Climb On (284/366)

(285/366)

Today Mel made her triumphant return to climbing! I’m so glad she’s back, because not only is she fun to climb with, she’s also full of hilarious stories. Never a dull moment when Mel is around!

Speaking of lack of dull moments…

Today I was climbing one of the routes and I made it about 2/3 of the way up. I was taking a little break to give my arms a rest and assess the situation. As I was getting ready to heave myself up over a ledge I accidentally hit myself in the face with the rope. Somehow I managed to hit myself in the eye which, given that the rope is, well, a rope and not a pointy stick is sort of improbable and impressive I would say.

Now, having poked myself in the eye with the side of a rope I soon realized that things were not all right in that department. In the sense that I could feel my contact lens moving around in there. If you wear contacts, you know the feeling. Sometimes the lens gets all folded up in your eye, sometimes it shifts around a bit, sometimes you have some dirt stuck underneath it. Whatever. Then you just stick your finger in there, move it around, and get on with your life. But as I was holding onto a climbing wall thirty feet in the air and my hands were full of chalk and dirt and sweat, that was not really an option. So I did a bunch of blinking until I felt my contact…fall out of my eye. Then I briefly noticed it flutter thirty feet down to the ground.

So, I did what you would expect. I shut my one eye (I can’t see past my nose without glasses or contacts. One missing contact and I might as well be blind.) and kept climbing. What? Is that not what you were expecting? C’mon people. This is ME we’re talking about.

And then. Then I got to the top. Andrew lowered me to the ground and before I untied myself I bent down and found my contact. It was not but three feet from where I landed. So I picked it up and stuck it back in my eye. Because sometimes you just gotta tell yourself to keep going.