boots, clipping rusty ¼” buttonheads and stubby trees to my buddy’s static line…surviving the learning curve. Shortly thereafter, I was living and breathing the sport, dropping everything in favor of dirtbagging my way from crag to crag and somehow shamming my folks into covering a NOLS semester as a part of my “education.” Returning to Maine as an Outdoor Ed. student at Unity College allowed a number of forays onto The Mountain’s slopes, ridges and jag- ged pinnacles. Some of these endeavors were glorious; others less-so and some perhaps even a touch embarrassing. One such lesson in humility stands above the rest; as if it were my final exam before graduating the New England School of Hard Knocks. Circa 1992: Three years into my climbing career and still on the steep side of the learning curve, full of bravado, I was dead-set committed to do- ing things the hard way, or perhaps the hardest way. Little has changed since the young days of anarchy: just last night, in hip-Bozeman, I heard the trendy sounds of recycled 80’s pop burst with the sudden and unexpected glory of Johnny Rotten – fisting through it all. I sensed a tingling at the back of my mind, and relived the sensa- tion of wanting something so badly that there was no holding back, regardless of what better judgment might say; no resisting the undeni- able urge to break something – and fuck it all if something is my head. I sensed impending catalyst every time I tied into the sharp end. I was hedonistic, raised on No Future, wholly en- grossed in the now, and there was nothing that failure in the mountains could take from me. The obvious next step was to bite off more than I could chew. I rallied a team of fellow students and followed the long paper trail along Baxter’s application process. We were at once overconfi- dent and intimidated. We spent endless hours during finals, fully rapt in trip preparation. We loaded massive 80+ liter packs to their breaking


Left: Photo by Daniel Gambino of Pete Tapley holding their unusable ice screw.


Right: Photo by David Crothers of the Pamola engulfed in low hanging clouds.


SEPTEMBER| OCTOBER 2011 climber MAGAZINEism | 17


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