23 September 2004
Climbing Up the Walls
While we’re on the subject of things I wouldn’t normally do on my own, but I’m glad I get to do anyway because my friends drag me along, I’ve been going to the gym lately. That might not sound like much, but anyone who’s known me for very long would likely react with equal surprise if I said “I’ve been learning to fly lately,” or “I’ve taken to eating live crickets.”
It’s not that I’m lazy (well, maybe it is), I just never got around to fitting a regular exercise regimen into my routine. I knew I should exercise, I knew would feel better if I did. It was always on the list, somewhere just between “making a million dollars” and “owning a restaurant.” Being blessed with a superhuman metabolism, I never really had to exercise to maintain my girlish figure. But lately, with a big boy job that keeps my skinny butt in a $1000 ergonomic desk chair all day, I’ve been feeling the effects of an exertion-free lifestyle.
So when Laura suggested we go to the gym last week, I actually considered it (pretty girls can be very persuasive). She also informed me that, since I paid student fees at KU for four years that went to build the spankin’ new campus rec center, I can use it for free for a few years even though I’m not a student. So that was another obstacle (gym membership fees) out of the way. Dang. I was running out of excuses.
Then she suggested we go rock climbing. I’m not the kind of person who gets excited about treadmills (do those people exist?), and I’ve always thought weight machines looked suspiciously like torture devices. But rock climbing actually sounded like it might be fun. None of this mindless lifting and running in place. On the rock wall, you were an intrepid adventurer, forging a path one handhold at a time to an unseen peak (ok, the ceiling).
Ok, so maybe it wasn’t so adventurous, but it got me in the door. When I checked in at the rock wall, along with a harness and climbing shoes, they gave me a little green wristband branding me as a newcomer. I suspect that it was no accident that it suspiciously resembled a mental patient’s ID tag. “Danger. Moron on the ropes.”
Once I got tied on to the rope and started making my way up one of the “easy” routes, things went pretty smoothly for a while. I scraped my shins on the rocks a couple times, but that just added to the sense of adventure. I was pulling myself up and over, keeping my balance and making progress. Then…nothing.
I hadn’t really noticed my arms getting tired, at least not the way you feel when you’ve been carrying the bottom end of a couch up the stairs and you know you’re going to have to drop it soon. I thought I was doing OK. I reached up for the next hold and tried again to pull myself up. Still nothing. I was out of steam. The instructor yelled up at me. “You done?” I looked up and saw a good quarter of the wall left and sat back on my rope. “Take me down,” I said. I was done. For today, at least.
Sometime later that week I regained partial control of my forearms, and we’ve been back to the gym (treadmills, torture machines and all) on a semi-regular schedule since the first day. Yesterday Laura asked if I wanted to go climbing again. I skipped the visions of adventure this time, but I did remember that last chunk of wall I’d left between me and the ceiling.
“Sure,” I said. “Maybe I’ll make it to the top this time.”
Comments