"Mr. Parisi, Meet Mr. Concrete "
Rock climbing is a relatively safe sport. I know I've said this lots of times. Unlike lots of so called extreme sports or hobbies, climbing has no acceleration. No breakneck speeds. It's control. It's balance. And it has lots of redundant safety mechanisms built into the sport. If practiced correctly, climbing can be as safe or as bold as you want it to be.
If practiced incorrectly, climbing offers little margin for error. The vast majority of accidents in climbing occur as a result of human error. Gravity plus elevation plus solid surfaces equals a really permanent problem.
Terra all too firma, met suddenly after a fall, is referred to by climbers as the deck. Lots of climbers only meet the deck once. Depends on how you are introduced, and from how high.
I met the deck on Friday afternoon at Crawdad Canyon in Utah. The pool deck. Introduced it to the back of my head.
Gary and I drove out to Crawdad Canyon, a private climbing area with short black cliffs next to a little stream. The owners of the land developed the area for campers and climbers, and built a pool fed by the stream right next to a steep rock face. Gary and I were climbing on this rock next to the pool. I was climbing a fun, short but difficult route that leaned dramatically left. I had just finished climbing the route and was lowering off from the anchors at the top. To clean the gear from the route, I had to clip in to the rope that led to Gary and through all the gear I had clipped to the rock. It was along this end of the rope that I could guide myself toward all the gear that ran down the rock wall to my right.
After cleaning the last piece of gear, about ten, maybe twelve feet from the ground, I, without thinking of the consequences, unclipped from the rope leading to my belayer. This put somewhere in the neighborhood of 20+ feet of slack in the system as the extra rope was released. I was the weight at the end of the system.
My Parisi, meet Mr. Concrete. Mr. Concrete, Mr. Parisi.
Gary tells me my head bounced about a foot off the ground.
I don't recall any bouncing. I do recall a sound something like "OOOOOWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!" escaping me. Several times. I also remember a whole heck of a lot of pain and lots of blood on my hands.
I never lost consciousness - almost, but I was dancing with shock for a little while. After fifteen minutes or so on the ground I was able to move, felt OK - except for the hole in my head - and Gary got me to the hospital.
A cat scan and eight stitches later, I left with a neck ache and a mild concussion. And my first climbing injury. Had I been another ten feet up when I unclipped, it could have been my last climbing injury.
But it wasn't. I got stupid. Then I got lucky. All I have are a few stitches. And I have heard the "at least the doctor didn't have to shave your head" joke at least ten times already. Save it.
But I also got a rather loud reminder that this little game we play outside is a serious one. I forgot to respect it. I won't make that mistake again.
Cause next time, I don't know if I'll be lucky enough to get another reminder.
