Mom Faces Fears

Since Adam's away at camp this week, Eric's an only child in the house. He misses his little brother big time, and is starting to get a bit stir crazy. So today, we had a special Eric day with just he and I.

First off, we went on a very nice bike ride which culminated in a Starbucks outing where we enjoyed iced drinks and read the New York Times. I was counting that and my walk as my exercise for the day, but Eric had something else in mind:

Rock Climbing.

We're fortunate enough to have an indoor climbing gym in town. Typically, my routine is to take the two boys and a good book to the gym. They climb, I read, and everyone goes home happy. Not today - Eric said, "Mom, you have to climb too or it's going to be boring."

As the Mom of an almost 15 year old, I can appreciate the fact that these chances to respond to such invitations will soon be few and far between. Soon enough, he will not want to be seen with me, let alone actually have outings with me.

So I pushed my fears aside and dove in.

Fears: How big my backside is going to look when I'm climbing, how it'll look truly dorky when I make it a third of the way up the wall and have to come back down, and finally, the fear of actually trusting the auto-belay to keep me from dropping three stories to the ground on my head.

Facing your fears is a good thing. I thought that I had them conquered until I was halfway up my first climb. I was on the first wall - me and the four through six year olds! One of the Moms who was standing next to the line saw me and said, "That's why I wore a mini-skirt, so my kids wouldn't talk me into climbing!"

Great!

I mounted the wall with great confidence, made it halfway, and decided that was a good effort for the first trip. I was ready to come down, but that's actually the hardest part. You have to let go of your death grip on the hand holds, lean back, and let the auto-belay catch your weight. I didn't quite follow the directions and bounced into the wall twice. Then I landed in a very un-gracious pile on the cushy floor. I had the four to six year old crowd in stitches!

Their giggles forced my competitive juices into overdrive, so I made it to the top and came down perfectly (well, at least less badly) on the very next try.

Several trips to the top later, we were both ready to head home. My heart was racing, my palms were sweaty and my legs were shivering...it was great! I love trying new experiences, especially after I've tried them! Next time, I may even take on the number two wall!

So I'm not ready for a trip to the walls at Yosemite, but at least I learned something new and had a great day with Eric while doing it. Life is truly wonderful.