T.S. Eliot began The Waste Land with the line, "April is the cruelest month..." I'm sure he used the line to create the feeling of dread and bleakness that permeates his entire 434 line poem. I am choosing to use the line because, well, my back hurts.
It hurts right between my shoulder blades. But more on that later. Right now, it is snowing outside. Yesterday was beautiful, but today, it's snowing. Why is it snowing? It is snowing because it is New Hampshire and I have the day off. The climate knows when I have the day off. Don't ask me how it knows, but it knows.
I spent a beautiful day at Waimea yesterday, climbing with Kayte. It wasn't crowded, the humidity was low, and the bugs weren't out yet. Basically, the day was perfect. I kept thinking to myself that this would be a perfect day to send my project. I wasn't putting the pressure on, but a voice in the back of my mind kept saying, "You had better send today Jay, because this will be the last nice day in a long time. This is your last chance. For the love of God, don't blow it." Alright, maybe I did have the pressure a bit cranked-up.
And then I blew it on the project, falling at the very top. And then my back started to hurt again. And then I climbed a different route to "loosen up," and then I fell weird off that route and hit my hand really hard on the rock. And then I ended up in the Plymouth Hospital getting x-rays.
My hand is not broken, thank God. Just severely bruised. But my back still hurts his morning while I sit at my computer, drink coffee, and look out the window to a dreary April day. The snow has now turned to rain. The weather outlook predicts rain for the next ten days. Great.
Though we have had an amazingly good spring, I feel as though I have been ready for this rain for a while. While it feels so good to spend time in the sun, I can't seem to ignore that the rain is just around the corner, just the next day out on the Intellicast chart. (I have learned that a 20% "chance" of rain means that, in New Hampshire, it will rain for approximately 20% of the day). I have come to see this attitude as detrimental to my happiness.
Why can't I simply enjoy the present? Where has my focus gone? Perhaps it is bombarded my those little aches and pains that have begun springing up. Why does my back hurt? I have no idea. It just started one day and it has persisted ever since. There was no trauma, that is, unless you consider the combined trauma of living on this earth for 32 years. Sure, April may be the cruelest month according to Eliot, but May brings bugs and humidity. And it is supposed to rain for the next ten days.
