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fiend
Apr 14, 2004, 7:23 PM
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If there's on thing that humans are good at it's making mistakes....
and of course jumping on others for theirs.
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shakylegs
Apr 14, 2004, 7:28 PM
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In reply to: Dude, Travis, Have you not read A Prayer for Owen Meany or watched "Simon Birch?" Chucking baseballs kills!!!
I cried at the end of that book. Yeah, I'm comfortable with my feelings.
But, I thought it was basketballs. Can't remember the baseball part.
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maculated
Apr 14, 2004, 7:29 PM
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On a serious note, however, it all depends on the hypothetical dads.
I think Jonathan's point is a little weak in that he assumes that the workaholic dad is doing it for enjoyment. Since we're arguing climbers, let's argue climbers.
There are those of us who have made life committments to never become workaholics. There's a reason. My dad is a great example. He made bank, my family lives in a swanky house on the top of a swanky hill in an swanky part of the SF Bay Area. He worked for month and even years away from us, and when the big earthquake in SF hit, I literally did not see him for 9 months - he worked nights 7 days a week. He's 60 now and he has other obligations to family and he's unhappy. He looks at me and simultaneously wants to beat me silly because at my age he already had two kids and two jobs but he also looks at me and can see that I'm not going to be unhappy the rest of my life, either. Would I rather he have lived an awesome life and then died? Heck no, but . . . you are being selfish in your own argument when you say climbers are selfish.
If my dad up and left all his responsiblities and finally struck out to seek happiness before he died, I would be stoked for him. I'm going to be bummed if he doesn't, honestly.
The thing you need to remember is that how parents live their lives also translates to how their kids will lead theirs. If I pop out a few little maculateds in my time, and then I splatter ten years later, I hope that at least that time that I spent with them will be full of positive life lessons, not tired Mom sighing, needing a break from them, and giving them expensive toys to compensate.
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roughster
Apr 14, 2004, 7:30 PM
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In reply to: If there's on thing that humans are good at it's making mistakes.... and of course jumping on others for theirs.
Bingo! We are seeing this happening on the "True Confessions" thread. I understand the "desire" to want to flame someone, but realize that it does not good. Its better to read the report, let it sink in, think about what went wrong and what you would have done differently, and then try to add smething positive or at least say you're thankful she got out alive.
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maculated
Apr 14, 2004, 7:30 PM
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Shaky, don't you rememember how Mom bought the farm in that book?
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dredsovrn
Apr 14, 2004, 7:52 PM
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I am going to guess that I missed something. Who is Amber?
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flamer
Apr 14, 2004, 8:18 PM
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In reply to: In reply to: Dude, Travis, Have you not read A Prayer for Owen Meany or watched "Simon Birch?" Chucking baseballs kills!!! I cried at the end of that book. Yeah, I'm comfortable with my feelings. But, I thought it was basketballs. Can't remember the baseball part.
I also cried at the end of this book....I was fighting fires in Florida summer of '98- we were on our way to a new fire - I was balling in the back of the van- my saw partner thought I was nuts- then he read the book and did the same thing a week later.
good book.
I have more to say about risk and this topic in general- but I don't have time this second.
josh
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fargoan
Apr 14, 2004, 8:42 PM
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In reply to: [If I had the choice of having a workaholic father, or a dead father, I'd always choose having a dad. At least the workaholic is doing something for his family. He's putting food on the table, and supplying them the means to live. A father that dies climbing, died doing something strictly for himself. It's kinf of arrogant to assume that his happy go lucky climbing lifestyle actually had such a positive effect on his children that his death was preferable to having a dad that works through the weekends sometimes.
i can't disagree with that. i think it's a balance though. i mean, me soloing up el cap is one thing... but all it takes is one touron pulling up my anchor here in the park (a not uncommon event) and i could break my back while climbing on top-rope. (of course, now I'm talking about risk-calculation, which changes the discussion, but again, i'm just trying to say that everybody chooses their own acceptable level of risk, whether they know it or not. and i'll agree that people should consider those around them, but it's their life in the end.) or at least that's what i'm trying to say.
now, what if dad's a professional guide? and gets hired to take a party up the north face of the eiger?? :lol:
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shakylegs
Apr 14, 2004, 8:49 PM
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In reply to: I also cried at the end of this book....I was fighting fires in Florida summer of '98- we were on our way to a new fire - I was balling in the back of the van- my saw partner thought I was nuts- then he read the book and did the same thing a week later. josh
Hey, no fair! You were doing manly stuff with axes and saws and stuff. A tear was permitted in your case. Me, I was avoiding my fiancée with whom I was splitting at the time.
Amber, for clarification’s sake: you did this the immediate Monday after RRR? If so, NOT JUDGING! Just wondering if you gave any thought to the fact that you had spent the previous weekend drinking, which may have led to the hypoglycemia.
If it was a week later, never mind.
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calamity_chk
Apr 14, 2004, 9:13 PM
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In reply to: Amber, for clarification’s sake: you did this the immediate Monday after RRR? If so, NOT JUDGING! Just wondering if you gave any thought to the fact that you had spent the previous weekend drinking, which may have led to the hypoglycemia. If it was a week later, never mind.
yes, it was the monday after, but the only night i drank was saturday. honestly, i'm not sure that i drank enough to induce hypolgycemia, espeically that late in the day. it seems like i would have felt it earlier, but i'm no medical professional and certainly wasnt testing my glucose levels during the day.
i'm fairly certain that inadequate diet and smoking too much are what threw me into fits. (smoking encourages inefficient management of blood sugar and nicotine withdrawl tends to promote a hypoglycemic state. i was craving a cigarette to the nth degree up there and had been eating less than normal - scary to those who know my dietary habits.)
also, i'm in horrible physical shape (cardio as well as muscular strength) and have lost a lot of weight - body fat is *way* low.
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climbsomething
Apr 14, 2004, 9:27 PM
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In reply to: In reply to: I see that doens't slow down others very much though. Risk tolerance is a very personal thing. And yet, since we are all supposedly climbers here we can begin with the notion that each of us assumes undue risk EVERY TIME we go climing. We like to delude ourselves in a sense, reassuring each other that we are safe in what we do. And yet... anyone who declares climbing to be "safe" is in my humble opinion a fool. Well I do judge Amber for her lack of judgement and overstating her skills. Yes, there is risk involved every time we rope up, but...one can stack the cards in their favor by having a strong climbing background, realize one's limitations and through experience realize when one is in over their head and get out safely and in one piece. The bottom line is Amber with her lack of skills should not have been on that wall.
People like bobd1953 are judging Amber's *abilities* and *actions.* I don't feign to speak for him or Amber, but I take from their posts on the matter that: 1) Bob is not taking it upon himself to judge Amber personally. Rather, he is forsaking the warm fuzzies to make the stark but not unfair point that she was an inexperienced climber whose inexperience contributed greatly to her accident. 2) Amber, after her accident, agrees with him. She has stared death in the face and learned, learned how to re-evaluate her own motivations and abilities. She can judge her OWN character and motivations now, and only she really has that right. I am sure she has considered this.
I am not stating a revelation, people. I am just saying that you have to disassociate judging people personally and taking swipes at their character and drive from analyzing their actions.
Likewise, I am not judging Amber personally. I am not saying I told you so. She did not "deserve" this terrible scare- it is not just desserts for somebody who thought too highly of themselves or sprayed or whatever it is she or others perceived her to do on these boards. I am glad she is okay. It is not my place to judge her as a person- yeahyeahyeah, it can be "fun" to trash or flame somebody but frankly, when the shit hits the fan like this, it's pretty tacky. It's sobering when somebody almost dies. You know in your heart, if you have one, that you don't want to judge this person, laugh at them, kick them when they're down.
But it is entirely kosher to analyze what went wrong, even if it means breaking from the group hug for a second. I think Amber is bright and tough enough to not take that too personally. If she weren't, I imagine she would have kept silent on the whole ordeal. But she's smart enough to have learned and want to pass her lesson on to others, and part of that is bracing herself for the analyses of other learned, experienced people like Bob.
Again, I don't judge Amber's heart, and I doubt anybody else around here really does either. Nor do I think we are hypocrites every time, after participating in The Amber Threads, we take our calculated risks, whether that means slaying 14-pitch dragons or bouldering above some broken blocks. There's a difference between weighing our own ambitions and passions and delivering testimony on one's terrifying accident. And I don't think it's that difficult to see. But hey, that's just me, getting on a soapbox, taking a big breath, and vomiting my thesaurus...
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tedc
Apr 14, 2004, 9:29 PM
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In reply to: In reply to: By your logic no one should tackle any objective that is beyond their ability to control. No one should EVER venture on to K2. My guesstimation is that Ambers risk of injury or death on MB was significantly less than that of any competent alpinist attempting K2 Amber was far from being a compentent big-wall climber. You just don't get it, do you?
And Moonlight Buttress is far from being the K2 of big-wall climbs. Sorry if my analogy wat a little unclear but I think I get it just fine.
Amber's risk of death on MB was pretty small. (Much smaller than the risk that the most competant climber assumes when attempting a climb like K2 or the risk Hillary assumed on Everest.) Sure her dice came up snake eyes. But so do the dice of lots of people who take risks. Bob, tell me that you have never looked death in the eye and rolled a lucky 7. That makes you (and me too for that matter) only a roll of the dice different than Amber. We all take risks. The best we can hope is that we understand the risks so that we can evaluate them against the reward and make an informed decision (unlike Amber, who has admitted thet her descision was arrived at erroneously)
PS:
Dingus gets it too:
In reply to: But the base ambition... of going where we haven't gone before and presumably have no business going in the first place... isn't that part of what climbing is all about??? |
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dingus
Apr 14, 2004, 9:31 PM
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In reply to: Again, I don't judge Amber's heart, and I doubt anybody else around here really does either.
Someone in one of those other threads said she was too ambitious. Wast that notion I objected to. Still do.
DMT
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atg200
Apr 14, 2004, 9:37 PM
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In reply to: In reply to: Again, I don't judge Amber's heart, and I doubt anybody else around here really does either. Someone in one of those other threads said she was too ambitious. Wast that notion I objected to. Still do. DMT
but she was too ambitious - hell, she talked about doing the hallucinogen in the black as he first wall over and over again. i climbed with her quite a bit, and i knew that something like this would happen sooner rather than later - she was an accident waiting to happen. i am glad she didn't die, and i'm also glad she didn't take anyone with her. its all fun and games until you get your partner killed too.
its probably a lot easier to be objective about these things when they don't involve people you know.
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shakylegs
Apr 14, 2004, 9:38 PM
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So, Amber, as you mentioned in the RRR thread, you drank enough on the Saturday night to fairly pass out in Alex's car. Let's face it, you most likely still had alcohol in your body.
You're down to about 90 lbs, you drive late through late Monday and get only a few hours sleep, most likely fitful at that.
You might be in nicotine withdrawal, which, hey, congrats! Sincerely. Hang in there.
Your cardio needs work (Hi Amber, my name is Michel and I'm in the same boat).
Nowhere in the A&E thread is there any mention that you & Tim established a turn-around time.
All this and you're attempting what appears to be a big wall that might be at your limit on a good day.
I'm definitely not judging you here.
I'm looking at this as what to do if I want to get my a$$ in deep crap. Glad you made in out.
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very
Apr 14, 2004, 10:07 PM
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dude, drinking ain't no reason to lose your know how on a wall-
drink a few more cobras and you could have got up el cap in a pooshe!
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calamity_chk
Apr 14, 2004, 10:10 PM
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first .. fwiw, the conversations that i mentioned in the post .. "conversations that i recalled vividly and painfully" .. were mostly conversations that i'd had with atg200 about my various weaknesses and goals. it's been a while since he and i have climbed together - but he and camhead were my main partners during late '02/early '03. i've improved a bit since climbing with atg last, but suffice to say that he'll be one of the people from whom i seek advice whenever i feel like i'm ready for something big again.
shaky, i did drink a fair bit on saturday, but i passed out in my own car because i had driven from boulder to vegas the night before and was working with about 4 hours of sleep at the time (saturday night). true, i'm sure the alcohol helped me sleep a bit better, but even without beer, i probably would have fallen asleep on the drive back to vegas anyway.
sunday was a rest day. i mostly did errands and checked out the sights. at lunch, i met up with tim and his wife, we had lunch and went to zion. while i dont recall exactly how many hours of sleep i got, but it wasnt fitful. further, i'm never a happy camper when i have to rise at 4a - even if it was my idea and even if i am climbing. i'm just not a morning person.
i was in nictoine withdrawl. i normally smoke a pack a day, i only had four or five that day. i honestly believe that this was more likely to have played a role in hypogly than the alcohol. even if i wasnt necessarily good at recognizing my climbing abilities, i feel rather competent in addressing factors that affect my blood sugar. i've been dealing with mild hyperinsulinism most of my life.
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calamity_chk
Apr 14, 2004, 10:15 PM
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shaky, wonderful job at getting things wrong and being an ass.
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shakylegs
Apr 14, 2004, 10:55 PM
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Amber, I'm not trying to be an ass. What I'm trying to point out is that, even unbeknowst to you, there were pre-existing conditions that would have contributed to your condition later in the day.
So, if you still have a problem, please point out where I was being an ass.
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tim
Apr 14, 2004, 10:57 PM
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In reply to: Nowhere in the A&E thread is there any mention that you & Tim established a turn-around time.
Sure we did -- I established that we'd be bailing if we couldn't make it to within a pitch or two of the top, before we set out that day. Whether this came as a surprise to Amber or not, that's how I thought of it. It's 8 pitches, and my wife had to catch a flight out of LA the next day, so it was fire the route or bail, and as her lead took about, I don't know, 3? 4? hours, I radioed up that we needed to bail. There's always a turn around time, defined or not... been burned too many times by rappelling in the dark. I'd have been okay to push through if we were two pitches from the top, but at the Rocker Blocker, with fixed lines to the ground? Once the sun started to go down, that's all she wrote.
(that was the only thing I had to add)
edit: Oh, also, I do not think you were being an ass. Some inaccuracies but overall your concerns are fairly legitimate. Probably did play a role.
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plund
Apr 14, 2004, 11:06 PM
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JUDGEMENTS - 1) Amber is very very lucky 2) Amber has mucho sacko to lay her story out here for the flamelords to barbecue 3) I'm a n00b, so my judgments don't mean squat 4) hindsight is 20/20
Amber, I'm glad you & your partner are okay - tip of the cap for trying to make the best of a frightening, dare I say somewhat embarrassing situation.
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holmeslovesguinness
Apr 14, 2004, 11:10 PM
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In reply to: Of course if things had gone a little better we could easily have been on Party Ledge thinking about the best course of action (bail or punch it out). So we inhabit a gray area where calculations are messy and judgements arbitrary, and I wonder how to come to the conclusion that "humble, injured, aware" is better than "reckless, successful, healthy"? Obviously that's a biased presentation but, guess what, I'm biased. :-)
There's the rub - I think A LOT of climbers get into things that are over their heads at one time or another without recognizing just how bad things could get (unless something bad actually happens). Most of us we just cruise on through our gumby years in blissful ignorance until we get enough experience to know just how dumb we've been.
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shakylegs
Apr 14, 2004, 11:47 PM
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Tim, thanks for the clarification. I missed the turnaround time thing, and I apologise for the misunderstanding.
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scottcody
Apr 14, 2004, 11:57 PM
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If I may chime in.... but i think this topic is very well covered and brings up a lot of well written and well thought out posts... I'll do my best to maintain the standard of quality.
Amber,
I think your only "crime" if you will, was not paying attention to your body. Self awareness is not, in my opinion, a technical skill that can be taught. And it is from this lack of self awareness that you got yourself hurt.
I would also argue that there was nothing "freak" or random about this incident (IMO it is not an "accident") as is suggested by stating "her dice came up snake eyes". She/you were not struck by rock fall, a bolt didn't blow out on you, weather didn't move in and catch you without yer Gore-Tex, etc, etc.
Was your ambition at fault? Well, did it impair your self awareness? Was it your ambition to get up the wall that had you ignore the first signs of bonking? It can be called pride, ambition, and a litany of other things.
And for my point
1) Technical skill can be learned by anyone, but it isn't technical skill alone that gets you up long routes.
2) I think anyone that has been climbing for any length of time has gotten him or her self in over their head, And for those of us that are still around, i think most would agree that it was presence of mind and awareness of the situation that kept us from either getting really hurt or dying.
This I don't think can be easily taught or learned.
Case in point... My wife (I'm gonna pay for this one :) )
5-6 years ago my wife and I went to El Portero and started up 1-2 pitch 5.9 route next to space boyz. She was following and trailing the second rope. (Now she is a good climber in the technical sense, she could easily follow anything I could lead (which at the time was 11 ish... I know, I know aren't I cool :roll: )) Then she gets to the crux of the route, a small overhang/roof thing about 20 ft. from the belay. Well, (i still give her a hard time for this) she pulls up a bunch of slack on the tag line throw a fig 8 on a bit and clips it into the bolt that is under the roof. Why? "Because it was heavy and pulling on my harness" the result... she is just about to the belay and surprise, surprise, she can't go any higher. We were fortunate that this occurred in place where the situation was some what easy to correct.
Point of the story; she should have had the presence of mind to AT LEAST clean "the gear" as she climbed past. Is that something I could teach her before hand... nope. She was on her own to think through her actions and acknowledge the possible outcomes of those actions.
I am not talking in a general sense... because I think in a general sense the above statement is meaningless. I am talking about on a moment by moment, action by action basis.
This and to the degree with which it is practiced is what, I feel, makes good climbers... “If I do (action, ie fist jam, smear, edge, place gear, skip breakfast, don't bring smokes with me, don't wear a nic patch) then (consequence) will happen”.
For truly great climbers this becomes second nature, so much so that many of us n00bs, don't even see the pr0cess occurring.
And that is my point and the lesson that should be taken away from Amber’s folly.
Ambition to climb big cool stuff fuel that inspires great feats, but one must ALWAYS be aware of his or her surroundings, both internal and external.
Amber,
I'm glad you are ok, and if/when I make out farther west I'd be happy to tie in with you.
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