After a 5 month hiatus, I went climbing yesterday. Zack and I headed to the climbing gym for an afternoon of what could only be described as medieval torture. I assure you that my seemingly rock-filled forearms have not been in this much pain in a long time.

I don’t think I’d be hurting this bad if it wasn’t for the simple fact that there was another girl at the gym. A climber girl, and a good climber girl, at that. So, although I hadn’t attempted to climb anything more vertical than my staircase in almost half a year, I was fairly determined that I needed to out-climb my new found mortal enemy, The Climber Girl–The Climber Girl Who Has Been Climbing A Lot And Was Way Better Than Me Whose Name Happened To Be Sarah, Also.

After the first climb, I thought I was going to pass out. I had unwittingly started on a “harder” route, thinking that I could climb a crack all the way up. As it turned out, the “crack” was mostly for “display” and I wound up climbing the whole route barely hanging on with the tips of my fingers. Nevertheless, I got all the way up, and I was feeling really proud of myself. Proud of myself in an obvious and physically visible kind of a way. I was strutting around like a Peacock with my tail all hoisted up into the air like, “HA! Look at ME! I am a BADASS. Who can CLIMB THINGS.”

Or at least that’s what I wanted to be doing. Instead Zack lowered me to the ground and I laid there while I asked him to please untie me from the rope because my hands seemed to have stopped working for me. Also, could you please take off my shoes? As another crippling blow to my ridiculous pride, the 15 year-old girl that we took climbing with us (a former camper we hang out with occasionally) then climbed the exact route that I had climbed, but did it faster than me, and then didn’t look like a steaming pile of death afterwards. Suh-weet. Aren’t I just a beam of physical health and sound mental processes.

I swear, typing hurts today.