Climacterical Climber's Column

This is the first installment of a column I have just started to write for the "Explorer," the Newsletter of the Explorers Club of Pittsburgh. I  figure, writing is like everything else, practice makes perfect. So I hope writing a regular column about aging and climbing will help me write a better aging climber book.
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Climb with your readers?

Hi! I am 51 years old, and I am an aging climber. Lately, I have recognized some changes to my body and to my mind, or should I say sanity, which are definitely age related; and I am grappling with the effects, real or imagined, they are having on my climbing.

Take for instance my eyesight. It has always been fantastic, as you’d expect from an astronomer who makes her livelihood looking at distant stars and galaxies. With modern science requiring less and less of my physical presence at the telescope, these days, though, the way I look, or rather, squint, at the sky’s secrets, is on a computer screen. Indeed, it’s not the things that are far away which give me viewing trouble. It’s rather the things right in front of my eyes. To be more precise, all objects which are within about arms length from my peepers now require me to study them with, sigh, reading glasses.

My dependence on reading glasses was a slow and creeping process which started about 9 years ago. This happens to be about the same length of time that I’ve been climbing. First, I needed my glasses just occasionally. There were months when life was quieter, the job less stressful, and I didn’t use them at all. But as the years went by, I reached for them more and more frequently. When I misplaced one pair and bought another one, the diopters increased.

Over that same time period that my eyesight waned, my climbing got better and better. I went through the usual stages, from gym rat, to outdoor newbie, to trad leader. I am now toproping harder grades than I did a decade ago, and this past season I led my first 5.10a sport route. You know what that means – the holds have been getting smaller!

As I anticipate the 2010 rock season, I am actually beginning to worry about my vision. How can I possibly improve my climbing if I cant’ see the holds anymore? Should I be climbing with my readers on? How uncool is that! Would it even be practical?

In the past, I’ve been dealing with my problem with a special trick. How? – you may wonder. How does she do it? And how come nobody has noticed? Let me tell you my secret. I rest on straight arms. Now, resting on straight arms is always a good idea for conserving your strength. In the case of the farsighted, aging climber, it has additional benefits. While I rest on straight arms, I lean back so I can actually see the holds! Next, I scout out the route, memorize my sequence. Then I pull myself into the rock, climb, and pray to the rock goddess that my body follows my mental image of the route and hits the crimps that I sussed out previously. Sequence executed, I come to my next rest position, where I lean back, once again able to see the climb. Repeat. Succeed.

I think I’m onto something here. Maybe I’ll be able to get away with my straight-arms workaround for another season or two or even three, or until I loose my short-term memory, whichever comes first. (My memory also has taken a nosedive in the last three months and seems to be declining more rapidly than my vision ever did. Double sigh.)

I haven’t read about this innovative climbing technique for the agedly challenged in any of the magazines. When I read climbing magazines it strikes me just how much focus there is on the young superstars. Granted, it is interesting to learn about people pushing the very envelope of the sport, which usually translates into chasing grades; and that is done by very young climbers.  But as the generation of baby boomers ages, the numbers of aging climbers are growing. Since we can’t do anything about the fact that we age, how we age is important.

At the January club meeting, ECP president Sam Taggart invited members to write more articles for the Explorer, and he mentioned columns. I immediately thought of writing a column about climbing and aging.

Apart from climbing tips for the farsighted, future entries will include information and viewpoints about the physiological, psychological, and social aspects of aging for climbers.

Notice I typeset my column in big font.

Climb on!