I should have let Sage come over today. Should have taken Hunter up on it this morning when he asked if I wanted to go to the zoo with him and the kids. Should have found something, anything, to do today but stay locked in my house, staring at the fucking walls.
But I didn’t and now here I am, going out of my mind.
It never gets any easier. It’s been two decades. Isn’t it supposed to get easier?
Today marks twenty years since my mother and baby sister died, and the pain still feels brand new. Mos
t days it’s just a dull ache, just a little twinge now and again that reminds me that I’m missing something important—like an arm or a leg—even though I’ve learned to live without it.
Most days it’s bearable.
But today…today is rough. Rougher than I expected.
Maybe because it’s been twenty years.
Maybe because I’m watching Hunter’s niece and nephew struggle with the loss of their own mother.
Maybe because I’m just a giant puss who can’t get his shit together even after all these years.
Whatever it is, today I miss them like it’s been twenty minutes since they died in that car wreck and not twenty years.
The old guilt rises up, threatens to swallow me whole. If she hadn’t been driving me to my game, if we hadn’t been rushing because I’d begged her not to be late because I didn’t want to run punishments, if I’d just been more understanding of my mom’s crazy schedule and less a part of the madness, maybe things would be different. Maybe they’d still be alive.
The therapist my grandma sent me to when I was young told me I’d drive myself crazy thinking like that, and she was right because just going back there makes me feel like I’m drowning. If I sit here all day thinking about how my little sister would be turning twenty-three next month, I’ll lose my shit completely.
Fuck it. Just…fuck it. I have to get the hell out of here.
Jumping to my feet, I head to my exercise and gear room. I always keep a few backpacks ready to go in case I get the bug, but once I grab one I still take the time to go through it, to make sure I’ve got everything I need.
A stop in the kitchen for some snacks—a few packs of oatmeal, some granola bars, trail mix, a couple bananas and some water—and I’m gone.
Normally I know exactly where I’m going when I set out on one of these free-solo trips, but today I don’t know where I’m going to end up. I’m vaguely thinking Mount Woodson or Torrey Pines, but when the time comes to turn off, I just keep my foot on the gas and my Range Rover heading north.
About halfway there I finally figure out where I’m heading and exactly what peak I want to climb today. I probably shouldn’t even attempt it—I do my best climbs early in the morning, but I won’t even make it to Tahquitz Peak before noon.
Still, it’s where I want to be, and I’ve been doing this long enough to know that’s half the battle. Besides nothing in San Diego County is high or hard enough to give me much of a challenge, and that’s what I need today. Something to do that requires enough concentration that it’ll force me to think only about which handhold I’m going to use next or how to get to the next pitch instead of dwelling on my mom and Sarah and a bunch of might-have-beens.
Yeah, climbing probably isn’t my smartest move with my shoulder not quite back to normal yet. But I’ve got a clean bill of health from the doc—everything that should be healed is healed, so it’s not like scaling the side of a mountain is going to do any more damage to it. It might hurt like hell, but I’m okay with a little pain. If I wasn’t, I would have lost my fucking mind a long time ago.
Besides, it’s one more distraction and today I’ll take whatever I can get.
I’ve got music blasting as I drive—a nice little AC/DC, Metallica and Aerosmith mix that makes it impossible to think and has the added side benefit of getting me pumped as fuck by the time I pull up to Devil’s Slide. It’s close to a five-mile hike from here into Tahquitz, with a twenty-seven-hundred-foot elevation gain. South Ridge is an easier route—a little shorter and less elevated hike—but I’ve done both and I prefer Devil’s Slide.
I stop just long enough to check my supplies one more time—I may be an adrenaline junkie but I don’t have a death wish, no matter what Coach seems to think. No way I’m hiking in to Tahquitz, and then free-soloing it, without making sure I’ve got what I need.
It’s a good trail, a solid hike up that takes a lot of concentration in some spots and not so much in others. But my favorite part of the hike is the scenery. I spend most of my free time on the beach in San Diego, and while I love the Pacific, it’s kind of nice to be up here in the mountains with a whole different kind of scenery.
It doesn’t hurt that it’s a beautiful day. Back home it was just another June gloom kind of morning, with a gray sky and a definite chill in the air. Up here, the chill is even more in evidence but there isn’t a cloud to be seen in the bright blue sky and the visibility is prime. I can see for miles over the mountains, and it gives me yet another thing to focus on as I climb.
When I hike this trail on the weekends, it’s usually pretty busy. But since it’s the middle of the day on a Wednesday, I’ve got it almost completely to myself. I only see three people the whole time I’m making my way to Tahquitz—a couple that I pass about halfway to the peak and one guy coming back.
Which means I’m alone when I get to Tahquitz a little over an hour after I start the hike. Once there, I pause long enough to drink some water and eat a banana and a packet of trail mix. Then I change into my climbing shoes and strap on my chalk bag and helmet.
I brought a lot more equipment—rope, runners, carabiners, anchors—but now that I’m standing here looking up at Tahquitz, I don’t want to use any of it. It’s not an easy rock to climb, but it’s nowhere near the hardest one I’ve traversed, either. There are several pitches on the way up where I can stop if I need to, plus it’s a pretty clean climb. If I take the route up I used last time, on the north side of the rock, there are a lot of handholds, too.
Still, I think about it long and hard. I’m pretty much alone out here. If something happens, I’m screwed. Then again, I’d still be screwed if there were a hundred people out here with me. If I fall off this rock, I’m not walking away.
But, I know I can do it.