I’ve never found an issue of Vogue to be particularly threatening. They usually sit harmlessly to the way side on shelves at super markets and whatnot. This particular issue was massive and had a horrendous spread of animal suits inside it, but I think what was so scary to some was that I had it at, gasp, a climbing area! After a few funny looks I was told at one point my over sized picture book was the last straw of a number of chaotic events that weekend at Rifle. I found this really offensive considering the travesties I’ve seen take place over the years in this canyon. I was more surprised because I took climbers to be people who didn’t conform or pigeon hold others in order to ostracize them. I thought they were people who didn’t decide fashion means girly, which means not outdoorsy, which means lame, which means if you’re a girly-girl don’t even try climbing, and if you’re here with your boyfriend go home, it’s not for you forget it, thanks. Who decides people are only cool if they climb hard and don’t get sponsored, and if you are sponsored you’re an attention whore. Who call people liars about boulder problems and grades and say names aren’t good enough. I mean I never thought climbers were that cool, but I thought they were slightly less rigid than this.
Anyhow I for one love a little gossip and chit-chat, and I’ve been loving being in CO with lots of people, even when I don’t agree with all of them. When the conversation gets too boring I can always pull out my Vogue to entertain myself and scare off some boring ole’ climbers.
Below are many-a-shot of our new lil casita with some views of Sopris from the front, followed by some shots in the canyon and around the Western Slope, enjoy!
My boyfriend Joe has this thing called the Triangle. We found out about it a few years ago when we were having our charts read by a friend. While my chart was filled with swirls and squiggles, Joe’s apparently formed flawless lines of congruency. I don’t remember much of what was said about my chart, as I had appropriately drank several glasses of wine as one should do prior to being told about the depths of themselves and the stars that align them, but I definitely remember Joe’s reading. Things would just work out for him, his world would be a little more effortless than the next person’s, life would just come together.
After that night I started to notice Joe’s day-to-day triangling. How he wouldn’t get charged for extra luggage, or a parking space in the front of a lot would open up just as he pulled in. Seriously this guy was charmed. So I guess it should have been no surprise to me when Joe found the perfect pad within two emails and one phone call. Unlike the numerous places I had looked into, we were finally on our way to one of the only apartments not filled with 12-steppers, kids, or roommate desperados. The A-frame house seemed to make perfect sense, and I grudging gave into the fact that yet again my efforts proved fruitless in light of the triangle.
Here are a few pictures from the end of our Wy trip, the Tradeshow in UT and to the road to CO. Yet another set of three’s and endless good luck that I can blame Joe for.
SOOOO funny! Get your votes in! Check out Joe’s acting cameo in Spencer Victory’s Vertical World.http://www.reelrocktour.com/contest/
Up until this point my main experience with Wyoming was the long treacherous drive between somewhere, CO to the Tradeshow, UT for the winter OR. Yes I’ve driven this stretch in the summer as well, but I don’t really remember WY during those drives or have it etched in my brain like the winter ones. There’s something about having the ump-teenth tracker trailer spew slippery, brown sludge into my windshield blinding my view and having me pray for my life and zanex for about four straight hours that really makes you remember a place and has you swearing you’ll never return. Ironically it was often Alli Rainey’s smiling face I’d see first at those Winter OR visits. There she’d swell and gloat about the amazing climbing at Tensleep telling us again and again to put it with our other road trip check points. With the visions of flat, cold, semi-ridden Lamarie fresh in my mind I’d usually skirt her request nodding politely, thinking in my mind “she wants me dead!”
Obviously the summer is the time to be here, and sure there’ve been some hot days, and I have remind Joe it IS the summer and it’s likely hot everywhere. Plus when it’s too hot you read books, watch cowboys and eat icecream scoops the size of your head on waffle cones that taste better than the cream itself. When it does cool off, (which is bound to happen every afternoon) you head to beautifully streaked walls that look like little pieces of Ceuse have just dropped in the middle of cowboy country and crimp and pocket pull your way to the top. This is one of the few areas where the style is more mine than Joe’s, so I’m trying to keep him distracted with onsighting and ordering more things online so we have to wait for their shipment. It’s working so far and with a new job awaiting me in Aug I’m climbing everyday like it’s my last.
When I was younger I was sure I had an overwhelming fear of spiders. My mom and sister both had arachnophobia and therefore I was brought up in a household where hatred of the spider was just so. We’d scream when we saw spiders and unable to bring ourselves to get close enough to squish them we’d simply set a mug on top of them and let them die a slow lonely death. You’d walk around the house with all these upside down mugs thinking, “this is really sick.”
Of course I never really thought too deeply about it, I didn’t like spiders, they were scary. Then I went to NYC where there’s a severe lack of wildlife, so I didn’t really deal with them there. And then, bam, I started living in a tent. Life in a tent brings many creepy crawlies close to your life, and eventually you just start accepting them, ending what could be a road-trip long battle. It was around this time I realized I wasn’t really scared of spiders at all. I’d simply let spooky “spider in the shower horror stories” become my own for lack of any real drama in my younger life.
I’ve never really been scared of snakes either, but as we walked recently walked up on a really pissed off rattlesnake I realized I haven’t actually seen that many snakes to begin with. Let’s just say there’s a natural reaction when you’re face to face with something you know could put a real damper on your nice lil outing with a single strike. Joe apparently doesn’t seem to have this survival filter, so that’s how he got the cool rattler shots below.
I’m starting to think my whole spider mentality is the same thing with my settling down mentality. I’ve told myself for so long that being in one spot too long is scary. So much so that I’m really starting to believe it. At this point I’m thinking I need similar forced tactics like my tentin’ up on the road trip to get over the fright of a steady stay. We’ll be on the road for few more weeks then a long trial stop in CO to see how permanence feels. I guess I shouldn’t get too worked up about it though, it’s not like I don’t kill a spider every now and then.
Check out the latest issue of Dead Point Mag here !Big ups to Jackie Hueftle and Vanessa Compton for putting in the time and effort it took to get this issue together! I even slid in a lil’ article myself along with some great shots by the fabulous Caroline Treadway during her recent hiatus down south in Utah. I miss you grrls!!! xxx
Turns out there are some surprising similarities between writing and climbing. Like climbing you get out shape from writing and often feel like you have to start from the very beginning. There’s also this point in writing, especially when it’s something long and treacherous, where it feels like you’ll never get it done, like it’s totally impossible. This feeling was so similar the first days on harder projects I couldn’t ignore it, and I’m pretty sure making the comparison is the only reason I was able to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Sure enough a few days later I had yet another all too familiar moment. It was similar to when you’re trying a route and everything seems to finally come together; the beta gets sessed, you start making bigger links and it’s this day where you think I could really do this. With writing it was the same, everything began to form a shape and the vision of the piece got clearer. There was finally an end in sight.
The photos below are from Jolly Ole’ England, where I spent the last few weeks. I love this little country. The rolling hills, endless botanics, never ending footpaths, tea for days and pints for nights. Next time I’ve promoised to be brave enough to actually drive the rental car. Like my father says “It’s in my blood.”
