The great let-down

I let my boyfriend down yesterday. About 15 feet down, in under 5 seconds.

I recently took up rock climbing. The first time I ever tried it I was wearing hiking boots and had never even had a harness on, much less been strung up 30 feet on a cliff face. It was frustrating, and rewarding, and beautiful. This year I bought shoes, a harness of my own, and a grigri... a simple little device that prevents a potentially scattered mind - like mine - from letting go of the rope and dropping a climber. Good idea, right?

Last night as I watched my partner climb, I reveled in the joy of the experience, the views (he has a great butt.... the sun on the cliffs and river below are stunning too) and the swarm of swallows soaring around us as we scaled Falling Rock. I breathed deeply as I took up the slack, reminding myself how happy I was to be there, how far I had come to be able to take on such a challenge and succeed. He reached the top with grace and smiled down at me. His nod was my signal to lower him down. I nodded in return and began to let the rope out. The grigri was not what I expected and our weight difference was magnified as I struggled to smooth out his decent. The rope wound around my foot and as I shook my foot loose and tried to straighten the coiling rope, I dropped him.

"Jaci! Jesus fucking christ, Jaci! Jesus!" the short stream of obscenities that spilled from his beautiful mouth pierced my heart so deeply, I was instantly certain it would be months before I could recover. He was fine, although completely freaked out and I stood awkwardly avoiding his gaze for a few minutes. We tried to figure out what my problem had been which only served to make matters worse. He had every right to be angry and his lashing had come as he had just dropped 15 feet, facing backward, off a cliff that has killed more than one in the last few years. I totally understood, but as I climbed my last of the day, I spun myself into a progressively worse state of mind. I wanted to let it go, I knew I should have and yet, somewhere I wanted to hold on to the pain. Maybe I wanted him to see how badly I felt about it. Or I just needed a good cry. Or I wanted to feel sorry for myself, tear myself down, beat myself up... just for old time's sake.

I held it together until we hiked out of the area and headed for the car. I cried all the way home. That, of course, helped nothing. By 9 o'clock, I was convinced he would never trust me again, we'd never be able to share this sport I had utterly fallen in love with and our relationship was forever doomed. I am not normally the dramatic type, but when it hits, it slams. I was a wreck.

We bought a six back of beer at 10, made love and went to bed. I felt better, but not great. I still felt ridiculous, humiliated and incompetent, but better. As the day wore on, I began to heal. I breathed deeply the light. I reminded myself I could do it and it would go perfectly. I imagined it going perfectly. A friend of mine stopped by later and told me she dropped her man once too. I felt better. I called and told him, he laughed a little. It would be OK, we would be OK. If a relationship of four years can't handle a little fall, it wasn't very strong to begin with.

Maybe that's the lesson. Well, the obvious, physical lesson is to always keep my right hand on the rope. ALWAYS. But the spiritual message contained withing (for which I always look when something particularly good or bad happens) might just be that we can take it. We're going to drop each other sometimes. Expecting your significant other to always have their hand on the rope of your life is not only ridiculous, it's impossible - and selfish. We have to decide to trust each other anyway, to believe that a higher power, or fate, or circumstance will step in when we drop the rope and simply promise each other that we will do the very best we can, as much as possible. And that we'll shut up and take the cursing when we accidentally mess it up and let go.

I am fairly certain I will never again let go of the climbing rope when I am on belay. I am also fairly certain I will not respond the way he wants me to in some situation someday. I am sure the same will be true for him. But our love is deep, our relationship fiercely strong and we'll be Ok.