They’re words on a screen. I make yearly goals, and I put them in a note on my phone. I used to write them in a notebook or in my journal. Some of those goals still exist in ink or graphite twenty years gone. Occasionally, I’ll go back through old lists and cross stuff off, or I’ll decide if they’re goals I still want to pursue. Sometimes I make new lists. Infrequently, I find my lists have worked themselves out.
At the beginning of 2025 I tried to make a list of
attainable goals. Toward the end of summer, when I was in my pre-August panic—August
being the normal annual low point in my cycle of moods—I realized I hadn’t
reached any of my yearly goals. More than half the year had passed. What was
wrong with me? These were all goals I could reach. This was a list that should
have faded in its predicted due time.
I’m still chipping away. I will cross off fewer of those items
during the 2025 calendar than I had intended. Two lines are troubling me at
this point:
Resend Dreams, and
Send The Pearl
Dreams—as I’ve written about extensively elsewhere—was
one of my proudest sends. It is the most well-known boulder problem I’ve developed.
It’s a hard V3 at the end of a long walk. It takes some compression power and
some mental conditioning for the top out. I know I can do it. I’ve just not tried
it since I wrote it in my yearly tick list. That will change asap. I have less
time to complete this item because the Forest Service will close the Indian Creek
gates sometime within the next three months which will increase the approach
significantly and prohibitively.
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| Standing under Dreams in 2022 |
The Pearl on the other hand…
I never sent that problem. It was a Scott Rennak discovery
at Sky Bridge Ridge ages ago on the big boulder that had come out of the Inhibitor
dihedral. It has good DNA. And it’s as iconic as Dreams. It has sort
of an architectural elegance with its upward arcing offset on a smooth, clean
face to a sloping, blank top out. It’s sculptural. Aesthetic.
So twentysomething years ago I worked it. I was able to do
the initial moves after a couple sessions. Then I went back and worked the top
out moves, because I couldn’t climb into them and sort them out. After another
session I was able to do the top out. I just never followed through and pieced
it all together. I was close. At V5, it wasn’t beyond my capabilities; though
V5 was the hardest grade I ever sent.
Would I have dedicated more time and energy to these two
goals if I hadn’t gotten caught up in developing Schoolhouse Rocks this year?
Yeah, probably. So, what’s changed? Chiggers, I guess. The last two times I’ve
gone up to Schoolhouse to clean and send more problems, I’ve ended up with more
and more itchy bumps. It’s made me think of less buggy options. Dreams and
The Pearl came to mind.
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| The Pearl a couple of years ago |
Yesterday evening, I almost asked my girlfriend if she
wanted to hike up and look at the Pearl. She doesn’t climb, so I felt
like it would be a little bit of an imposition. That’s the conditioning that’s
still held over from my manipulative relationships. She’s not like that. So why
didn’t I ask?
I think I want a private moment to contemplate the problem.
I’m sure the top out needs to be cleaned. I’m sure I’ll want to clean up some other
problems in the area to have as warm-ups and as a potential circuit. Three
years ago, I explored the crag a little more and found a little bonus potential
that I want to develop. So, I can put some time into it for sure. It’s just
been hard to tear myself away from the naked potential of Schoolhouse and the
greater Boulder City development.
If I can do The Pearl…
