains, weren't allowed sugar or soda or even juice on a regular basis (except, everything else as preservative and additive free as possible. We never ate out and never ate fast food. Not allowed to watch TV and "forced" to go outside and play in our vast yard or safe suburban neighborhood or even more vast (and safe for kids to roam free) open space behind our house. My mother even made much of my baby food herself with our Foley mill. I grew up in a small, rural town with most of its nature intact and unpolluted/uncontaminated by industry. Etc, etc.

I am lucky to come from GENERATIONS of such people on both sides of my family. Read: we have no family history of diabetes, cancer, heart disease, stroke, etc. Nearly everyone lives to be at least 90. Yet, my own mother, who was also subject to this healthy genetic pedigree and was raised in the same privilege and was so conscious of health that she made my own baby food, was herself diagnosed at the age of 34 with cancerous tumors in her heart (yeah, wrap your head around that one, it's extremely rare even in the medical literature) that aggressively metastasized, well, everywhere and was dead about 3 months later. And children cancer--are you seriously going to tell me their parents brought that shit on by insisting on living a life of shitty food and environmental toxins? Or crappy, negative thoughts? Really?

I now am lucky enough to live in a sweet little neighborhood in south central Denver in a well-cared for house amongst many well-cared for houses, far enough from the freeway or messes of high tension wires that I need to worry about such things. We have an excellent water supply. On Sundays in summer I can walk to the Old South Pearl farmer's market, and when I can't I can afford to shop (if I'm picky) at either Whole Foods or Vitamin cottage which I can either walk or ride to. As I shop in such places, surrounded by organic whole foods many of which are local and most of which are sustainably produced, I notice that pretty much everyone shopping there is like me. They always are. I live this way because I care, because I am conscious that it DOES matter what food and lifestyle choices we make. And because I have privilege, I am able to CHOOSE in the first place, not to mention make fully informed choices.

Even though I have been quite poor at various times in my perpetual student lifestyle, I recognize that I am still privileged. Even the times when I was happy to eat rice and dried beans and oatmeal for a few weeks just to have something to put in my belly I'm still privileged. Because I know it won't always be this way. Because I have the knowledge and experience of taking good care of my health and making good choices. Because I am not so debased that even in (especially in!) Los Angeles I was able to afford to live in a neighborhood that was safe, and quiet, and green, and close to the ocean where natural breezes helped dispel some of the hazardous pollution, and safe places to recreate were all around me. Healthy people surrounded me and supported and praised my decision to choose health. It makes a huge difference. Does it ever occur to anyone to ask why everyone at their yoga classes and such is almost always from a certain cultural and economic station?

When I worked at Scottel, I shared an office with a young woman who had a 7-year-old and a 2-year-old. She and I would talk about them from time to time, and the trials and tribulations that come with raising kids. She and her husband were basically just starting out with fairly entry-level jobs, trying to raise 2 little ones in an expensive city. They lived in a little apartment where it wasn't safe to send kids out on the streets to play unless you watched them like a hawk, so they spent a lot of indoor time, watching more TV than she would like. And since her husband was all but a child himself in the kitchen and she worked full-time and neither of them were raised with the best traditions of food choices, it was tough for her to make sure everyone ate right all the time. Etc, etc. Tough going for a 23-year-old. I understand her frustration.

So my proposition is this: yes we live in a toxic shitty world. Yes, it is possible sometimes to choose whether (and to what extent) you will live in it. But at some point you have to acknowledge that not everyone has those choices, or at least that range of choices. For millions it's not as simple as telling them to quit eating conventionally grown produce and fast food, and get outside and get some exercise and start a meditation practice in the 5 minutes you may have to yourself as a single parent holding down 3 jobs to make ends meet. And I haven't even started on access to decent healthcare, or problems endemic to our current system of healthcare as predicated on a disease-management model vs. one based on prevention, but whatever, as we say in grad school academia, "that is beyond the scope of this discussion."

At some point, if you are serious about helping people, if you really, truly, REALLY give a shit then you have to acknowledge institutionalized forces (that are bigger than any individual) of economics, of public policy, of FOOD POLICY in this country which SUCKS tremendously, of racism, classism, sexism, able-ism, all the other -ism's that dictate and constrain the choices people make every day about how they negotiate their world. And once you do that, of course, you become dangerous, and radical in the most traditional meaning of the word. And not everyone is ready or willing to go there, to see that much or call for something so big and comprehensive. It means going through the looking glass.

It means acknowledging your own unearned privilege and maybe even giving some of it up. It means committing to paying with your life (not in death, necessarily, but in myriad other ways) in order to continue your work for wider goals of economic and social justice for everyone. It means considering that there are barriers in the way of everyone living your so-called simple universal "cosmic laws". It means having an honest discussion about our country's food policy and making sincere efforts to support community gardens and CSA's and the like that are actually trying to empower people and communities instead of just telling them to buy better food and get some exercise, fatty or you'll get all the health problems you so richly deserve (ah, fat hatred apologia--yet another series of future posts!)

And if you're not there yet, that's ok, I totally get it. I wasn't always where I am, and boy have I been painfully called out on the carpet for my ignorant assumptions over the years. Wanted to sink through the floor and die, I did. It's a process, and we are all in it, and it takes a lifetime. It's not always comfortable, and sometimes it's depressing and even scary, and you may occasionally find yourself paralyzed with despair. You'd be in some good company, believe me. But you move forward with it because you care, because you are committed. You can only start where you are and go from there. But goddamn. Be upfront about it.

And until you are willing to be that comprehensive and self-conscious, kindly take your self-righteous, healthier-than-thou sanctimony and shove it up your ass.

Love,
LoLo

Mental Aether Update

A lot of things have been swirling around in there for a while. There are many, many posts I should probably write. There is a whole other health-related blog that I need to imagineer for my practice and soon-to-be-honest-to-goddess website. I'm feeling frustrated and somewhat rudderless trying to find my way and how I will fit into the larger world as a practitioner of TCM, like a woman without a country since I don't feel much affinity with what I've encountered so far in the "orthodox" TCM camps, but allopathic medicine by and large still has its head up its collective arse about incorporating anything new that isn't shiny and expensive and readily demonstrated by randomized, double blind controlled studies. Also, I went to an awesome functional medicine seminar in Boulder last week given by a former internist named Larry Dossey that was extremely interesting and thought-provoking, on the growing importance (and hopefully inevitability) of [allopathic] medicine's acknowledging the connection of mind, body and spirit when it comes to healing (and that each has the potential to affect the others, to which those of us trained in Chinese paradigms roll our bored eyes and mutter "duh!" while taking another swig of some elixir out of a highball glass).

In short, there's been a lot going on in my head, and I've been feeling a lot of frustration about wanting and not being able to zero in on the words to express it.

I need to review a couple of things, hopefully this week or next. One, there was a huge expose of Oprah and her great love of woo (fine, it's Oprah, whatever) but the privileging of that (with the complete abandonment of reason and science) over what we now practice and believe to be true about medicine is not okay. And I come from a long background of analyzing and criticizing bias, privilege, knowledge and knowledge production, etc. I am not beholden at all to the idea of science as some kind of church or holy sacrament for which you will be swiftly and surely punished if you dare to be critical. But I do see lots of parallels to work we did in women's studies and later in my career in education. So there's that.

And in my quest to begin to understand why I hate woo and have such a visceral reaction of anger toward it (and the pressure to accept it uncritically, even if it seems made up out of whole cloth), I came across yet another article this morning about how your poor health is totally, 100% your own fault for choosing to live a toxic life. It grew to be so long that it became it's own "I Write Letters" post. If you are reading this far, you've already hopefully enjoyed it.

So yeah, I have lots to say. Lots I NEED to say. As Gloria Anzaldua wrote that she was afraid to write, but she was more afraid NOT to write. She also wrote a shitload of righteous awesome in her book La Frontera and her other writings in This Bridge Called My Back, which should be required reading at some point. And please understand that I don't mean to appropriate her struggles and the risks she took to speak out about them or even consider them to be remotely my own, but they do help. They illuminate and inspire. And stress the importance that there has to be hope and vision for something different, and better.

As she and Cherríe Moraga once said, "To assess the damage is a dangerous act. To stop there is even more dangerous."

Now, if you'll excuse me I have some reading to go and do!

Finn Discovers Mushrooms!

The boring kind, that is. But still awfully cute...

For Whom the Maroon Bells Toll

You ever have a trip that turns out to be nothing like what you worked so hard to make it be? Even when you didn't really work that hard? Then you know what I'm talking about.

The original plan: leave early Saturday for the 26.something mile 4-pass schlep around the Maroon Bells. Arrive at trailhead, hoist on packs, and go--hopefully at least getting over West Maroon by the end of the day. Day 2 and 3 more of the same until back at the car, whence glorious shedding of stinky trail clothes and plans for post-trail beer and pizza commence. Drive home full of delicious beer and pizza, take showers, take naps, procrastinate cleaning gear as long as possible.

Well. Blink. Sigh.

Don't get me wrong--this was an awesome trip! Just, different.

It began the night before Day 1 when that nigori I split with Quinn over dinner made me too sleepy-drunk to drive home and James had to instead. Plus getting home and remembering that we still had to write out recipe instructions and prep/repackage all our food and pack since we got back too late from climbing the 5th to do it before dinner. James wanted to do some of it at night, but I made sad puppy eyes at him and flopped on my bed, practically falling asleep instantly.

We got up at 6 and did all that, had almost left the house just after 9 when we realized all kinds of stuff, like ZOMG we forgot the wine AND the platypus to put it in, we still had to stop off at the Crushery for coffee and breakfast, etc. I think it was more like 10 when we finally got on the 25. Once there decent time was made--I loved the red convertible with a couple in Cat in a Hat hats, all decked out for the 4th. It seemed like forever until we got to Glenwood, but we did.

Then, we had to stop at the gear shop because James needed a shirt and I needed a rain jacket (except I didn't, since my old one was hiding in the deepest darkest corner of James' pack unbeknownst to us until we shook everything down in camp later that night). Ah well, you can never have too many jackets, right? Then Safeway for a pot scrubber and pouch of smoked salmon and inferior deli sammiches, and finally we were on our way down to Aspen.

As we drove up the road to the trailhead, a road easel informed us that auto travel was restricted up to the Bells and we would have to take a bus. Crap. Or not, depending. We circled around, found parking, tried to find info in the people-forsaken visitors center (nice touch, Aspen Highlands!) and finally figured out from a guy working down in a gear rental shop that overnighters could in fact drive up and park. So up we went.

We pulled up to the ranger booth at the entrance. Our conversation went something like this:

Me: We're here to start a 3 day backpack trip.
Ranger: You have to go back down and take the bus.
Me: But there's no overnight parking down there--what are we supposed to do?
Ranger: Oh, you're overnight? Oh! Well ok. $10. When are you leaving? Oh, let me write you a different pass then.
James: Here's $10.
Ranger: You'll also want to take some chicken wire to wrap around your car for porcupines 'cuz they--oh, you know?
Me: Boy howdy, I do--I've had a car eaten by marmots in the Sierras more than once.

Etc. As she talked I noticed a list of annual passes taped to the window, and that my National Parks pass looked a lot like one of them, so I asked. Turns out, it did. So she took back our pass, and threw a couple rolls of chicken wire into the back seat, but didn't give us back James' $10. When we asked, she replied, "I don't remember you giving me a $20... but..."

Sheesh.

So we get up to the trail head, and realize we don't have the pass it sounded like we needed to put in the window, so after gulping down the inferior sandwiches (I was powerful cranky by now, and it was raining--yay!) we drove back down, only to be informed by a different ranger that putting up our annual pass would be just dandy, thanks so much. So, back up again. Changing into trail clothes in the rain, getting organized in the rain, etc. We toyed briefly with either trying to find a campsite or hotel room in Aspen, but then laughed at ourselves for thinking such a thing on the 4th of July. Suck it up and at least hike to Crater Lake, and then reassess. We even considered driving back down the road the the place in Snowmass where James took me and Jamie last year.

By the time all of this was done and we were on the trail, it was about 3:45 and the sun was back out. No excuses now! We quickly slalomed through the day trippers around Maroon Lake and headed up the Crater Lake trail. Such a relief to finally be out! After about an hour it started raining again, even though it was still sunny and no clouds overhead. Bloody weather. Soon enough we got to the lake, and were pleased to discover that hardly anyone was there--even backpackers. We found our camp at #4 (the best one is #6, but that's what you get for not finding enough beta beforehand I guess) and set up. James took an awesome shot of his tent pitched in front of a dark, wet clearing that, along with the reflection from his camera flash on the guy-lines, made it look like the tent was hovering above the ground, suspended by lasers. I set about setting out the kitchen to make quiche, WEA-style. No cotton gloves for stove operation though--oops!

In retrospect, as I sat trying to cut the butter into the pastry mixture with a tiny plastic spatula and the titanium spork for which James had finally found a use (did I mention he mentioned this was his first trip not eating freeze-dried meals in pouches?) I reflected that really, this step could probably have been done at home. Also, a couple pairs of vinyl gloves are way better than the unwieldy used ziplock bags for handling the dough and keeping your hands from becoming a gooey, clubby mess.

The quiche poofed up beautifully, and unfortunately settled a bit too much as it cooled. However, it WAS very filling, which is a nice feature of backpacking food. And the flavor was good, although some dried herbs would have worked wonders. Next time, I suppose. The brownies turned out much, much better. And all the same, it was all good enough to attract the biggest, most fatty-boom-balatty porcupine I've ever seen (ok, it was the only one I'd ever seen, but zie was so big and fat zie could barely waddle away after grunting at James for trying to get a closeup pic).

At night, it stormed well--bright bursts of lightning and deafening cacophonies of thunder. Most of it was 1-2 miles away, but it came from the west and disappeared off to the east, right overhead. The morning dawned cool and overcast, and so we decided to leave camp where it was and just range out as far as we could on day hikes. We headed out toward West Maroon Pass with the leftover quiche for brunch, and got a couple more miles up the trail before we ran into our neighbor from the next camp coming the other way. He reported he'd gotten to the first major stream crossing (and we could see the stream from where we were, and it was fairly major) and turned around since he was just out for fun and didn't feel like changing out of his boots. His dog was ecstatically wet and muddy though.

After sitting down to eat and watching the weather come in around 11AM, we reached the same conclusion--no sense climbing higher out of the trees if it was going to be electrical. We donned raingear and headed back, made it almost to camp before it really started raining and a huge clap of thunder sent 3 dayhikers scurrying for tree cover along the shore of Crater Lake.

What else to do but take a nap? So we did. And it was nice, since neither of us slept well the night before. Woke up to still cloudy and a little drizzly, but lightening. We pulled out the packs and headed up the Buckskin Pass trail around 2:45 and the sun was already blazing.

Buckskin turned out to be a pretty cool trail, and amazingly beautiful. Fairly steady climbing but nothing rude, and flowers everywhere--columbine, avalanche lily, shooting star, Indian paintbrush, alpine strawberry, and lots of others I don't know. Lots of avalanche slides down that gulch, some of them pretty recent judging by the bits of still-green fir branches that littered the ground. We came on a guy in a good mountaineering tent camped in the most idyllic spot, except for being totally exposed in an open meadow to storms. Hrmm.

At last we were able to see the top of the pass, totally blocked by a gigantic cornice. As we got closer, we could see another trail that swung way out to the left of it to clamber over a much shallower wedge of it, but alas, no time. And no axes anyway. We turned around at the trail junction with Willow Pass and headed back down to camp.

The pizza with sundried tomatoes, olives and artichoke hearts came together nicely in spite of not having a big enough plastic to roll it out on (and I don't trust my throwing skills enough to not land our only bit of dough in the dirt). We were pleased as well that we had wine left in the platypus. The storm that looked like it was brewing seemed to swing north of us and pile up in the east, where it looked dark and angry.

Around the last of the sunset James spied a tiny wedge of alpenglow on the peak behind us, so we grabbed cameras and wine bottle and headed down to the lake. There we saw our 2nd porcupine, although not nearly as fat as the first. There were some deer too. I love twilight.

The rain chased us back up the hill and into the tent, where we stayed for the rest of the night. Of course, we awoke to bluebird skies. Breakfast of pancakes with butter and boysenberry jam, because really--why carry it on your back when it can go in your belly? On our way out we gave lots of beta to people coming in, and got reports that the weather was supposed to dry up for a few days. Nice timing, eh? Oh well. It was still amazing.

Once back at the car we were pleased to discover it unmolested by porcupines, marmots or other varmints with sharp nasty teeth. We also decided not to head back out down the East Maroon trail. The bag of fresh car clothes was so seductive, as were my chacos...

The drive home was a little sad, as it always is. I would love to go back again when the weather is more accomodating--thinking about what's on the other side of those passes is driving me nutz.

Taking the 5th

So Friday dawned. We slapped off the alarm (so much for leaving Chautauqua by 7AM, tee-hee!) at 6 and grunted back over to sleep for an hour. Fortunately we had sorted gear the night before, so it was a quick get dressed, grab climbing packs, stop off at the Crushery for some breakfast sammies and coffee, and up to the TH. We got super lucky--rock star parking at the nearest spot to the trail, inexplicably the last one left in the lot.

The weather looked shitty. Forecast said it was supposed to clear, at least until the afternoon storm, but I've learned this year that you really don't know. We sat at the picnic table and watched a soloist on the 1st Flatiron, barely visible without binocs. After about 30 minutes we decided to go for it. It was warm, muggy and sticky--not like my beloved high desert at all. James blazed a stiff pace up to the arch, and then after a small bit of bushwhacking discovered that in spite of our late start we were the only ones on this whole rock. James decided to try a different way onto the rock, and we set up a belay anchor for me, and up he headed. He quickly realized why he always took the left route, as this one was a bit of a garden. At least it wasn't wet any more...

Once he set up the belay station I set off to clean and climb. I was curious about this one, since it was the route that some of the other BMS groups did. All in all, I'm glad I got to do Seal--more fun, and a much longer and nuttier rap. This seemed pretty tame by comparison. But, still, easy and fun climbing. James didn't have to worry about having his lead head on too tight, and I didn't have to worry about much of anything.

We did the route a bit differently in a few other places, which presented a couple of interesting problems starting pitch #4 I believe it was. James and I each figured it out, no one fell or even slipped. I got all the gear back. As we got higher and higher the people down at the arch got smaller and smaller. Still I couldn't believe no one else was up there!

Finally, we got to the top, and James showed me a puddle with little critters swimming around.
It is amazing to me how they got there, and still survive up there. There was also a beer left by some BMS group for another, but it looked like it had been there a while. James threaded the rope through the very beefy eyebolt and executed a perfect rope throw. He rapped first, then me. Then down the trail as fast as our legs would carry us so we could hit the Southern Sun for beers and food.

We got right to a table, and after a lengthy discussion and sampling adventures got right to our beers. We knew we would be back in a few hours to meet Quinn and LJ for drinks, so we had little sammiches too. We even got invited to some private party, but alas we would be in Maroon Bell country. As we sat beering ourselves, the rain started to violently splat splat against the windows around us. We missed it by about an hour--so glad to be inside and not up on that rock as the light and boom show started up. Driving down to Denver was interesting, as many of my post-work drives have been this month. Rain so hard you can barely see, an inch or two of standing water on the freeway in spots, people pulled over under overpasses even though it's not that freaky to try and drive it. We just started laughing sometimes, it was such a storm. And huge, bright, fat lightning bolts that rent the sky in two over and over again, while the rolling claps of thunder were perceptible in the pit of your stomach they were so raucous.

And by the time we got home? Sunny, bright, blue sky... no evidence we got pounded by a storm except for the water all over everything still. This place, I'll swan.

Meet Finnomeno!

The update would not be complete without this--my household grew by one kitten this week. Turns out one of the guys I climbed with the last two weekends fosters kittens for the Denver Dumb Friends League. Turns out he and his wife were assigned a mama cat and her 7 kittens, which were then about 6 weeks old. He told me what they looked like, and I couldn't stop thinking about one in particular--a little black boy with a white-tipped tail. I've always wanted a black kitty, and... well, after the climb I asked if I could come and see them.

I went to play with 7 kittens last Thursday, knowing I would probably come home with one. Of course, I fell in love with my little black one immediately. And oh, it was so hard to not take two!!!

I met David at the shelter on Thursday as he was returning them to be adopted out, and took my little one home (David and his wife kept two of them also). They did such a wonderful job raising him he wasn't nervous or afraid at all. He and Zooey sniffed each other and he started playing immediately. She, of course was not at all sure she like this new arrangement. I laughed a little as I remembered bringing her home to Gibson and how she used to torment him so. Turnabout, I suppose. So far his favorite toy is her twitching tail, for which she's walloped him pretty good. I think he's learning.

After scrapping quite a bit this morning, they curled up on the couch together and slept the rest of the day away. She then gave him the mother of all baths. Hopefully, this is a turning point and all will be well.

I've decided to call him Finn, after the Irish legend. I think the name will turn out to fit.

You can see all the cute kitten pics here, and enjoy the bath vid below. Listen to the little man purr!

BMS Graduate!

Well, it seems trivial, and on most levels it is. But man, it was more of a commitment than it looks like on paper. Nearly 2.5 solid months of outings, lectures, tests, etc. I'm glad it's over, so I have my weekends back, but so glad I took it. I learned so much, and learned it well--it is an exceptionally run school let alone for only paying $200 and buying some gear. I invested in a mountaineering specific pack, the Osprey Variant 52 (which I totally LOVE), an ice ax (BD Raven Pro), helmet (Petzl Ecrin Rock--thought about a BD or Camp model but how can you resist a brand that means little boy penis in Yiddish? Exactly, you can't), plus sundries like a few lockers, a new belay device that could accomodate the fatty fat-fat 11 mil ropes we tend to use, a couple of new sewn slings, and a snow picket (I learned on soft snow day that if your pack wasn't anchored to a picket or an axe Frank WOULD kick it down the hill to teach you a valuable lesson!). James was kind enough to gift me an extra pair of brand new deluxe semi-rigid crampons he had lying around in his Garage Mahal, I already had a pair of new mountaineering boots, and I've been stockpiling different jackets, hats, and gloves since I got here and realized winter is a whole different shade of crazy out here than in SoCal (duh!).

Since I was on the river when my group climbed Citadel for Routefinding, I got to crash Steve Hughs' party up Bancroft. We met at the park 'n' ride at 4AM, and I immediately knew something was different from my group when I checked my watch which read 4:05 and we were still standing in the lot waiting for people to arrive. Frank would have blown the taco stand at 4:01, and if you were late tough titties. Given how unpredictable the weather is here and how important 15 minutes or so can be, I totally get it now. I think we left at 4:15. Someone asked me if Frank was a total hardass with my group. I smiled in the dark to myself and replied, "Yeah, but in a good way--I like that he won't let you get away with shit."

We jolted a few miles up a jeep road (had no idea how much crazier the ride down would be--a few times my head hit the ceiling and I contemplated putting on my helmet) past the first open gate (yay!) to the 2nd closed one. We gathered, organized, decided to shit can the snowshoes, and set off. Once at Loch Lomond we veered west and started climbing up benches to get onto the East Ridge Route. Once on it, it was fun class 3/4 scrambling for an hour or so that got progressively more knifey until we got to a feature called the Notch--a huge chunk that is lopped out of the ridgeline. Iain and David went on ahead to set up the rap and protect the climb out. By the time we reached them the wind was up (cold!) and clouds were beginning to come in. It seemed like it took forever to get everyone down and up the other side. I can't believe some guy actually free soloed it in his ski boots--it's not super hard, but it's plenty exposed and there aren't the greatest holds when you have bulky feet--if you fall you're going for a long and possibly deadly ride.

Once out of the Notch we still had to get up the 2nd crux of some very spicy class 4 scrambling, and then more scrambling just less exposed for another hour+ until we got to the saddle before the final scramble section before the false summit and easy ridge run to the top. By the time we got there it was after 11AM, and the clouds were socking in and the graupel was definitely falling. It was disappointing, especially as this pair of climbers behind us pushed on (they caught us at the bottom and said they'd summited in the knick of time but had an awesome glissade down), but we knew it was better to be safe. We traversed out onto the snow field in the cirque to our left, sat down, and had a fun ride all the way down to Lake Caroline. By the time we got to the cars we couldn't even see the mountain--it was a good call.

I also crashed Steve's High Peak climb, since my group did theirs up Lamb's Slide on Longs the day we climbed Bancroft. We climbed Citadel from the couloir, then traversed the ridge onto Pettingel, and would have climbed that too if not for the stupid weather.

We met lazy on Saturday afternoon in shorts and tank tops to backpack in the token 1.5 miles to make it an overnight. Weather began coming in and we set up camp at the last sheltered flat spot, and watched as lightning lit up the sky and clouds engulfed Pettingel. It alternatively rained and graupeled for a couple of hours. Lee built a fire, at dinner time I enjoyed my Mary Jane's Farm Bare Burrito while others ate their smooshed Subway sammiches. FINALLY it was late enough to justify going to bed, so into my bivvy I crawled. It wasn't so bad. Jen's bivvy has a hoop, which helps, and it's not the people who had schlepped tents got much sleep anyway. I got up at 4, put on boots, made sure my bento box was full and pack was arranged, and was ready for the 4:30AM leave time. Except that at 4:25 people were still boiling water for oatmeal. Yeah, we left about 4:45.

Fortunately we made good time to and up the couloir, despite 2 people veering way, WAY off route on the approach (routefinding, people!). It was a fun snow climb, and even though it was only 8AM or so it was an east-facing couloir and plenty soft and squishy--another reason to leave early.
We had some spicy scrambling along the ridge to get to the true summit, then a little bit further to reach the rappel. Once everyone was off the rap, more scrambling along the ridge until we were onto the flanks of Pettingel. The weather was rolling in fast, a few ghost turd pieces of graupel were beginning to float and swirl in the air around us, and we knew it was time to go. No more summits that day.

Lee volunteered to glissade down into the middle of the bowl and see how bad the post-holing would be. Fortunately, he took off walking easily once he reached to bottom of the glissade so we took off after him, me starting too far to the right and having to stop and adjust my course to avoid the tib/fib fracture of the rock band in the middle. We got SOOOOO lucky that our trek out was mostly easy walking--we were expecting to post-hole up to our waists, and were rueing our decision to leave the snowshoes in the car.


The rain hit by the time we got to camp, but it was a mostly quick and dirty (one tent group was trying to do a careful, artful pack job for some reason and one guy who insisted on camping on a snow slab took a bit to dig out his deadman, not that it was windy enough to need them oh well.) Again, happy to have only packed the bivvy, and happy we only had an easy 1.5 mile cruise down to the cars. Man those beers at Tommyknockers tasted good!

River Rat!

Jeez, I'm behind on this thing. It's been a busy 30 days, for sure. I finished hard snow day with no crampon mishaps, and even got to do some bona fide ice climbing up a short frozen waterfall up on Mt. Lincoln. Next season, Ouray for sure! I finished my exam, am STILL waiting on results (how long can it take to score exams for 7 people? Seriously.) I finished my high peak and routefinding trips and graduated from BMS. I got a new job up in Loveland 3 days/week. I got a new kitten who is so cute it makes my teeth hurt. I made some new climbing and riding friends. This post, however, will focus on the week I spent on the San Juan River around Memorial Day.

Jen and her brother Aubrey put their heads together last Christmas and decided to put their names in for permits to celebrate his graduation in the spring. Yampa was denied, which is a bummer 'cuz I hear it's a pretty awesome river. San Juan, however, was granted, for 20 people. We started with 17: Jen, Aubrey, my brother Craig, Jen's cousin Jess and her boyfriend Chris, Jen's friend Abbey, Jen's mum Mary and her friend Marguerite, plus various Outward Bound connections (Sara, Diana, Bayley and her partner Jeff) and family friends (Bakers and his friend Dave and his 7-year-old son Andy) and Craig's friend Nate from VLS who is doing an internship in Telluride this summer. Craig, Abbey, Chris, Jess, Sara, Jeff, and Nate took out on the 3rd day in Mexican Hat, the rest of us continued the adventure to the takeout at Clay Hills.

The trip began in the rain. I left Denver in the rain, drove all the way to Bluff, UT in the pouring rain trying not to be killed by insane truckers and stupid people trying to make good time to Moab. I arrived in rain, set up my tent in the rain, etc. The morning was overcast but dry until we shoved off, and then it rained/poured the rest of the day until we set up camp in the evening. Blessedly, it stayed dry until the middle of the night when it rained again. It made the first day kind of a bummer, cold and shivery, not conducive to hanging out. At least I was on Diana's boat with the Gay Pride Umbrella! We set up the shelter tarp to eat lunch, and continued to huddle under it or the umbrella for at least an hour after we were ready to go, waiting for the rain to abate. 'Cuz that's how it's supposed to rain in the desert, right? Short, fierce, and sweet.

We gave up and moved on. We stopped to see these cool petroglyphs.

Later on we stopped to see these house ruins. What a view they had!

Once we got to camp I began to get the full sense of what a river trip is like. Since the boats were largely loaded and rigged by the time I got there, I had no idea how much we actually had until it came time to unload in camp. Everyone's dry bags, kitchen dry box, giant stove, propane bomb, several jugs of water, the groover, the food and beer coolers, etc. Plus, I got the full idea of just how well we were going to eat on this trip--fresh food just about every meal, lots of stuff, even wine and Diana's gin and tonics. Yes it was kind of a shit show, but it was an awesomely enjoyable shit show.

And the beer--I don't think I've ever seen so much beer in one place outside a liquor store. Coolers full, and mesh bags full dragged behind the boats in the water. I think we started drinking at about 10AM every day and didn't really stop until bedtime. After the first day the weather behaved and we felt more like drinking them in the intense, hot sun. We got a couple of afternoon thundershowers with spectacular lighting shows. The day we stayed at Lime Creek a couple of hours afterward we heard a strange kind of roar, and then suddenly a current of dark brown water filled with what looked like small bits of log came rushing down the practically stagnant Lime Creek--a flash flood, started miles away.

As the sun was coming up on our 4th day, Jen got us up early to hike the Honecker Trail to the rim. We got up there just as the sun was rising and the light golden-orange. You could see all the way to Monument Valley, AZ (read: hundreds of miles). Someone had built a tiny Stonehenge. The trail blends into the canyon wall perfectly--unless you knew about it you'd never know about it. We got down and Dave (who used to be a chef before he retired) and Bakers and Mary got to work making an awesome breakfast of bacon, eggs, toast, coffee, fruit, etc. I think we finally got on the water close to noon.

I had been in the ducky with the kayakers and Bakers in his canoe the day before, but I chose to ride with Diana this day so she could start teaching me how to oar. I started getting how to move the boat, but still have no clue how to go through rougher water or water with lots of obstacles--this trip the water was so high all the rocks were covered and it was easy. Of course, so were the sandbars, which make it a little treacherous toward the end where the river is so silted up and backing up from Lake Powell. It gave me a new appreciation for Edward Abbey, that part.

When we got to a big class 2 rapid called Government, we eddied out to scout. Dave ran it in his kayak while we watched. Bakers showed me how to find the tongue and just follow it around to ride the wave train through the rest. He and I hiked down to run it while the others watched. I got into the ducky and followed his line into the tongue, and sure enough I really didn't have to brace or steer much of anything--the current took me, swung me through the curve and then spat me into a really killer wave train with big haystacks that were a super fun up and down ride all the way to the end. I found Dave and Bakers and we eddied out to watch the rafts come through. Then we continued on to my favorite camp of the whole trip at the side canyon Slickhorn.

As we were pulling up to our beach, I noticed a guy on the other side of the river, in jeans and a green shirt and cowboy hat, and what appeared to be a bandana over his face and gold mirrored sunglasses (later when we got on shore Bakers pulled out his binocs and that's exactly what he was wearing). He seemed to be acting strangely--downclimbing and then scrambling up this ledge, pushing large babyhead boulders off down the bank, dancing around like he was on something that looked like it could have been fun or could have been terrifying. We noticed a kid around the corner from him messing about near the bank of the river. Tried to ignore them while we set up a shower made from a water jug baked all day in the hot sun and tried to scrub all the river sludge off of ourselves (the water was the color and consistency of cafe au lait--my day in the ducky yielded a dappled sunburn from where water splash washed away my protective coating of silt). As we were drying off we saw a man come from upriver and collect them, and realized it must have been some kind of solo experience, and those poor kids had probably been out all day.

Chef Dave helped us make the perfect garlic shrimp to go with fresh corn and black bean salsa in tacos. We sat around the beach in chairs drinking wine and watching the fire in the pan, while Andy experimented with the flammability of various materials found around camp. Jen warned us to enjoy our gorgeous camp, because the next night would be none to nice. Oh, she had no idea!

We hiked up Slickhorn Canyon a bit in the morning, with Diana pointing out various fossils and layers (she's a geologist!) and Andy challenging anyone who would humor him to race twigs and leaves down the trickle of water still running down the canyon.
We stopped again at another called Grand Gulch for a hike as well--super cool arch in this one, lots of desert varnish, humongous boulders that had obviously been rolled down quite a ways in the last big flood.

Back in the water, we were clearly hitting the slackwater portion. Lots of rowing to reach camp at the not so reasonable hour of 7:30PM. We got to the official site (saw that the last one upriver had been completely destroyed by a flood that produced a huge alluvial fan feature over the former site). Marguerite and Bakers had gone ashore ahead of us and came running out of the trees thrashing their arms like mad--mossies were EVERYWHERE. As soon as we got to shore they were all over us, too.
We debated whether or not to try and make it to the takeout, at least 2 hours away and hard to spot in the dark (and a big scary dangerous huge waterfall blocks the way into Powell) and decided to stay on the rock bench above the eddy we grabbed next to the Mosquito Swamp.

We covered ourselves in clothes and bug spray as best we could--Bayley and I had nets for our heads, the rest of the grrlz made hijabs of their sarongs. We unpacked hurriedly and tried to set a fire in the pan while Bayley and Jen made dinner. By the time we ate it was just about dark and they were nearly gone, but the air still hung heavy, muggy, and hot. No breeze at all, for the first time on the trip. We cleaned up and basically got ready to go as soon as we got up, early, hopefully before the mosquitos knew we were about.

We shoved off right as they were getting bad again. Bayley started cooking breakfast on the boat named Patches while Aubrey rowed. Breakfast sammies of veggie patties, leftover tater tots from last night's dinner, cheese, grilled onion I believe. Oh, and fresh brewed coffee too. Unbelievable. We got to eat soon before we hit the takeout, which fortunately because it was early was empty.

After that it was just work--unloading everything, breaking down the boats, sorting which gear needed to be returned to which rental facility and therefore would go in which car, etc. Aubrey, Bakers, Dave, Mary and I ran the shuttle to retrieve the rest of the cars, we finished loading while Andy played in the mud (that kid is unbelievably cool, not to mention a great boater of all craft) and hit the road. It was a long trip back to Denver with all the stops: return gear in Moab and Fruita, drop off Bayley in Grand Junction (Jeff made us some killer coffee--thanks guys!) and finally Diana's place in Silt. Totally worth missing my routefinding trip (and by extension high peak). I can't wait to do another one!

I'm So High

Or I was, yesterday. About 2000 feet off the valley floor, suspended by 2 9.4 mm ropes anchored by webbing slings attached to a bolt drilled into the rock by some porch swing hardware. Simultaneously beautiful, and quiet, and terrifying.

Yesterday was our 3rd Rock Day--the culmination of all the rock skillz we've been learning. We set off from NCAR early--about 6:30AM, in order to avoid traffic jams at the rock. It looked much like it looked a year ago out there--the snow finally gone, the grass temporarily green, super pretty, remembering how I got so taken by this place so quickly.

Kevin was out with some nasty sinus infection, and our fearless senior leader Deb got rear-ended the day before and could barely extend or rotate her neck, so she came in with us and made sure we got off the ground ok and bid us adieu. I was bummed, because I really like Deb and she loves to teach rock and she's a fantastic climber, but she offered to go out with us after the class was over--said she trusted our skills enough, which is a huge compliment.

Frank and Jason led us up in teams of 4 and 3, respectively. The leaders got to wear rock shoes, while we got to wear our clunky mountaineering boots. We were, to be fair, only following, and didn't really need them. But trying to climb in them was an experience all the same. Good thing the crack route up Seal isn't too vertical. Frank figured out a masterful scheme of rope management whereby we all got to try cleaning routes and anchors but we never had to untie from our initial tie-ins. Oh wait, Tim and Cindy had to switch places at the end of Frank's rope, but that was it. We also learned how helpful it could be to have radios at the top of the 3rd pitch, after Frank and Tim had climbed up to the top of the 4th and final pitch. The pitch was about the full length of the rope, and because of the way the rock curved you couldn't see or hear above or below you. There was so much drag on the rope you couldn't feel rope drag either. Apparently Tim (belaying me from the top) and I (waiting patiently at the bottom for him to pull up all the slack and signal that he was ready to have me on belay so I could climb) were yanking on either end of the ropes like ringing a church bell but neither of us could feel it. Finally they heard me scream "Climbing!!!" and two climbers waiting patiently behind us confirmed they heard "Climb on, Laura!" so up I went. About halfway up I found a nut someone had left in the crack--obviously left because they couldn't get it out, and I had no cleaning tool, but I thought I'd try anyway. It worked! I thought I scored a piece to begin building my rack. Turned out it was Frank's, and Tim wasn't able to get it out. Oh well.

The whole climb was super fun--technical enough that you could practice different moves and techniques but not so steep it was impossible for newbs like us. I climbed better than I thought I would, even not considering the boots--I felt like I was problem solving better than I ever had, and not nervous at all. Of course, I was trying not to think of the rap at the end.

Ah, the rap down. Most that I've done start with some sort of flat ground at the top, with a horizontal lip over which you have to hang your butt into space so your legs are about 90º to the rock and you just kind of walk them down as you lower yourself through your belay device. This one was different. You don't start from the tippy-top of the rock, but rather about 20 feet below it. You scooch yourself through a narrow cleft between slabs until the whole rock drops away in a sheer (except for the overhung section!) face. When you get there, you clip into the anchor at then reach one leg around the corner (like around a corner in a hallway) only there's no floor. Then you hop out with the other one and let your autoblock hold you while you get situated. Now you are hanging completely out in the void, only your face is so right up against the rock you could kiss it, and your legs are hanging straight down. Somehow you have to lower yourself a little while kicking yourself away from the rock to get in that sitting position, which you figure out how to do, and then down you go. Except there is so much rope drag it isn't a smooth or even a fast ride at all, a lot of bouncy-bouncy (at least for me). But it was very controlled.

Then I saw beneath my feet that the overhang was approaching. I lowered over it, and then... I was in space! I continued to inch down, and then I began to spin slowly around to face out from the rock. I was only about halfway down, and I realized as I gazed out onto the foothills and Boulder and the plains in the 200 or so degree view before me, I am so very, very high. Hanging by two strands of nylon. It felt surreal. I even stopped for a minute to let my arms rest--that's how difficult it was to feed rope through with all that drag. It was just quiet, and everything felt far, far away. Even my classmates below me were still far away--all I could hear was a gentle wind. Just me dangling in space.

I kept lowering, lowering, lowering, finally got back to rock against my feet, and then I was down on the ground, and that was it. Cindy came down, it looked like she nearly flipped upside down when she hit the free rappel section, but she went fast and righted herself. Then came Frank, who said he nearly tipped upside down too from the weight of all his gear. Then it was time to pull down the ropes, coil them, and hike out to the cars in time to hit Southern Sun for beers and food.

I wish James were there. I can't wait for him to get here in June and take me climbing in the Flatirons. I think I finally, 15 years after starting, get climbing. I wish I had gotten a picture from the rappel, but I wasn't thinking and my camera pretty much stayed buried in my pack. Stay tuned for hard snow day next week, wherein we try not to slash our ropes, our clothes, or ourselves by mis-stepping while wearing crampons. And then I race to the airport and maybe have to courier Jamie's cat Agnes to LA. And try to pass my NBAO exam in spite of waiting until the last possible moment to study. Should be exciting!