King Lines
First of all, here’s the cover for the German edition of The Cabinet of Wonders. Pretty, isn’t it?
The monarch butterfly migration that passes by my window each autumn is over, I think. Haven’t seen a butterfly in about a month.
And, speaking of seeing beautiful flights, Thomas and I have been watching King Lines, a documentary about the climbing projects of the legendary Chris Sharma. I haven’t blogged about climbing in a while, mostly because, well, I’m nine months pregnant and so not exactly shimmying up a rock wall on a regular basis (or any basis). But I love the sport, and so thought I’d share this video with you. If you don’t know anything about climbing, Sharma explains the basics, and you can see him working on two of his famous projects: Es Pontas, a rock arch over the water in Majorca, and Realization, a route in Ceuse, France. For each climb, you see Sharma working on the “crux”—the hardest part of the route. In both cases, the crux involves a mad leap called a “dyno.” I’m not sure what the distance is on the Realization one, but for Es Pontas, the jump is about 7 feet.
Both are impressive climbs. For Es Pontas, Sharma is climbing upside down most of the time. Every time he falls, he plunges 60 feet into the water (dangerous: you can break a rib or your back doing that). Realization is the route on the rock face with blue streaks, and it is rated a 15.a climb—in other words, it’s inhumanely hard, and maybe five people in the world have done it. Sharma was the first to complete it without a rest. Es Pontas is 15.a/b (I think no one’s quite sure because no one has repeated the climb, and Sharma doesn’t grade his routes).
One of the things I like about the video is something that Sharma says at the very end, about what it’s like to work on a project and finally succeed. He says that you celebrate for a little while, and then move on to the next thing. It’s a humble way to describe what he does, but it’s also a good universal perspective for anybody who is passionate about an art, sport, or field of work. Once you achieve something, you can feel good about it—but only for a little while, because then you realize you have to move on to the next level, the next thing that will push your limits…
A note about climbing grades:
5.6-5.7 Baby Steps
5.8-5.9 Beginner or Warm-up Routes
5.10-5.11 Intermediate to Experienced
5.12 Very Respectable
5.13 You’re Climbing with the Big Boys and Girls
5.14 You Have an International Reputation
5.15 People Doubt You are Really Human
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