dirt, fire, sunburn, mountain

"Something about your face is really odd."

Having just walked inside after mowing in the orchard and torching our burn pile, my face was covered in dirt.

"Mom, this is what how my face looks every summer."
"No, but something's different.  Are you sunburned too?"

Oh yeah, and that too.  You see, on Thursday, I climbed my second mountain this week, and got sunburned for the second time as well.  However, it was only my face that was sunburned; my neck is still quite contrastingly white.  Cover my red face in dirt, and apparently it looks quite odd.  haha.  I will not post any pictures, in hopes that I can even out my skin color during the rest of break :)

There's something about hard work that is really satisfying.  Climbing mountains and working in the orchard. And during the last week, I've realized how much I am ready to start living this lifestyle again.

Last Sunday, the day before finals, I got the opportunity to climb Fife's peak with my dad and a couple guys. Don't hate me... Wouldn't you do something crazy the day before finals if you could?  I killed myself during Dead Week to pull it off, and I'll probably never get the chance to do it again.  It was a good, non-technical, begin the season climb.

PHOTO: DAD, ME, RITTENHOUSE ON FIFE'S PEAK

Then, just after I arrived home on Wednesday night, I checked the weather in the mountains.  I completely forgot about my garlic bread in the oven, I got so excited.  I texted Ryan Gratias, "The weather on Rainier for the next two days is perfect...just sayin."  After a rather lengthy discussion about weather conditions, time off from work, whether or not I could climb - being a girl, and me getting increasingly frustrated, it looked like I'd have to climb some mountain by myself.  I thought about soloing Rainier.  My dad hit me with a load of reality on that idea.  (And that's a good thing, sometimes I think only a 1/4 of my brain functions when I get excited about climbing.)  I decided instead to go climb St. Helens since I'd never been there before.  I figured everything out and packed up all my stuff, and then Ryan texted me again at 11:45pm.  Complete change of plans.  If I could get ahold of some ice tools, I would climb Chair Peak with Ryan and Brandon.  After a ton of thinking, praying, phone calls, and pointless driving to different places, I got what I needed to climb the North Face of Chair Peak. So with not nearly enough sleep and barely any food in my stomach, we set off on one of the most perfect days of climbing ever!  We summitted with beautiful views of the Olympics, Adams, Rainier, the Stewart range, Glacier, Baker, and so many more.  The sun went down just as we started our second rappel off the mountain.  It was my first experience with ice climbing, and will definitely not be my last.  We managed not to die on route :) and not to die falling asleep on the drive back.

This morning I somehow managed to groan out of bed at some early hour, eat breakfast, and head out to work in the orchard.  Hair up, jeans with holes in the back side, scarred steel-toed mud boots, driving tractor, and a face covered in dirt...I'm ready for summer.  Ready for a lifestyle of manual labor and mountaineering.  Of course, I'm not by any means rushing Spring - it's going to rock too!

THIS BURN PILE IS FAIRLY SMALL IN COMPARISON TO SOME WE'VE BURNED.

PS: I love torching things.

Willpower and the 'Slacker' Brain

Deadweek.

A few weeks back, in my Human Development class, I learned of some pretty interesting research.  In one room, people were given either a 2-digit or a 7-digit number to remember by memory.  They were told they would then walk down a hall to another room to repeat the number to someone else.  What they did not know was that the actual part of the study took place in the hall.  They were met by another person, carrying a plate of chocolate cake in one hand and a plate of fruit in the other.  The people were asked, "Would you like a this yummy plate of chocolate cake, or this healthy plate of fruit?"  Almost without fail, all the people trying to remember a 2-digit number took the fruit, and all the people with the 7-digit number took the chocolate cake.

You see, we have two different brains at work: the rational brain, and the emotional brain.  When you only have two things on your mind, you can make a rational choice: Calories, sugar, high fat content, think about your waistline, think about your cholesterol, it's not good for your health.  But when you have 7 things on your mind, the rational brain clearly has too much to manage.  So the emotional brain is much more likely to take control.  It says a lot about how inadequate our reasoning is.

You can listen to the discussion on this study here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122781981

Oh deadweek.  Please don't eat me alive.  I think I have more than seven things on my mind.