The need for rock

The Simple Chick and I made a decision a few weeks ago to make our trad season happen. Last year, as sunny days passed by, I threw myself into running, but it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that it broke my heart to not be out on rock. Life and circumstances change and I now know many more safe and competent climbers to get outdoors with and, for the next four months at least, I am free to get out whenever the weather is favourable.

A smiling Simple Chick at Stanage

For the past few weeks, the sun seems to have just kept shining and I have actually managed to get out climbing. I was perhaps surprised to find that the events of last year are still at the forefront of my mind, even when seconding I am sometimes frightened and I am now unbelievably cautious on lead. I don't want to go above my own gear - because I have seen gear (not my own) fail, with serious consequences.  But something else curious has happened, perhaps because of the added Vitamin D, perhaps because it gets me away from my PhD, perhaps because of the inherent mindfulness of the very act of climbing, but for these last few weeks of frequent trad excursions, I have have felt far more at peace with myself than I have done for several months. The more time I spend wielding hexes, the things that have been upsetting me seem to be carried away on the ever present wind.

Trying to muster the courage to jam on lead...

And to me, climbing, particularly on gritstone, remains a challenge. I constantly have to fight my own fears, my perception of my limitations and my hands are scabbed from learning to jam, but even if I have been shut down on routes and despite having so much still to learn, of all the different aspects of climbing that exist, I know that trad is my 'thing'. The way that it makes me feel and the way I feel about climbing trad, are almost impossible to encapsulate in words - it is as if I 'need' to climb to make myself whole.

P making up another route at Almscliff

I want to spend every minute of good weather this summer out on the rock with my friends. I no longer care about the inconsequential ins and outs, and ups and downs, of real life, for me, climbing transcends it all.

As time and time again I find myself saying, 'I just want to go climbing'.

Scary Mary atop 'It's Scary Mary' (S 4a) at Stanage