Our plan to climb this weekend crumbled. Not unexpected, but its collapse fits within a label titled disappointing. I was excited to flail on some rock. Looking back at our last trip within this region, which now seems like so long ago, memories of routes and laughter and that buzzing energy that is friends delighting in nature, story forming, and an escape from the daily repetitions of urban life. Another week shall return me to this pursuit. For, given the breakdown of our small crew, we’ve turned to backpacking. To get away from electronics, the car and our home (which has been quite the mainstay of our hours) so that we might take in flora and fauna more directly while immersed in the visual, olfactory, and audible splendor of wilderness excites me. Climbing shall await another weekend.
I am curious to see if our relentless pursuit of physical exertion will prove useful during our trek. Backpacking is hard work. Hiking alone can often feel a touch brutal, with the elevation changes, uneven ground, and persistence of boulders and/or streams to navigate. Compiling into the equation a heavy pack notches up the intensity noticeably. Many memories exist of me struggling along a trail, overwhelmed by the weight and yearning for a campsite or car, depending on which stage of the trip serves as our narrative at that moment. The drudgery of motion conducted against adversary while surrounded by beautiful sights is an uplifting sensation hard to convey to those who dislike exertion and/or being outdoors. I suspect adventure shall prove difficult, as always. A distant, elusive reality remains in terms of what level of fitness must we obtain to lessen its brutality.
The prospect of becoming benighted while sitting near a tent pleases me. I look forward to the sky dimming until the darkness reaches its crescendo. Complete darkness offset by whatever phase the moon might be in. And as the sun’s direct blaze diminishes, those playful pinpricks of light bouncing off of Planets and emitting from stars shall pop into the sky’s breadth. All the while, the temperature shall transform down various degrees of warmth. And, certain animal sounds shall transition into silence as others awaken. These night creatures becoming our background symphony. Insects. Perhaps bats. The patter of various rodents.
I am excited. I look forward to this escape from the deep marks of familiar days that we have been etching. Climbing, that activity shall be experienced another week. For now, we take to our feet so that we might pare down and seek some escape into the essentials, of which nature shall be predominant.