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I See the Light

Guest post by: Jeff Evans

Article Overview: A young climber accepts the responsibility of guiding then unknown blind climber Erik Weihenmayer...developing systems of communication and leadership in spite of no previous paradigm.

I See the Light

When I first met Erik Weihenmayer, I was living in Joshua Tree again. After the years of hard work spent getting first my degree and then my wilderness EMT certification, I wanted to blow off some steam. The manager of a local gear company whom I’d kept in touch with had offered me a few hours for the remainder of the summer selling climbing equipment. It sounded like the perfect chance to regroup, and get back to my dirt bag climbing roots.

I bought an old pickup truck for the trip out and made it my home for those few months. Each week I worked a couple of shifts at the store so I could afford ramen noodles and the occasional beer. Mostly though, I woke up smelling like sweaty garbage and climbed all day until it was time to crawl back into my sleeping bag and wait for the next morning. Sometimes I didn’t shower for weeks on end, and I was loving it. For all I’d accomplished, I came to realize that sometimes it feels good to just let go and live carefree. Some people save for vacations to Paris or Tahiti, I just wanted to get back to the desert for a break.

I had given some thought to what Sam said that day in Colorado, and decided I would give it a shot if Erik wanted to come on out to my ‘home.’ Sure enough, he said he’d love to. Besides seeing what kind of climbing chemistry we had, Joshua Tree would serve as a good barometer of his talents and abilities. When Sam’s car pulled up, I had my first look at his blind friend. Sam helped him from the car, while I watched on from the bed of my truck in disbelief. I couldn’t imagine this guy could make it up the stairs, much less any natural upward-facing feature on earth. He looked a mess in every conceivable way. He was obviously athletic, but was so white that I wondered if he might have gone blind from living in a cave. His pale skin was accentuated by an outfit that made him appear to be a roadie for the world’s most awkward metal band – a mullet, some tattered jeans, a t-shirt, and a denim jacket with an Iron Maiden patch on it. Worst of all, the different kinds of denim didn’t even seem to go together. Neither did his socks. I wondered if there wasn’t some sort of blind dressing the blind thing going on. Wow, I thought, he’s not just blind – he’s colorblind!

I was already disappointed, but after Sam introduced us, the ridiculousness of the situation became apparent. Here I was, essentially homeless, in the middle of desert and rocks with a blind man who wanted to climb with me—dog, stick and all. Erik either sensed my lack of enthusiasm, or was having doubts of his own. Even though I knew he couldn’t see me, I tried to hide the skepticism from my face. The moment was heavy and awkward with no one volunteering anything to say. Finally, I mumbled that we might as well go up some rocks while the day was young. In truth, I thought it best to get this over with as quickly as possible. It seemed like my morning was about to be ruined, but I might still be able to get rid of him by afternoon. And so, with the help of his seeing-eye dog, I led Erik over to the first pitch.

The small community of dirt bags living in Joshua Tree were used to seeing a lot of things. Situations that might seem outrageous in the civilized world wouldn’t cause them to look twice. This was a place that attracted people who wanted to live in trucks and vans and crawl around dusty rocks all day. Drunken fights, bad acid trips, and naked climbers were all pretty regular sights and sounds. Now I had something that topped them all. As my neighbors peered on curiously, I led the way for a man with a seeing-eye dog to the first pitch and roped him up. Jaws dropped. I could see men and women looking at one another and mouthing out, ‘are you serious?’ We were about to find out.

I started up the first pitch. It was a relatively easy climb, and one I’d done several times before. I moved from hold to hold quickly and smoothly, hoping to expedite Erik’s departure back to wherever he came from. I couldn’t remember what I’d been thinking when I agreed to this, but both lobes of my brain now considered it a mistake. Clearly, the thing to do was to get to the top and let him figure out that why there were no other blind climbers. I reached the end of the short pitch quickly. Now it was Erik’s turn. Without any sort of hesitation, he reached up to find the first hold, and then the second. He wasn’t fast, but he wasn’t sloppy either. He seemed to have a natural sense for positioning, and would slip easily from one spot to the next. Perhaps, I thought, I’d underestimated him. He might be able to enjoy himself on some of the easier sections while I kept an eye out. Before long, he had reached the top where I was waiting. I was impressed with his grit, and thought about taking him somewhere more challenging after he’d had a chance to rest and catch his breath. But before either of us could get comfortable, he turned my direction and asked, “What’s next?” I couldn’t help but smile.

Curious now, I led him down and onto a more difficult route, one longer and more technically challenging. Again he surprised me with his calm determination. While he didn’t have the benefit of experience, he never got flustered and simply kept moving until he found his way. He was a very strong climber for a beginner, sighted or not. In fact, for him, getting up the pitches wasn’t the hard part. Rather, it was in getting from one rock to the next. The park was crowded with people and gear, which Erik occasionally walked into or through. He, of course, couldn’t see anybody, and no one seemed to be looking out for him. Several times, as we made our way from one formation to another, he’d crash into another group of climbers. I tried to steer him with the help of his dog, but it was impossible to stop him from getting in the way. He never complained or said he was sorry, just made his way through until we were ready to start a new pitch. He seemed to understand that you just didn’t expect to see a blind man in Joshua Tree climbing next to you, but he didn’t apologize for it either.

Following each ascent I’d look at him, pale and mulleted in his mismatched clothes. I had worried he wouldn’t have the stamina to make it up even one stone face. Instead, he took climb after climb, never slowing or asking for rest. After a few hours, we became familiar enough for me to ask the questions that had been sitting on my mind all day. Who was he and why was he doing this? Erik’s dad was a former Marine. Like a lot of military children, he had grown up in different places all around the world. His early years in Shanghai, Korea, Europe and throughout the US had instilled in him a strong sense of adventure and curiosity. Even if he couldn’t see, he always wanted to know what new things sounded like, smelled like and especially felt like. He hadn’t been born blind. As a child he had been diagnosed with retinoscheses, a degenerative eye disease that caused his retina to unravel over time. The condition was irreversible, and from a very early age he knew that he would eventually go completely blind. His sight continued to worsen, growing darker and darker until he could barely make out shapes and faces by his tenth birthday. His disease had robbed him completely of his sight by the age of 13, the same year his mother had been traumatically killed in a car accident. For many children, these losses would have been crippling, but it left Erik only tougher and more resilient. His father continued to impress upon his three sons the importance of family, pulling the boys even closer to himself and each other. To the outside world, Erik’s father and brothers were fiercely protective of their youngest member. But within, they didn’t allow him to use his blindness as an excuse to stop achieving in his life. He had not only achieved, but flourished. Academically, he excelled, earning a Master’s degree in education from Boston University. He had landed a very prestigious teaching assignment at The Phoenix Country Day School. He had also continued the family’s adventurous tradition, taking on long hikes in central Asia with the help of guides. He was just beginning to learn about serious climbing, however. As a teenager, he had attended a camp for the blind where they had a twenty foot wall that could be scaled. He made his way up the side again and again, dozens of times in an afternoon, finding and testing different ways up its constructed face. Long after the other campers had moved on to other activities, he found himself experimenting with holds and movements. It wasn’t much of a start, but it had given him an early love of climbing that he hadn’t forgotten in the years since. When he moved to Phoenix, he decided that he wanted to drive his love for climbing further. The problem was, nobody else wanted to go along for the ride. He joined rock climbing gyms and had good conversations with the other members. But once the talk turned to an actual climb outdoors, everyone he met was busy that day. He tried hanging out near the rock gardens that dot the countryside in Arizona, having close friends help him find his way up the sharp, red stones that grew there. Inevitably, others would be impressed with his skill. But again, when it came time to talk about meeting somewhere for a longer ascent, the whole world seemed to have a dentist appointment that day. Everyone admired him, but nobody wanted to be the one to get stuck dragging him around, or worse, explaining why they’d been with him if he got hurt. In desperation, he started calling established guides. If he couldn’t find partners the way other climbers did, then he would pay someone to teach him. Even this didn’t work out. Once the guides got word of his condition, their calendars filled up. It seemed that he was never going to find anyone who would train with him until he met Sam, who was teaching at the same school. Sam’s open mind and carefree attitude made him an ideal partner and friend. The two of them spent hours at the rock gym and outside on short pitches learning the fundamentals together.

Now, though, he wanted to do something bigger and he needed a technically stronger partner. I was starting to think that maybe he wasn’t just a charity case. For a new climber, he was strong, and no one could question his heart. We did dozens of ascents that afternoon, each time trying a different feature that would challenge him in a new way. He sometimes paused, but never showed frustration or anger. He simply examined a problem and then dealt with it. By the time dusk was nearing, I was so impressed with his attitude that I decided to take him up one last pitch. This would be the longest and hardest so far. It was a roughly shaped spire that crawled and cragged it’s way up over 600 feet, at times forcing the climber to move hanging and inverted up a concave surface. Think of trying to climb up your living room wall and then across the ceiling. It could be a challenge for even an experienced rock rat, much less a rookie who’d been at it since morning.

I forged up the side, feeling the effects of the day’s work myself. Erik followed steadily, never moving too quickly, nor falling behind. At times he would reach out, searching for the next hold. I started to provide small verbal directions. I never told him exactly where to move. Rather, I gave him general directions, allowing him to figure out the final solutions for himself. He never asked for more than was needed or became overwhelmed when the route was arduous. He just kept attacking, slowly and methodically. It was an impressive display, so much so that at times I forgot that he couldn’t see where he was going. At last we reached the top of the rock, and sat for a rest on a smooth, flat stone on the surface. The sun was retiring, and my muscles ached. I had been impressed enough by Erik’s climbing to think I actually wanted to go out and try it with him again sometime. I gave him the good news, but his answer was short and impatient. “That’s great, but what are we going to do now?” I was a bit confused. “Well, I suppose we should get down and have some dinner.” “Let’s climb some more.” “Erik,” I said, “it’s been a long day. I’m tired. Plus, it’s getting dark.” I lifted my leg to pick some of the pebbles out of my shoes. “Look, let’s get some sleep. I’ll take you again in the morning.” “You can be tired tomorrow. Do you think I care if it’s dark?” I looked up at him. He wasn’t kidding. He just stood there, waiting for me to come up with the next excuse so that he could convince me to keep going. At that moment I finally began to understand what climbing was to him. It wasn’t just about doing something different. This wasn’t going to be a hobby for him, he was out climbing because he had to, and this was a chance that he’d waited months for. Erik wasn’t adventurous, he was a lunatic. He was just like me.

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Article Tags: barometer, blind friend, climbing equipment, disbelief, erik weihenmayer, friend sam, joshua tree, mullet, next morning, occasional beer, pale skin, pickup truck, ramen noodles, remainder, roadie, sleeping bag, stairs, tahiti, tatter, wilderness emt



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