IMTUF 100 Race Report: Some Things Were Beautiful, Some Things Hurt

The strange dichotomy of my life continues! As I'm finally sitting down to write about the 36 harrowing hours I spent running through the rugged backcountry of Idaho last weekend, please note that this entry is brought to you from the luxury of a plush hotel room, complete with room service, in Salt Lake City, where I'm on business (and, soon, play) for the next few days.

In sharp contrast, last weekend, I was a filthy wreck of a human being, coated in dirt and sweat and Duct tape.

I suppose I need to start at the beginning - dinner with Deby after she finished the Pine to Palm 100 in Oregon three weeks ago. Deby is one of my badass-ultrarunner-mom-extraordinaire friends. She's run five 100s in the last couple of months, which is ridiculous, amazing, and thoroughly inspiring all in one. Though all my epic runs and pacing gigs this year have undoubtedly stoked my enthusiasm for knocking out my own 100, there was something in particular about seeing Deby's strength on the beautiful trails at Pine to Palm that really got into my pores.

So, despite the fact that I've said all year that I wouldn't try to run a 100 until 2013, there we were at dinner, and I was busy on my fancy phone researching potential 100s for the remainder of 2012. Sadly, though, there was not a one that really appealed to me. They all had issues: too far away from home, too flat, too many loops, too many leaves, already sold out. Grumble grumble; first world problems, I know.

So I dropped my pipe dream. For a week, at least. Then I took a look at the website for IMTUF (Idaho Mountain Trail Ultra Festival), the 100 that would be Deby's 5th this year. There were reasons to be cautious: the entire course is at significant elevation (5,000-8,000 feet). It would be an inaugural race, which could mean poor logistics or course markings. Then there were the race directors' ominous disclaimers: "It will be a loop course of uncompromising quality and difficulty through the Payette National Forest. You are highly encouraged to have a mountain 100 under your belt before you attempt this race." And: "This is the high Rockies and these giants make their own weather."

Shiver.

But no matter; I was already seduced. IMTUF boasted everything I wanted: tons of elevation, almost exclusively singletrack trails, a generous 36-hour cutoff, a hot springs at the start/finish line, sexy laser-engraved finishers' belts, and perhaps best of all - a race far away and mostly full of strangers, so I could sneak away and give it a try without hardly anyone in my life knowing. Deby and I were the only Washingtonians in it. Somehow, given the sheer impulsiveness of my decision, I really wanted the opportunity to run without the pressure of anyone in my life knowing what I was attempting. To be honest, mostly it was because I felt wildly uncertain I'd be able to finish, and well...I guess I wanted to protect my ability to DNF (Did Not Finish) if need be. I worried that if I knew all my buddies at Seattle Mountain Running Group were tracking me, I might explode from the pressure alone.

So I sent Deby a quiet email: "I got this spontaneous, harebrained idea in my head that I might want to try IMTUF. Please don't tell anyone. Am I crazy?"

She promptly wrote back: "You already know how to be tough and to get it done. So no, I don't think it's crazy and am all for it! Check with your boss and start dreaming Sister."

So, asked for the days off from work: Check.
Asked Steve if he would be interested in coming to crew/pace for me: Check.
Registered on Ultrasignup at 2 a.m., six days before the race: Check.

The following Friday, Steve, Deby's crew/pacer Erin, and I got up before the crack of dawn and hit the road for Idaho. Nine hours later, we rolled up at the woodsy paradise of Burgdorf hot springs.

We met Deby, and the four of us shared a cozy, primitive cabin with no running water or electricity. We cozied up by the wood stove, which proved infinitely valuable through the well-below-freezing nights.

Which brings me to the start of IMTUF: 6 a.m. Saturday morning. The temperature was 8 degrees Fahrenheit. The drink tube on my hydration pack froze almost instantly (and didn't thaw out until three or four hours into the race). I had a handheld, too, but that, too, froze quickly.

The first few dark miles of the race were absorbed almost entirely with hydration maintenance. Every time I wanted a sip of water, I had to breathe heavily on my handheld for at least a minute to thaw it enough to unscrew the lid to drink. Then the moment I took it off, new water froze inside the grooves of the lid, making it impossible to screw the lid back on. I devised a plan: run for several minutes while holding my open handheld upright so as not to lose any water, and with the lid clenched between my teeth, so my breath would melt the ice in the tracking grooves. Then I could screw the lid back on and run for another mile or two before getting thirsty again and repeating the whole laborious process. The water itself rapidly became a slushy, ridden with ice chunks.

 

Photo by Michael Lebowitz 

Early on, I fell into line with Brandi - an Idaho local, fellow 100-virgin, and also the race director Jeremy's wife. We more or less ran the first twenty miles together, cruising along the gently rolling terrain at a 10 or 11 minute mile pace, chatting it up, chasing the sunrise, having a great time.

The course was rugged and beautiful from the very beginning. The fall colors were stunning. My body felt fantastic. My mind was high already.

 

Photo by Michael Lebowitz  

 

The course began the first of many brutal climbs shortly after mile 20. I fell away from Brandi here, and had my first "Oh $%&#, what was I thinking trying to run this thing?!" moment. My lungs seared at the thin air on the first big climb. The first 20 miles had felt so effortless, I'd forgotten that the zen-like runners' high was more an anomaly than a standard and that, in fact, most of this would actually hurt quite a lot. Humbled already.

I planned my blog entry: the subject line would be IM(not)TUF(enough). 

Around the 50K mark, we runners got briefly dumped out on a road. Against my mind's willing, I found myself walking - even on an easy downhill. I counted down from 5, then picked up my feet and began running again. Right then, Steve and Erin came barreling around the corner in their crew vehicle, honking their horn like crazy, and nearly giving me a heart attack. They were on their way down to meet me at the next aid station; I was running about an hour ahead of my very loose time projections, but already feeling tired and a little discouraged. It was definitely a boost to see them both.

Such a boost, I guess, that I forgot about paying attention to course markings, and missed a giant orange sign that would have told me to hop the guardrail and veer right into the woods. I could see the aid station on Payette Lake that I knew I was supposed to be headed toward, but as I continued down the road I was on, I was moving beyond it. 

Then, the orange ribbons guided me left into the woods - the opposite direction from the aid station. In my already slightly dazed state, I was only vaguely aware of the fact that something seemed off. I ran a half mile or so up the trail before finding a welcome outhouse at a trailhead that I dashed into. When I emerged, Steve and Erin had pulled up in their crew vehicle, and were frantically waving me down; "You missed a turn!" they told me.

So I turned back around and retraced my steps. Embarrassingly, the race director Ben happened to be driving by and saw me running the wrong way on the road. He tried to get me to turn around, but I explained that I hadn't been down to the aid station yet, because I'd missed a turn, so I still needed to get down there before running onward. He was dumbfounded, "Didn't you see all the orange flags and the the giant orange sign?"

When I did get down to the aid station, the other RD Jeremy pulled me aside. "Ben told me what happened. Didn't you see all the orange flags and the giant orange sign?" he asked me. :P Silly, already-delirious, 100-newbie me. User error! And only 32 miles in, oi vey. It was going to be a long race. I was so shaken up by my wrong turn and the RDs' mention of potential disqualification (obviously, they didn't disqualify me, because I'd made the effort to retrace my steps and probably even ran a bonus mile or two - but their use of the word at all spooked me) that I blew out of that aid station, completely forgetting to drink or eat or restock my pack. Steve and Erin hadn't been able to find a road to drive down to the aid station to meet me, so they weren't there either. I dashed out in a hurry, and only realized a mile or two later that I had about 30 oz. of water and 150 calories in my pack, to last me the next 12 miles (roughly 3 hours). 

The day had heated up. The air was thin and dry, my throat already full of dust. I felt parched, hungry, low on energy. The terrain was rugged. I was stressed about my wrong turn, then forgetting to drink or eat at the aid station. My mind got stuck on a self-defeating broken record. I couldn't stop beating myself up for my mental fuzziness, for careless errors that might well cost me the opportunity to finish. I was pretty sure, at this point, that I'd be DNF'ing - perhaps later rather than sooner, but as my water and food ran out and I started to feel dizzy, a DNF already seemed inevitable.

In Eat & Run, Scott Jurek wrote: "The ultra distance leaves you alone with your thoughts to an excruciating extent. Whatever song you have in your head had better be a good one. Whatever story you are telling yourself had better be a story about going on. There is no room for negativity. The reason most people quit has nothing to do with their body."

Although I had mostly been running by myself for the past ten miles, a couple runners had passed me during that long stretch, and taken the time to chat a bit before moving onward. Any kind of social contact offered a terrific mental boost. When the next aid station at Foolhen Meadows finally showed up - happily, earlier than expected! - I was finally able to change the soundtrack in my head to a positive one. I gulped down water and HEED, ate liberally, jammed a thousand calories inside my pack, and instantly felt better.

Then, just a couple miles more, and I arrived at the spot where pacers could jump in for the first time. Steve and Erin were both there, smiling brightly, positive and encouraging as ever, geared up, and ready to run. The greatness of the mental boost I got from Steve joining me cannot be overstated. I'll go ahead and say it now: there is absolutely no way I could have finished this race without his company, conversation, camaraderie, and coaching. I have renewed appreciation for the role of a pacer. In all four of my pacing experiences this summer, I'm not sure I ever served as a genuine savior/race-salvager to my runners, at least not on the level that Steve did for me in this race. Indebted is an understatement.

The sun went down shortly after we left the mile 44 mark. We kept each other as lively as we could through the night. I'd said beforehand that I'd like to keep conversation going as much as possible, to help the miles go by. We'd also agreed beforehand that, short of a true medical emergency, both of us would keep running - no matter how much it hurt, no matter how appealing stopping might seem. Steve had never run longer than a marathon - but being the avid hiker and backpacker he is, and knowing that I'd be moving slowly anyway, I was confident he'd do just fine.

At some point, he asked innocently enough, "So, um, is this much walking pretty typical in an ultra?" And there I'd been, thinking proudly that I was running quite a bit more than I'd expected to by mile 50! I laughed. Steve added that if he'd known trail running was really just glorified hiking, he'd have hopped on board a long time ago. 

From mile 50 on for quite a few hours, I felt fantastic. Definitely caught my second runners' high. Saw a shooting star, made a wish. At mile 58, there was a fire roaring and the AS served chicken fingers and the most delicious instant mashed potatoes I'd ever tasted. Life was good.

Then came the inevitable crash. The stretch between Blackwell Lake (mile 68) and North Crestline was supposed to be 10 miles; however, the Garmins of several other runners indicated it was actually 14. Mentally (and physically), I was ready for the aid station about two hours before it actually turned up. Steve and I were rocking a steady run/walk over the mountains - yet this section wound up taking us 5.5 hours.

This was, by far, the most challenging part of the entire race. Sleep deprivation set in. My toes had begun blistering horribly. My legs, miraculously, still felt strong - but that was pretty much irrelevant, given the abrupt, excruciating pain of every step on my blistering feet. I was wincing - and eventually moaning - in pain, with every single footfall. Steve put up with my grumpy bitterness like a champ - even as he crossed into his own uncharted waters of ultrarunning. Let me tell you: if you can be so fortunate as to land yourself a rowing coach/coxswain for a pacer at your next hundred, you will not regret it. He knew all the right things to say to keep me putting one foot in front of the other.

Mentally, it was extraordinarily hard to feel as though we were chasing down an aid station that would never come. I started sobbing pretty uncontrollably, while running, around mile 75. The finish seemed so impossibly far away. My feet hurt worse than they'd ever hurt before. It was brutally cold out. Runners had already dropped due to nausea, altitude sickness, hypothermia, hypnoatremia, sheer exhaustion.

Worst of all, I was disappointed in myself for so thoroughly falling apart. My biggest question, going into this experience, was whether the distance would break me. I'd seen it break so many. Beforehand, I felt convinced I'd be stronger than that, that I wouldn't be broken. I told Steve, "I want to be grinning and doing cartwheels at mile 80, not grumpy and crying and talking about quitting." But there were no cartwheels.

Let's put it this way: even if Glenn had been there, I wouldn't have been able to muster a jump. I simply felt I had nothing left to give. And I still had nearly 25 miles to go. (The IMTUF course is, in fact, long by several miles.)

The aid station at North Crestline, when it did come, was a godsend. There was a cozy tent. There was real food. A kind man wrapped up all my raw, bleeding, torn up toes in Duct tape. Unfortunately, I'd slowed down so much overnight that I had gone from being even at mile 70 with the eventual first-place woman to being right up against the cutoffs. (Granted, first place woman Emily Berriochoa eventually finished in 34:23, just about an hour and a half ahead of the cutoff...just to give you some perspective on how tough this race was.) I still very much doubted my ability to finish - which felt heartbreaking.

But we started off again, awake, refreshed, and now with some time barriers to keep us moving. The sun was up; it was a new day. My feet felt (slightly) better, all taped up. My mantra was from Slaughterhouse Five: "Everything was beautiful, and nothing hurt." On cruise control, we blazed into the aid station at mile 87 with smiles, a half hour to spare to the cutoff there, and jetted right back out to tackle the last big climb of the race, up to Cloochman Saddle at 92.6. The climb was a challenge, and certainly got my muscles screaming - but it was gorgeous.

The ladies working the aid station at Cloochman were awesome. We sat down to enjoy some watermelon and no-bake cookies, and wait for Deby - who had been a half hour to an hour behind me for most of the race - to catch up to us. Unsurprisingly, she was in solid spirits. The three of us took off for the final home stretch together. 

Unfortunately, the altitude, sleep deprivation, mild dehydration, along with the whole running 50+ miles thing on pretty much no training whatsoever, caught up to Steve at this point. As we ran along the very sunny, very exposed, and very high-altitude (at least to us Seattle flatlanders) ridge, he started to feel extremely dizzy. I thought it very sneaky of him to fall apart right then, because it yanked my own mind out of the pity party it had been in - and I shifted all my focus to making sure he was okay. We did slow down; I waved Deby on ahead while I sat with Steve, got some water in him, and gradually got us moving again. It was wildly distracting from my own misery at that point! Well played, coach - a good trick for the pacer book, to be sure. 

When we finally dropped off the ridge again into the woods for the final final home stretch, we were both pretty wrecked. Nothing was beautiful, and everything hurt. That last stretch of downhill trail, which ordinarily I would have loved bombing down, felt like a death march to Hades. I was looking at my watch, knowing I was rapidly approaching the 36-hour cutoff. As we tumbled painfully down the never-ending trail, I felt my heart sinking.

I knew that we were supposed to pop off the trail at some point onto a forest service road for the final 1.5 miles. When I finally reached the road, I let out a whoop, and found power in my legs I didn't even know I had. It was a total Hollywood moment. I knew Steve had nothing left to give at that point; I could hear him cheering and whooping behind me, yelling at me to go for it and beat the cutoff.

Something primitive was unleashed in me; I roared. I sprinted down that road. I was beyond all pain, all exhaustion. For anyone who saw Bob Satko run out the final fifty yards of his 200-miler at Pigtails earlier this year, I felt exactly like that moment. I was ecstatic as I went flying down that road. I could hear the echoes of Steve's cheers fading behind me as I flew.

 

Photo by Michael Lebowitz

The non-Hollywood part is that I missed the cutoff by three minutes. But let's be real; did I care? Hell no. I ran 100 miles! :) Ben and Jeremy were there to cheer me across the finish line, award me my finishers' belt, and invite me back to, as they suggested, "run a 32-hour race next year". 

I'll be back for sure. This race was unbelievable. Ben and Jeremy were some of the best race directors I've ever seen - so involved, so present, so supportive, so awesome. They had everything dialed. The course was ridiculously well marked. The aid stations were fabulous, the real food delicious, the volunteers amazing. Idahoans are some of the friendliest folk I've ever met. The hot springs at Burgdorf were the perfect way to soak exhausted muscles the following morning.

Group shot of the inaugural IMTUF's runners, crews, volunteers, and RD's:

 

Photo by Michael Lebowitz 

Thank you to everyone in this picture for making my first 100 experience as incredible as it was! Once again, I'm overwhelmed with gratitude for the people who've brought so much richness to my life. I thank you all for believing in me. I couldn't have done this without you. Love, love, love.

Pants, metaphorical tsunamis, and my new gig

Too many adventures to write about, too little time! Let it be known that over the past few weeks, I have donned a variety of pants - literal, figurative, and otherwise. I've taken turns wearing my fancy pants, my mountain pants, my eating pants, and of course, my running shorts.

(Please note: If you're tired of reading about mountains and running, you can find a brief interlude from those themes buried in the middle of this entry: just look for Cee Lo Green!) 

So, two weekends ago, I went to Oregon with my friend Deby for yet another crewing/pacing gig. While Deby knocked out her umpteenth 100-miler this year, I tagged along for the road trip down to southern Oregon and a long weekend of rich conversations, glorious meals, evening hot-tubbing, and sleep-walking mountain miles.

The race, Pine to Palm, is Oregon's only 100-miler. After cruising for two days around the backcountry roads there to support Deby and the other runners, I'm definitely adding P2P to my Ultra Bucket List. Beautiful part of the country, great trails, tons of runnable single-track, thoroughly challenging course. The time cut-offs, unfortunately, were rather aggressive early in the race; paired with intense heat on a lot of exposed ridges and a couple aid stations running out of water, the conditions caused many runners to drop out in the first half of the race.

Strong, steady, and determined as always, though, Deby cruised through like a champ. A little before midnight on Saturday, I jumped in at Dutchman Peak to run the last 35 miles with her. The thin air in the Siskiyou mountains got to us quickly. Around 3 a.m., while trudging up a long section of service road, we both began drifting into walking sleep. It's the strangest sensation, to be moving, to drift off for a second or two, and come to stumbling along in the darkness...your legs still walking, but your mind completely shut down. We curled up on the side of the road for a short nap, but found neither of us could actually sleep - so we marched onward. When the sun came out, it proffered a welcome energy lift.

Perhaps the most amazing moment of the weekend came in the form of a kind stranger at the finish line, who let us borrow her car for several hours to go retrieve our own from Dutchman Peak. Prior to her generosity, we had hit a bit of a panic, realizing suddenly we were not on our home turf in Washington, where we're both accustomed to knowing a good chunk of the people there and could count on hitching a ride with someone. The two other runners and crews we knew had both dropped out in the middle of the night, so we were essentially stranded at the finish line, with no friends, no prospects, no money (left our wallets in our car at Dutchman!), no cell phone reception...and certainly no energy to backtrack 35 rugged miles on foot to get back to our own vehicle. Disaster! Thank goodness for the kindness and trust of strangers. We live in a good world.






All the time I've been spending doing this sleep-deprived rambling around in the mountains has been good processing time for my little heart. 2012 has undoubtedly cast some tidal waves of change in my direction. Metaphorical tsunamis, for better or worse, require a good amount of energy to handle.

As many of you know, I recently accepted a new communications job with a mobile start-up. It was a difficult decision to leave REI, as for 3+ years it's been an absolutely amazing company to work for. Ultimately though, I'm really excited about this new opportunity to further develop my skill set - and hopefully make a bigger impact than I felt capable of making in my old role.

I wake up every day with new tasks to tackle, whether they be drafting letters, writing video scripts, designing newsletters, or in the case of last Friday afternoon - greeting, schmoozing with, and being the face of my company for 400+ members from all over the country. I met good folks from New Orleans, Tulsa, Salt Lake, New Jersey, Puerto Rico, and beyond. Really cool experience. Then jetted over to Seattle's EMP in the evening for our official launch party...rocking out to Cee Lo, scarfing hors d'oeuvres, and sipping Sprites at the open bar like the classy lady I am.





But putting on my fancy pants (or dress, as it were) didn't prevent me from totally shifting gears and donning my mountain pants again at 7 a.m. the following morning.

We've had a truly beautiful summer here in the Northwest. 40 consecutive days without rain, and more sunny, blue-skied, 70-degree days than I could count. It's a shame to reach mid-September without having tromped around even once in the stunning North Cascades - so this weekend, with the help of my new friend Steve, I rectified that. There was a tremendous amount of fog, but happily, we enjoyed the little island paradise of Mt. Forgotten, rising above it all at 6000 feet.

It was a rigorous hike that began in deep fog - but the upshot was getting the mountain (true to its name!) all to ourselves. We ditched our packs for several little exploratory scrambles around. Tasty Ramen mash, mountaintop Scrabble, and cliff-side naps in the sunshine sweetened the whole experience. Not to mention obligatory post-hike milkshakes.

North Cascades for the win.

And...I like my life! Thank you to all who continue to make it a good one.

Booklust: Another long one.

A book must be an ice-axe to break the seas frozen inside our soul.
- Franz Kafka
Less than one month ago, I finally picked up a copy of The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to our Brains, by Nicholas Carr - a book I'd heard much about, picked up every time I wandered into Elliott Bay, and tried to chase down at libraries and used bookstores all over - before making the plunge. I read it in two days, and it's been a serious wake up call.

Flipping open my laptop first thing in the morning, starting my days with internet, and punctuating most of my free moments with mindless web browsing is NOT good for the soul. Nor for the mind. I've justified it, telling myself that it's important to read the news and stay up on current events, that Facebook is a pleasantly mindless, relaxing pleasure at the end of an exhausting work day, that the internet is crucial to being connected in this modern world, that most careers are web-based anyway, that it's far more interactive than TV anyway and hey, at least I don't own a TV.

All those things are true - but it doesn't mean that constantly being connected is a positive thing in my life.

I should know, right? As a lifelong devotee to the great outdoors, I've written plenty of journal entries that attest to the mystical powers of disconnecting from the daily grind, of immersing oneself entirely in the natural world and just living in the moment.


Oct. 2006: Mammoth Cave National Park, KY
(Case in point: Journal entry, Oct. 22, 2006, after my first multi-day backpacking trip: As cliched as it is to say so, it was so refreshing to liberate myself from all the meaningless crap we fill our day-to-day lives with, the "free time" we create through microwaves and laptops and flush toilets, that we just, in turn, squander. Or, at least, I feel like I do. Even as I'm writing this entry, I'm multi-tasking a bit online...and I HATE that! I felt so very "in the moment" during our trip...I was just thinking about the woods, the rain, the people I was with, my body - "moments of being" as Virginia Woolf called them.) It's a powerful thing.

It's not just in nature. It happens, too, in deep, rich conversations with a close friend. Or on my morning walk to work, face turned to the sun's first rays over the building tops downtown. Or when I curl up in bed with my leather-bound journal and ink pen and let my thoughts flow. Or on a 15-minute break at work, the din of screaming kids and bad 80s music on XM radio in the background, as I lose myself, however temporarily, in the refuge of a good book. Or in dreams, or while cooking, or while riding my bike, or while stepping over a fallen leaf, or while photographing the full moon, or in those groggy, post-alarm clock, first few moments of a new day.


The moon last night.
It's in those moments that thoughts are born. Not just normal processing thoughts, but the fodder that gives rise to our best insights - the very stuff that makes us most human. That insight, those connections, is what separates the human brain from the computer brain, and what can be the saving grace of our species, if people can only not lose the ability to harness that power...the power of insight, from which we also derive the powers of compassion, of imagination, of free will and ambition and creation.

Since The Shallows, I've been in a reading frenzy (as I've mentioned in brief passing already in this blog, I know.) It's crazy that two months ago, I was saying, "I'd love to read more, but I just don't have the time." Wrong. I just wasn't making the time. I've had the same 24 hours in my day as before, the same crazy 50-60 hour work weeks, the same obligations, everything; I've just made reading priority again. As Gandhi once said, "Action expresses priorities." After all, I didn't seem to have a problem reading when I was at Oberlin. One (delightful!) semester's worth of reading then:


Here's my reading list from the past month, most of which, yes, I've read cover to cover...a few are still in progress.

Compelling Nonfiction: Because we live in a fascinating world.
The Shallows, by Nicholas Carr
Bait and Switch, by Barbara Ehrenreich
Framing Innocence, by Lynn Powell
UTNE Reader: The Best of the Alternative Press, Sept/Oct 2010 Issue

Business Books: To help me help the companies I'm proud to work for.
Raising the Bar: The Story of Clif Bar Inc., by Gary Erickson
The Power of Full Engagement, by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz
The New Rules of Marketing and PR, by David Meerman Scott
The 4-Hour Workweek, Timothy Ferriss

Personal Development Books To give the gifts of knowledge and motivation to myself.
Rich Brother, Rich Sister: Two Different Paths to God, Money, and Happiness, by Robert Kiyosaki
Awakening the Buddha Within: Tibetan Wisdom for the Western World, by Lama Surya Das
My Reality Check Bounced!, by Jason Ryan Dorsey
The Myth of Stress, by Andrew Bernstein
You're Broke Because You Want to Be, by Larry Winget
Poor Dad Rich Dad, by Robert Kiyosaki

Writing Books To give me a definitive shove toward my dream of being a published author.
Bird by Bird, by Anne Lamott
Writing Down the Bones, by Natalie Goldberg
Nonfiction Book Proposals Anyone Can Write, by Elizabeth Lyon
Writer's Digest, October 2010 Issue

Some samplings:

It seems to be that Facebook and Twitter and YouTube - and just so you don't think this is a generational thing, television and radio and magazines and even newspapers - are all ultimately just an elaborate excuse to run away from yourself. To avoid the difficult and troubling questions that being human throws in your way: Am I doing the right thing with my life? Do I believe the things I was taught as a child? What do the words I live by really mean? Am I happy? The problem...with Facebook and Twitter and The New York Times [is that] when you expose yourself to those things, especially in the constant way that people do now - you are continuously bombarding yourself with a stream of other people's thoughts. You are marinating yourself in the conventional wisdom. In other people's reality: for others, not for yourself. You are creating a cacophony in which it is impossible to hear your own voice. - from "Solitude and Leadership" by William Deresiewicz, reprinted in UTNE

My favorite season is autumn; my favorite time of day is sunset. These are beautiful times - poignant and ever so fleeting. Isn't that true of many of life's loveliest moments? Everyday problems teach us to have a realistic attitude. They teach us that life is what life is: flawed, yet with tremendous potential for joy and fulfillment. Everything is workable. Until we fully learn this lesson, we are burned time and again by our unrealistic expectations. - from Awakening the Buddha Within

In an interview Writer's Digest did with Alice Walker, WD asked, "You've said that heaven should be a verb. What other words are underutilized?" Alice responded, "Bliss, ecstasy, joy. I live in Mexico part of the time, and my friend Yolanda always says that something is maravilloso. The word marvelous - especially when she says it about almost everything - reminds me that yes, indeed, that's the truth of it. Even with all of the things that are so awful, if you walk into your yard and stay there looking at almost anything for five minutes, you will be stunned by how marvelous life is and how incredibly lucky we are to have it.

Word.

100 Miles. Done.

Before my own ego gets too puffed up, I'd just like to point out that this past weekend, a handful of amazing folks covered 100 miles on foot...in less than 24 hours.

I did it in less than 31 days, which is cool, too. My shins and knees are pleased that this year, at least, I chose the latter of those two options :)

So, a confession: I've been composing an "I failed, and I'm trying to be okay with it" blog entry for the past two weeks. When I first set out to do this Hike-a-thon business, I had to set a mileage goal for August. My initial thought was to aim for 80 miles. It seemed ambitious, but doable. Then I reflected on how often I set "ambitious but doable" goals for myself...I'm a go-getter by nature, so even goals that sound crazy to most people (write a 50,000 word novel in a month, organize and direct my own road race, run an ultramarathon...) don't necessarily seem so crazy to me.

But, ambitious as some goals might appear to those on the outside, it's lame to create goals you already feel 100% confident you can achieve. What's the point? Even as you achieve them, it creates a false sense of satisfaction when, in fact, you haven't really pushed yourself to your limits at all. Hiking 80 miles in a month felt too readily attainable. So I upped my goal to 100 miles. And I genuinely spent all of August thinking there was no way I'd make it; I only had one day off from work per week, with the exception of my birthday week (3 days off).

When I got back from my birthday trip and realized I still had nearly 40 miles to hike, and only one more day off in the month of August, I thought I'd have to give up on my overzealous goal. Unfortunately, I'm too much of a...I don't even know what the right word is...nut?...to just give up. With a little creativity, I somehow managed to squeeze in all 40 of them. Well...39.5, by my most accurate count, officially clocking 99.5 miles for August...but without GPS to verify mile-by-mile each of my hikes anyway, who's really counting?

HIKE #10: MT. TENERIFFE


I've been fortunate to have great company on all my hikes this months, but this hike was particularly special. Though Seyeon is the person in Seattle I've known the longest, until this day, we'd never hiked together, just the two of us; with no nearby mountains, northeast Ohio wasn't really a place to hike much, and when I first moved out to Seattle, REI hadn't helped the hiking bug find me to bite just yet.

Given that we live within two miles of each other, Seyeon and I have a remarkably hard time actually getting together to hang out or catch up. This is largely the fault of My Ridiculous Work Schedule, the Yitka-time-hogging qualities of which many of my friends and loved ones are all too aware. (It's going to get better someday, I swear.) But we've both been reading some fantastic books lately, and having some equally fantastic thoughts and revelations surrounding them, so this hike was far more about spending time together to catch up with each other's minds than anything else.


We headed out to North Bend to take on Mount Si's neighbor, Mount Teneriffe - a mountain with several different routes to the top. We opted for the longest, most roundabout one - a steep, winding abandoned logging road that proffered some nice views of the fog on the way up, but mostly provided us with eight hours of uninterrupted conversation. We had the mountain entirely to ourselves, and our hike mirrored our conversation: meandering, full of tangents, no absolute summit at any point, but a wonderful journey along the way nonetheless. We stopped multiple times for snacks and to read to each other, then discuss what we'd read. Kind of like an intellectual seminar, except on a mountain.


Books discussed included: Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg, The Shallows by Nicholas Carr, and You're Broke Because You Want to Be by Larry Winget.

"It's not enough to just know what you want. If you only focus on wanting things, you will end up with more want. You have to have an action plan: things you can do every day to move yourself closer to your goal. Always ask yourself what you could be doing right now to make sure you have the future you want to have."
- Larry Winget
Mileage: 14 miles

HIKE #11: KENDALL KATWALK


My friend Gale is wearing pink in this photo, a tiny speck on the trail that's cut into the granite on the side of the mountain. See if you can find her.
This hike was another spectacular one, on the other side of the basin from Rampart Lakes, where I was last week. In fact, we could see Rampart Ridge from where we stood today, and likewise, last week, could see the Katwalk from our vantage point there. Very cool.

Gale and I also had never hiked together before (not even in a group), despite not having known each other for over a year. A fortuitous day off in common allowed us to head out early this morning for this trek up to Kendall Katwalk, a popular destination along the Pacific Crest Trail (the west coast's equivalent of the Appalachian, i.e. a 2,650 mile trail from Mexico to Canada.) Lucky for us, Mondays mean very few cars at the traihead, and most of the hikers we encountered were thru-hikers with big packs.

The views along the entire hike were stunning. Getting to talk to Gale more than our usual cursory chats at work was awesome. We also got to watch scurrying pikas and listen to screeching marmots. Video footage of this phenomenon forthcoming in a future entry...

Our weather ranged from blazing sunshine to a trail-flooding downpour, with a lot of partly cloudy in between. After months of being nervous about screwing up my feet for either running or hiking, I finally have absolutely no other physical adventure penciled in on the horizon, so I felt like it would be a good day to start breaking in my new boots. In truth, they're old boots...a pair of Vasque Sundowners from the 90s, back when Vasque still manufactured full-grain leather boots in Italy rather than China - an era of bootmaking in Vasque's history for which hikers across the world are still nostalgic.


Landing myself an unworn pair in my size was a serendipitous gift from the universe. Nevertheless, the leather is ridiculously stiff and in need of a lot of breaking in. 11 miles today with only one tiny blister isn't a bad start, though! And given the downpour at the end, I was grateful to be wearing Gore-Tex footwear for the first time in my life...my feet were the only dry part of me by the time we got back to the car.


Glad it was nice at the top, though!

Mileage: 11 miles

Total August Mileage: 100 MILES

Ultimately, here's what I feel I got from all hundred of them: the kindling of new and old friendships alike, a better knowledge base for my job(s), some much-needed mental clarity, strong gluteus muscles, rest for my battered shins from too many running miles, a lot of fresh air, rich food for thought, many awesome photos, and an even deeper appreciation for this beautiful world we live in.


And onward!

I saw the ocean!

It's been far too long since I've updated my blog. Apparently, working long hours and hiking on all your off-days doesn't leave much time for writing. I have more reflections on the psychology behind this goal-setting experiment, but I'll save writing about it for once the month is over altogether. For now, suffice to say that I have raised over $200 for the trails, thanks to all you spectacular souls who've helped sponsor my Hike-a-thon. I'm short of my fundraising goal, but I've still got four days! (This will be the last plug for it on my blog, I promise, but if you're at all interested in helping the effort, this is your last chance! Click here to help out.)

In the meantime...the latest in long-awaited hike reports of the past couple weeks...

HIKE #6: BALD MOUNTAIN


Not the most spectacular hikes I've done, but the Bald Mountain Trail nevertheless enchanted me and my crew with its sheer solitude. Jenica, Casey, Wayne and I set out for what some of us thought would be a cool summit - but because we did our approach from the Ashland Lakes trailhead, rather than the generally recommended one by Cutthroat Lakes, we wound up just hiking for a long, long time in the woods until the threat of sunset forced us to turn around, still in the middle of the woods, sans summit or views. We at least had a nice day for it, and a pretty lake on the way up:


We also had the trail entirely to ourselves, which amounted to the intrepid Casey having to fend off many spider webs on the way up. We ate many berries, talked music, and shared stories from our disparate homelands of Appalachia, the Midwest, and southern California. Though the hike itself was nothing to write home about, the company was. Again, so grateful for the friends I've made since moving out here. Good people. :)

Total miles: 11 miles

HIKE #7: OZETTE TRIANGLE (Pacific Coast)

Seyeon and Leo hiking along the beach.
I've been talking about wanting to go out to the coast since I moved here. With that ambition in mind, I took a few days off from work surrounding my birthday last week and, in all the craziness of August, failed to plan pretty much anything. Happily, things worked out all right anyway. I didn't get in the dozens upon dozens of miles I envisioned myself hiking in Olympic National Park, but I did get: amazing time spent with some of my favorite people in the world, a beachside game of Scrabble on my birthday, and my first rain-free camping experience in as long as I can remember (well, it did rain...but only when we were already in the tent, so who cares? At that point, it was just a soothing audio companion to the waves crashing against the rocks thirty feet from our tent.)

There is a sweet loop trail on the coast that Seyeon, Leo, Alan, and I decided to hike and camp along. We had to hike about three miles ("hike"...really, it was an extended stroll through the woods on boardwalks) out to our campsite, an amazing spot right next to the water.


My crew.


Camp: Leo making dinner, Seyeon tending the fire, Alan off searching for firewood, and me predictably behind the camera lens.
The Washington coast is far more rugged than most coastal areas - lots of jagged rocky outcroppings, far less developed, i.e. quite isolated and wild. I definitely want to spend more time exploring it. After an evening of drinking hot cocoa, inhaling s'mores, talking politics, and telling ghost stories, we retreated to our respective tents. I woke up before anyone else and decided to seize the opportunity to go for a little solo birthday morning hike. I walked out quite a way on the beach and found myself a nice big boulder amidst the tide pools to listen to the sea lions, watch the birds, and wish the darned sun would come out. It didn't, but I still felt perfectly content.


A good start to a new year in my life!
When I got back to camp, Alan woke up and joined me for morning stroll #2. We walked out to a cool little island that I believe is only accessible at low tide. There, we watched the waves and speculated about the array of strange objects washed up on the beach. Returned back to camp for a long, lazy day at our campsite, spent drinking more hot cocoa, stirring up our fire again, and playing some Scrabble oceanside.


I couldn't have asked for a better way to spend my birthday.
Total miles: 11.5 miles

HIKE #8: KLAHHANE RIDGE (Olympic National Park)


This was a seriously rockin' hike. Alan and I car-camped at the national park's Heart o' the Hills campground the night before, slept in, and got up to Hurricane Ridge by late morning to start our generally unplanned trek.


Alan and I outside of the Hurricane Ridge Visitor Center.
At a park ranger's suggestion, we began our amble along the Klahhane Ridge trail, which was paved for a short bit, albeit ridiculously steep and at elevation that made the climb seem much more intense than most of our typical hikes. The pavement and national park crowds quickly and drastically thinned out as we climbed, until finally we pretty much had the largely exposed ridge trail to ourselves.

Although the elevation made it a challenging one, it was a stunning, stunning hike. Sunshine and mostly clear skies proffered spectacular views on both sides of the ridge - on one side, Port Angeles, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, Canada visible, and Mount Baker poking through a thin line of clouds...on the other side, a panoramic view of the Olympic Mountains, way more up close and personal than is visible from my beloved home city. No photos will do it justice.


All the wildflowers and wildlife - friendly deer + even friendlier marmots - were icing on the cake.
Total miles: 10 miles

HIKE #9: RACHEL LAKE + RAMPART LAKES


I'm sure I've said it before, but I really, really mean it this time: this was the most gorgeous hike I've done in the Northwest. At the recommendation of a new hire at work whom I was helping train last week, I gathered five friends this past Monday and made the epic trek up first to Rachel Lake, a sometimes gentle, sometimes brutal 4-miler up, then even more brutally upward to scale a ridge and drop back down into the Rampart Lakes basin - a truly magical little hideaway in the mountains, isolated, and pocked with crystal-blue, shimmering mountain lakes. I've been doing a lot of alpine lake hikes lately was, I'm ashamed to say, beginning to feel sort of like "Ehh, once you've seen one mountain lake, you've seen 'em all" - until this hike.


Alan above Rachel Lake on our hike up to Rampart Lakes.
Alan and I were both disappointed as we reviewed our photos later, because somehow more than usual, they completely and utterly fail to convey the majesty of this place. But so it goes. That's, I suppose, why I go outside and hike instead of just admiring the photos in the guidebooks.

The coolest part of the day? At Rachel Lake, as we were all doubled over catching our breath, already massaging our exhausted quad and gluteus muscles, we ran into a 90-year-old man who was hiking with his dog, Dusty. Really friendly guy, who told us that every year, he's worried it'll be his last time getting to see Rachel Lake - but so far, so good; what an inspiration!

Total miles: 12 miles

Total Mileage so far: 74.5 (of 100)
Total Funds Raised so far: $210 (of $300)

Trekking with a pooch + Meteor-watching with wild pigs

HIKE #4: WEST TIGER MOUNTAIN


Seattleites love dogs. They're everywhere. People hike with their dogs, swim with them in the lake, take them into stores, sit with them on the sidewalk outside of cafes. Of the six units in my apartment building, which technically disallows dogs, two managed to talk our landlord into keeping one anyway.

Every time I'm out running or hiking in the mountains, I'm a little jealous of the people who are hiking with dogs. I still remember reading an article in Runner's World maybe 5 or 6 years ago about the ultrarunner Scott Jurek, and how he'd go for epic long runs in the mountains with his husky, Tonto. (On a sidenote, the article also discussed his making a home in Seattle, working at a local running store, and cooking delicious vegan food all the time. Upon reading the article, I remember thinking to myself, I want this guy's life! It's kind of cool now that we live in the same neighborhood in Seattle and overlapped at the Orcas Island run back in February.) Anyway - the problem, of course, is that there's no way my current lifestyle would allow for a dog. Some days, I leave for work by 8 in the morning, and between jobs, don't get home again until 11 at night. Not a dog-bladder-friendly schedule, by any means.

Likewise, I think it's really cool that people don't let having babies keep them from getting out into the mountains; I love the kid carrier backpacks, and how happy and engaged the little toddlers look as they get to go for a slow ride through the forest. I will strive to be that kind of parent someday. But of course, no dogs or small children for now; in the meantime, my only hiking companions are other grown up humans, when we can coordinate our work schedules.


Happily, this week, though, my friend James called me up with an awesome proposition: he's dogsitting for the week and wanted to take his dogsitting charge, an adorable lab/border collie mix named Ruby, for a hike. Elodie and I had made late evening dinner plans on the eastside for that evening, so it worked out well for James, Ruby, and I to do a nice local hike on the eastside, then meet up with Elodie for dinner (giant avocado bacon burgers at Red Robin, YUM) afterward.


Yes, it was everything I dreamed it would be.

The sunset rocked, too:


Miles: 7.5

HIKE(ish) #5: THE PERSEIDS


This one wasn't really a hike, but I'm enjoying my blog's temporary foray into hike-chronicling, so I'll keep the format. Last night around midnight, the annual Perseids meteor shower peaked. It's always the second week of August, and traditionally, my aunt and uncle host a big stargazing/meteor-watching party and campout on their land. I'd forgotten about the meteor shower this year, until Brant brought it up at work yesterday and mentioned that he'd rented out a bivy sack, with no plans whatsoever except the general thought that it'd be cool to go sleep somewhere away from the city's light pollution and watch for falling stars.

The big deal this year is that we've just had a new moon a couple nights ago. "Moonless Perseids" only happen once every three years - but the absence of moonlight makes a big difference in terms of how many stars are visible with the naked eye. Although I had a late tutoring lesson last night yesterday and had been dreaming through my whole workday about getting a long night of sleep in my wonderful bed, I was intrigued by Brant's plans. Although neither of us knew exactly where to go to watch for meteors, Cam popped out of the woodwork at the opportune moment to contribute a suggestion. He reappeared moments later with a printed Google map and a hand-drawn dotted line snaking all over country roads between Redmond and Fall City, with a little star marking "Da Spot" which he recommended for us.

Come 10 p.m. last night, Brant and I set out for the country. Again, I felt amazed at how easy it is in Washington to move between vastly different landscapes in a short span of time. You can literally go from beach to mountains to city to suburbs to rural farms, all in the span of an hour's drive. It didn't take us long to get completely away from city lights. With my sun roof open, we cruised winding country roads in search of the perfect place to lay out our bivy sacks and sleeping bags.


We found it. We had it all to ourselves. We had flat ground to lie on and a panoramic view of the night sky that included thousands upon thousands of stars. I could hardly even find the big dipper, because I'm so unaccustomed to several hundred stars being visible inside of the dipper, too. The meteors were pretty spectacular - at least one every couple of minutes, and sometimes two or three right in a row, almost criss-crossing each other in the sky. We had great snacks.


At some point, there was a fairly loud chorus of snorting and grunting from the other side of the tall row of blackberry bushes we'd lay out sleeping bags next to. Brant was off exploring on his own, and my sympathetic nerve system seriously kicked in at the idea of some wild animal being out there in the darkness. Brant had heard it even from where he was, probably fifty yards away, but we concluded that it was probably just a little piggy at the farm next to which we'd camped out.

Finally around 2 a.m. or so, I dropped off to sleep. Woke up at 6 to Brant tromping around in the sea of fog that had come in overnight. (The sky was completely clear for the duration of our meteor-watching...a miracle!) I got up, and we walked around a little bit, plucked fresh blackberries off the bushes, and picked up where our conversations had left off the night before as we dropped off to sleep.


Overall, a great success.


Breakfast!
Miles: .5ish

Total Mileage so far: 30.5 (of 100)
Total Funds Raised so far: $170 (of $300)

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