A Drop in the Bucket

Things have changed so much in the last year that it's worth mentioning exactly how little change there has been in the immediate universe of climbing we find ourselves in. 

I guess thats why climbing has been such a security blanket for us all. The trails, the rock, the routes, the crowd, the ledge - it all has a hardened sense of permanence. An unwavering solidity that is both calming and terrifying. Climbing has held our hand through this difficult stint; a period of time that has included one of the most intense periods of uncertainty that I have ever lived through.

Even when things seemed at their most dire we are privileged enough to just go play outside, chasing a vision of success that is as mysterious as it is arbitrary. The ambiguity of our actions completely lost on outsiders it must seem strange then to spend so much time intensely focused on a singular and repetitive endeavor. The utility of such actions is only known to the user; we climb because we must, we climb because we are human and prone to passion driven exchanges with one another and our environment, the more primitive the more introspective. So much of human-created art begs for interpretation and yet there is nothing so open to it. 

There is a switch we all long to flip at times that activates our old lizard brain. Being outside devoid of most technology and modern day trappings locked in combat with gravity and bad beta the most acute and intense meditation is triggered.