Ah Fall

Ah Fall, such a wonderful time of the year. The colors, the smell, the temperatures and the calmness that comes with the summer rush being over.
Having spent my summer rock climbing, hiking, biking, doing triathlons, remodeling a building, losing what little money I had in Vegas, trimming trees off roof tops and cleaning gutters, becoming a rep for a home fitness product, you'd think that I would need a break. Honestly, this was my break. I happily spent my summer unemployed, something I hadn't done since I was 15.

My life this summer was amazing. The things I got to see, hidden lakes in Rocky Mountain National Park, sitting on top of 14 thousand foot peaks, scaling rock mounds to dizzying height to look out over the world and revel in my accomplishments, learning a whole new side or rock climbing and realizing that there is so much more to an area than just the part you can see.
People come to my home to vacation. They come in huge trucks pulling campers larger than most modest houses. They come in vans, every seat packed and stay in hotels. They come two or three cars deep and "camp" in their 8 person tents with everyone else with the same idea, yet none of these people come to really enjoy the beauty that we live in everyday.
They come to see the town, and shop in the 27 t-shirt shops or the 6 candy stores or eat at 1 of the 3 subways. They come to drive into the national park and take a day hike, maybe consisting of a couple of miles. While those few miles may be the most scenic things they have ever seen, they truly are missing what the park has to offer.

Being unemployed this summer afforded me the luxury of really being in a place. I hiked up to a lake aptly named dream lake. Roughly 10miles round trip, I passed about 20 people on the trail, only headed to the first one or two lakes. Once I broke free of the crowd and got further and further up the trail I came across dream lake. I was the only person there. I sat there a marveled and the sheer size of the rock walls in the circ I was sitting in. I imagined all the rock climbs that were abundant around me and realized that I was here, not just sitting there alone, but I was here, in nature surrounded by beauty and stillness and the calm that all those people down below me didn't get to experience. My life this summer was amazing.

I scaled rock faces upwards of 800 feet with nothing more than some caribeaners, harness, rope and a partner. I sat on top the the world and surveyed a 360 degree view of miles and miles of wilderness. I ran from thunder storms, hid from lightning bolts, took shelter from hail, wind, sleet and snow yet through it all, I had the best summer ever.
Now being unemployed was not without it's challenges. I have a car payment, bills steaming from my days as a young single, sometimes not single, girl in a mountain town. Car insurance, medical bills and a few other things but yet I managed to get these all paid. How you ask. I love my family! No really, my father owns a building we have been renovating for the better part of ten years. Rather than hire or contract out people to do the work for him, he took me on and taught me the ins and outs of putting up walls, wiring electrical, hanging dry wall and lastly paining a 3000 square foot building. In return he helped me pay my bills. My mother hired me to scale her roof and cut the tree branches back that have been threatening to take the roof down for the better part of 3 years. While I was up there, I weeded and cleaned out the gutters, swept mountain lion leaving off the roof and just did general cleaning to make sure the house was good for the winter.

Another part of my playing for the summer was teaching boot camps in a local gym, while I had very few takers, people are scared of the term boot camp, it was fun non the less. I have access to the gym, I worked out both inside and out, ran around lake Estes, played on the school play ground, by play I mean worked out on and took friends dogs for walks. Tired yet?
Now with fall here, I am looking forward to the cooler temperatures and less crowds so I can go see some of the closer lakes, hike up to what were waterfalls and see how they have become ice curtains. Look at the snow capped peaks a think in a few weeks I will get to go ski on those. Walk around town and actually see what stores are here and what they have to offer. Most of all spend time in the park downtown and hangout with out the opmah bands or John Denver concerts, they were entertaining though.

The last part of my life in the unemployed realm before I actually will search for a job is a month long trip to rock climb in Thailand. We will be taking roughly four weeks, traveling to India, Vietnam, Puket, koi pi pi island, Prang-na and many other places. We will be taking cooking classes, snorkeling, deep water soloing, hiking with komodo dragons, riding elephants through the jungle and most of all climbing on the huge limestone walls that line Thailand's coast. Unemployment sound bad to you, not to me. I have made the most of this time and really taken the opportunities presented to me to learn, explore, and most of all grow as a person and learn about myself. If I could figure out how to keep doing this I would happily welcome the chance!