Sunday 8 January 2012

6 A.M.






In the pics, the new sequence. Powerful but steady.




In the pics, the final move stuck with the old sequence, on one of my best goes. Ouch!

Tomorrow is Monday, and my alarm will go off at 6.
My holidays are over and they've been great: I climbed nearly every day (nearly every day on the same problem, I must add) and I am happy.
Yesterday I finally decided to change the final sequence: I am bored of smashing my fingers over the hold, under the hold, to the right of the hold, or getting flappers due to its sharp and painful lip. This new sequence adds one move, and it's more physical than the old one, but it's also more secure.
The real problem, though, is that I am not enjoying this anymore. I am happy with every good go, but as I've said I feel it's over, and every go that doesn't see me to the last hold is perceived as a failure and a step back from my best efforts. Some days I didn't want to be there really, and only the company of friends or the simple presence of my dog gave me the necessary happiness to give my best.
I found out it's about happiness.
So, today I went there to finish the business with the new sequence. Well, I couldn't even do the moves in isolation. OK, it was very hot (spring is here definitely, mount Amiata has not seen a snowflake), humid and still, and I was on my fourth day on, but it was too perfect not to give it a try: a siege of months, progressing from not doing the moves, to doing bits of the whole problem, to getting close, to losing my mental sanity, to recovering it, to keeping going there during the summer, to finally finding myself with the final hold in my hand and letting go, to finding a new sequence and, in my mind, to finally doing it on my last day before going back to work and real life.
Wow, that would have been perfect.
It wasn't to be. I gave 110%, trying to find every possible faggotry to climb it, from liquid chalk, to putting my clothes on the holds to cool them down, to sheltering the sun with a pad (obviously falling exactly on the move that at that point was uprotected, a move I haven't fallen off from in months...), but simply I could not do it. As I said, I didn't even do the single moves.
Could I give more? Fuck no. Not today, not in the last two weeks.
I will go back to work and for sure I'll be thinking about the problem. I'll be asking myself if this new sequence is cheating. I'll be asking myself if it's simply the time to let it go. The fact is that I want to be happy while trying it, and this sequence makes me happy.
Now it's time to focus on work and training, hopefully I won't have a tight schedule right from the start, so the plan is to rest tomorrow, have a session on Tuesday morning, rest Wednesday then deliver on Thursday if I am free from school.
I am not exactly sure I became weak(er) while concentrating only on this project. Maybe I haven't broadened my skills, but for sure I perfected what I can do. Proof is that the other day, at the end of the session, I managed a new 7c that Michele had just opened (and hiked as a warm down five times in a row to get footage...); what once would have been a seasonal success, is now an end of session tick. Cool.
Right now, just before going to bed, and with work ahead again, I really am proud of myself. Years ago, when I had the other jobs, in the bank, or at the Public Notary firm, Suday evenings were a nightmare. As soon as I packed the car, with crashpads or my longboard, all the happiness of the day was gone, because in front of me I only had a job that I hated, and that gave me nothing except money: no joy, no self esteem, no commitment, nothing but money, dirty, soulless money. My jobs stole not only my happiness, but also my time, because they cancelled the good moments I'd had. I desired something else, and I never stopped searching the balance. I did not quit. I upset and disappointed many people, but finally I found what I like and what makes me happy. I don't need money, I need people. I need humans. I need good relationships, my best friends close to me. I need to see smiles when I'm at work, and I need to be thanked.
I won back an entire part of my life: I have my Sunday evenings again. And most of all I have my entire self back. The good and the evil self, but I have it all and I am, for once, proud of what I do.
Keep the fucking faith, love and destroy.


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