Defiance

Lately I've been feeling like 2016 will be the summer that I become old. I've actually had several summers that sparked this emotion; the first one hit at age 19, so I know it's not necessarily an emotion I can trust. But between the reemergence of asthma symptoms — which I can no longer convince myself were a one-time illness; the carpal tunnel thing — which my surgeon speculated might be the culmination of an old wrist injury I don't even remember, possibly while snowboarding as an indestructible teenager; and an upcoming birthday that will place me squarely in my late 30s .... maybe I'm not "old," but definitely living in a deteriorating body. We all do, every day, but sometimes the realization hits us more directly.

This weekend my friend Leah was married in Portland, Oregon. I was excited to come out as she enters a new chapter of her life, and witness the swirl of emotions connected to this — as she put it, "all the feels." I also was looking forward to visiting Portland — a city where I was convinced I would live out my days, back when I was 19 and "old" but still indestructible — but never ended up moving here. In fact, the last time I even visited Portland was seven years ago when was in the midst of a difficult break-up. Admittedly many of my memories from this region have been cast in distinctly negative light.

Beat wasn't able to join, and the time I'd be able to spend with Leah was limited for obvious reasons, so this would be a solo trip to Portland. I decided I'd fill it with a bunch of hiking, as much as I could squeeze in between wedding activities. My flight out of Denver was at 6 a.m. Thursday, which required waking up after less than two hours of sleep to drive out to the airport in a sleepy daze, go through the cattle corrals for a one-stop flight through Seattle, then get stuck in an aisle seat directly across from the bathroom, which is just unbearable on a morning flight. By the time I was driving a rental car out to Cascade Locks, my head was in full jet lag mode even though I'd only traveled one time zone away. It was 11 a.m. but felt like midnight when I arrived at the base of the mountain I planned to climb — touted on multiple Web sites as the "hardest hike in the Columbia River Gorge" — Mount Defiance.

Imagine my disappointment when I found out the trailhead was under heavy construction and closed weekdays. I jogged along the I-84 corridor for more than four miles out and back, looking for a possible side route to poach. All I could find were cliffs and waterfalls.

Since it was still technically early in the afternoon, I got back in the car and drove all the way around the gorge to the Mount Hood corridor. I parked at an obscure wilderness area trailhead with a plan to hike a 13-mile loop to a 4,800-foot peak called ZigZag Mountain. There was no one else there, which is a little disconcerting on a beautiful pre-holiday-weekend afternoon so close to a large city. But I set out with a GPS track, headlamp, jacket, and emergency water purification tablets, which is all you need when heading into unknown woods by yourself.

Sea level wasn't quite the magic elixir for my lungs that I had hoped, so a bout of hard-charging running quickly turned to hiking. After that, I decided to keep it comfortable. Trail conditions started out runnable but soon deteriorated to an overgrown morass strewn with deadfall and toe-catching debris. My pace was much slower than expected, and the day was growing late. Once the route dropped off a secondary ridge and headed toward the summit, I had a difficult time locating the trail among the brush and deadfall. The GPS track, which I'd drawn myself based on a trail map, was not accurate at all. The loop was committing and I was inclined to turn around, but I was enjoying the views of Mount Hood and wildflowers. And anyway, I had a headlamp and water purification tablets.

The GPS track only became less reliable, and while the trail was still well-defined in spots, there were enough overgrown sections to throw me off. At one point I followed my GPS track too directly and ended up on top of a cliff, then had to backtrack until I found the trail. It was never a case of being lost or not knowing where I needed to go, but there was more route finding than I anticipated, and thus everything took longer. Finally, at about 7 p.m., I reached the Sandy River only to discover the trail bridge had washed away in a flood.

The river was roaring. I started hyperventilating. I'd walked twelve tough miles to reach this spot, it was late, and my only choices were to either cross the river or hike all the way back around in the dark on that hard-to-find trail. Of course, if I'd waited for the panic to subside, I would have remembered that I'd first crossed this river on a road bridge, which was only a mile away in a direct line, and could have bushwhacked through the woods following the river until I found it. Anyway, I let the panic subside and hiked along the river bank until I found a wide spot that was only about thigh deep, where the current was more gentle and I could see the bottom (these are all requirements of mine for crossing a river alone, a task of which I'm extremely frightened.)

I made it across without incident, but my adrenal glands were drained and I was so very tired. Only fear can make me feel this tired. Becoming lost and immersing myself in rushing water rank among my most pervasive fears. Sleep deprivation doesn't help. Still, once it was all over I decided ZigZag Mountain is a rewarding hike, a beautiful route and not as tough as I perceived. It was certainly secluded.

On Friday I was still pretty tired, but this was the only day I had completely free. Leah and I walked to get coffee in the morning, and she recommended I check out Silver Star Mountain. This 4,400-foot peak is at the edge of a big swath of wilderness in Southern Washington. I had to park about three miles from the trailhead because I didn't know the area required a recreation pass (this is what bugs me about online registration. What am I supposed to do as a tourist when I show up at a trailhead with no cell phone reception and no pass? Drive three miles down the road and park just outside the recreation area, I suppose.)

I spent most of the road jog/trail climb feeling pretty grumpy, but the summit ridge completely shifted my perspective. Leah was right. The views are amazing up here.

The sky was clear and Mount Rainier and Mount Saint Helens were in view, as well as Mount Adams, Mount Hood, and Mount Jefferson. I hunkered down and spent about 45 minutes on the summit, until I was shivering in the breeze.

Saturday was Leah's wedding. My original plan was to spend the day in the city and then head to the ceremony in the early evening. But I am who I am, so instead I set an alarm for 6 a.m., and by 7:45 I was back at the now-open Mount Defiance trailhead.

The reason Mount Defiance is touted as one of the toughest hikes in the region is because it gains 5,000 feet in 5.5 miles. But that's the worst of it. The Mount Defiance Trail is a good trail, winding upward through the trees in the cool morning mist with frequent glimpses of the Columbia River far below. I'm in my element in places like this, and because I'd already put eighteen hours on my feet for the week by Saturday morning, for the first time in a while, my legs were finally more tired than my lungs. This limited me to a hard but comfortable pace, with no wheezing or lightheadedness. I couldn't have felt more relaxed or content even though I was scaling a mountain.

The previous day, I was talking to Leah about the difficulty of finding flow. That's the one thing I miss most about riding bikes, because flow comes to me most effortlessly when I'm pedaling. Running and even hiking tend to cause more stress, and only rarely do I lose myself completely to the task. But I found flow on Mount Defiance, with my tired legs and happy lungs, marching upward through a loamy forest that reminded me of both Juneau and California, and helped me feel at home.

Mount Hood as seen from Mount Defiance. I again hunkered down on a rock, snacked on Goldfish crackers, reveled in this successful "defiance" of my sometimes broken, sometimes old body, and watched the clock in an effort to avoid being late for the whole reason I was in Oregon. It had taken me 2:45 to make the climb, and I fully expected to need at least three hours to get down.

I opted to return on a loop down the Starvation Ridge trail, which in hindsight I would not recommend. Although this route takes you along a rockier ridge with incredible views, then past a scenic lake, the final three miles are one of my versions of Hell. In this version, I'm standing directly over a place that I can see and really want to reach (in this case the I-84 corridor), but the only way to get there is a relentlessly steep slide of loose dirt, roots, and gravelly talus, and I can't stay on my feet. Even leaning forward and taking tiny steps, I slid onto my butt multiple times. After landing on my hand once and experiencing a horrifying shock of pain through my right wrist, I instinctively held it up every other time. No damage was done, but it was hard and frustrating.

What goes up must come down. This photo was taken at 1,200 feet, with more than a thousand feet to descend to the river. It looks like it's directly below, doesn't it? It is!

Still, I'm pleased that through it all I still made it to the summit of Mount Defiance. It was in many ways my own defiant victory, and a perhaps a preface to a new chapter of health and vitality. Leah's and Steven's wedding was great fun, although I was guiltily a little too tired to live it up. Congrats you two!

All drugged up to go outside

Beat and I planned to hit the high country on Sunday. I was excited about this, but oddly nervous, given the plan was a half-day hike on a non-technical trail. "Thirteen thousand feet? I wonder how that's going to go."

In the morning I gulped down coffee, then continued the self-medication with two Aleve for my hand, two Claritin for the horrendous grass pollen season, full-body coverage of SPF 50 sunscreen paste with so much zinc oxide it doesn't rub in, and since the high-altitude UV barrage charred patches of skin that I missed last week, another sweep with sunscreen spray. Arm sleeves, body lube, bug dope just in case. Frozen water bladder, buff (snot rag), hat, sunglasses. Rigid arm brace to protect my still-healing wrist in the likely event of falling, which has happened in 25 percent of my runs since I had surgery a month ago. Finally, one hit of the inhaler for pre-exercise airway prep. More inhaler hits were sure to follow later.

Sometimes I miss those carefree days of winter when all I have to do is put on a coat to go outside.

 Beat and I are not good at alpine starts. Terrible, actually. I realize that once monsoon season hits we'll need to be up at 4 a.m. to visit the high country. But for now, the weather is very forgiving of our habits: Ambling out the door at 8:30, getting stuck behind a train, and finally hitting the trail after nine. Our objective for the day was James Peak from the Moffat Tunnel trailhead, gaining about 4,300 feet in 14 miles round trip, topping out at 13,300 feet.

 The weather was nearly perfect — on the warm side at 85 degrees lower on the route, but breezy and clear above tree line. I struggled a lot. Beat and I did a little running lower on the route, which was fun and felt good. But this hard respiration tipped my breathing over the edge, and I didn't get it back. I wheezed and walked slowly from that point on. Another tipping point came after crossing below a raging waterfall on a sturdy but narrow and rail-less bridge. Whitewater is a strong phobia for me, and the rather benign crossing ignited panicked hyperventilating, from which I couldn't recover. I was dizzy the rest of the way up the peak, teetering on narrow switchbacks and leaning on boulders. It was all so beautiful, but I was so frustrated.

 These types of experiences are difficult to reconcile. Can't I just be happy about getting out to an incredible spot on a perfect day? Standing on the Continental Divide and gazing out over hundreds of miles of rugged beauty? Eating a pastrami sandwich in the sunshine and laughing at marmots as they watched us ruefully? I am happy, but I also need to acknowledge my health frustrations as well.

I'm now one year into this "asthma" journey, and beginning to swing back to suspicions that I do in fact have chronic — if hopefully seasonal — asthma. I was sick most of last summer, had a resurgence of lung strength from October to December, experienced a relapse in January, and then went on daily medication from February to April. Since nobody wants to be on daily medication for the rest of their lives, my asthma doctor in the Bay Area recommended going off the maintenance inhaler after moving to Colorado (she also strongly recommended getting allergy tested in Colorado and starting allergy shots based on the results.) Currently I feel like I'm slipping back into uncontrolled asthma, so I'll need to confront that. I have 14 days' worth of medication that I saved for this scenario. I plan to start a two-week trial after I return from a friend's wedding in sea-level Portland — so July 5. If I see improvements after those two weeks, I will make a bid to stay on the medication. Either way I need to find a new asthma doc here in Boulder. Even more than the thought of taking daily medication, I hate the idea of having three different types of doctors who I see on a regular basis (though hopefully I'll be able to walk away from the hand specialist soon.)

Another aspect of my health that I need to work on is my attitude. I do become frustrated, but it doesn't have to be that way. Although James Peak was incredibly scenic, perhaps my favorite run last week was a solo outing on Winiger Ridge, a nondescript trail above Gross Dam Reservoir. This was one of those runs where I had no real plan for the day. I was exploring. So it didn't matter if I sucked, or if I couldn't keep up with Beat, or if I ran this one segment significantly slower than I was able to run in April. Happily I jogged along county and forest roads until I came to a ribbon of singletrack along a broad ridge, so I followed it. The sky was cloudy and there was a strong breeze, so heat and pollen were both subdued. The trail spent most of the time in forest, but occasionally popped out into meadows with yellow wildflowers and mountain views. My breathing stayed in control, and I couldn't have been more content.

This reminds me of a proverb I came across while researching asthma: "Life is breath. He who half-breathes, half lives."

Only 86 days until autumn. 

Lazy days of summer

I'm probably not the only one surprised that the summer solstice has already come and gone. It's been a quiet start to the season for me, with no big adventures or races planned anytime soon, the whole gimpy hand thing, and a disconcerting decline in my running fitness — possibly due to allergies, asthma, or just falling out of shape ... I admittedly have been a bit lazy.

I actually had a decent start with running in Colorado when I first moved here in late April — back when there was still some snow on the ground and I wasn't acclimated. Now, instead of improving, I'm getting worse. I wish I could see stats of my VO2 max now versus 13 months ago, because I'd expect to see a decline. Although I doubt that the whole "I ruined my lungs during the Tour Divide" theory has real merit, this continues to be my fear. Hard breathing doesn't earn me much these days. My legs remain bored with slow plodding, and yet plod slowly is all I can do before dizziness sets in. Because of this, three-hour runs don't leave me feeling tired afterward, but three hours is about the amount of time I can tolerate before frustration takes over the fun factor.

So it's difficult to get too excited about running. I'm hoping to carve out more opportunities for alpine adventures, where the plodding is slow and the breathing is difficult, but the scenery is so intoxicating.

 

Beat and I went for a 14-mile walk along Niwot Ridge on Saturday, up to 12,400 feet. Alpine ridge-walking is perhaps my favorite form of outdoor recreation. The gimpy hand makes it difficult because I can't manage much scrambling, which puts a lot of alpine terrain off-limits. But it won't be that way for much longer, I hope. Although until about a week ago I was pessimistic I'd ever recover, recently my hand has made some real improvements. Now I can grip a steering wheel without pain, which I haven't been able to do since before CTS symptoms showed up in March. I have one of those liberal surgeons who tells me the recommended recovery period is eight weeks, but it's fine to return to activities as soon as I feel comfortable. Since I still have pain, numbness and very limited strength, I don't feel comfortable with scrambling and biking yet. But I may be able to grab that second trekking pole soon.

This morning I joined Eszter for a jaunt up Green Mountain. She's visiting her hometown (maybe she doesn't consider Boulder her hometown ... so we'll say the town where her parents live) for the next two weeks, and it was fun to talk about bikepacking and the Trans-Am while out on slow run. 

She asked about my first impressions of Boulder, and I realize I haven't written much about that. My point of view is skewed because I reside 25 minutes outside of town and can live like a hermit if I want, and sort of do. I occasionally work in coffee shops and enjoy this, although this is a college town and the crowdedness of coffee shops reflect that. I've only visited a few local restaurants, and they've all been pretty good, but not "San Francisco good." I still do about 80 percent of my grocery shopping at Trader Joes ... habits die hard. Beyond that, there's a lot about Boulder that reminds me of my hometown, Salt Lake City. It definitely has a strong mountain west feel. The scenery from main street is hard to beat.

I've been following the antics of a running group that I joined, but I have yet to show up at a group run — mostly because of my location and scheduling, but also because of fitness insecurity. That's another thing about Boulder — the trail running scene can feel a bit intense. After living in the Bay Area with its seven million people, I grew accustomed to generally falling in the top 25 percent of women on most non-downhill Strava segments. Here, I'm working as hard as my lungs can manage and still struggling to crack out of the bottom half. Well, it's my fault. I was warned not to compare myself to Boulderites on Strava.

Anyway, someday I'll be able to ride a bike again, and then I'll just head out to explore miles and miles of forest roads, and none of this will matter anymore. Until then, I'm on the hunt for amazing routes in the Indian Peaks Wilderness that don't require use of hands.

Days at home

I was loping through tall grass on a fading forest road when it occurred to me what I miss most about cycling. I'd been pondering this since I walked past my mountain bike with its sad deflated tires that haven't been touched since January, yelled at my fingers while fumbling with the laces of my running shoes, and stepped outside into wind-blast of grass pollen and heat to go for a run that I felt strangely not enthused about, at all. I say strangely because nine days passed after my surgery before I felt stable and pain-free enough to venture back to trails, and I thought I'd be more excited about it.

I've been feeling down this week. It's not just about my hand, although I'd be lying if I didn't admit that pain and lack of instant-fix (which nobody expected) weren't a large percentage of my sour mood. There was also, of course, the latest batch of world news, mass shootings and this debacle of an election year. There was the onset of spring allergy season (my second of the year thanks to moving from California to Colorado.) There was some concerning news about Cady, the sweet cat who lived with me for 11 years and now resides with a friend in California. An acquaintance died. This woman and I were close in age and shared similar passions, so her candid writing about her battle with cancer over the past twenty months always struck a chord. Her illness had progressed to the point where the news might bring the platitude, "At least she's no longer suffering." But she remained grateful every day. She was never unrealistic, but she was also never resigned. She was grateful when she could hike; and when she could no longer do that, she was grateful when she could take her young son to the park; and when she could no longer do that, she was grateful when she could get out of bed; and when she could no longer do that, she was grateful she could still draw; and when she could no longer do that, she sent out a final goodbye. She was gone just over a week later.

So I was a bit sad and I was stuck at home, unable to drive to town with my bad hand, and canceling an interview and a meet-up with a friend because of this. I do love the place where I live, and enjoyed some beautiful sunsets and humorous interactions with birds, rabbits, and deer. I'd take my laptop outside, but the allergy fog would drive me indoors before too long. The heat ramped up to nearly ninety degrees. I ventured back into running slowly — 4, 5, 6 miles on the dirt road, extremely careful because tripping and falling would have been a disaster.

I did get a lot done with my Iditarod book project, which I'm happy about. The first draft is nearly finished. I just have one more chapter and a few details to add, and then it will be time to sort through it and determine whether it makes any sense. Thematically the storyline is quite similar to "Be Brave, Be Strong" — about failure, kindness, and overcoming self-doubt. I'm thinking about combining the story with a full-color photo book, because designing such a book would be a lot of fun — even if not so lucrative. After this I need to find less esoteric subjects to write about. Maybe. I'm not sure it's that important.

A follow-up with the surgeon brought a lecture about not using my hand enough. Although the nerve still has a long way to go toward healing, I can improve my strength and dexterity with hand exercises. Great. There will surely be more pain and mistakes down the road (I already broke the screen on my phone because I dropped it), but maybe someday soon I will stop screaming at my shoelaces.

The surgeon basically gave me the go-ahead to live my normal life, so I celebrated today by exploring a new trail near my house, Twin Sisters Peak (a small rocky outcropping in Boulder County, not to be confused with the popular summit in Rocky Mountain National Park.) The heat index was high but there was a nice breeze, and despite allergies I begin to feel more peppy after slogging out the first mile. By accident I veered off the main trail onto a disused forest road. After realizing this, I decided to keep following it all the same. Suddenly caught up in the prospect of new discoveries, I realized that this is what I miss most about riding my bike — exploration. There's a large scope beyond this small radius where I've run and hiked since moving to Boulder two months ago. Wheels give such an empowering sense of freedom, when it's possible to cover dozens of miles in a few hours. Sure, there's still tons of new space to explore on foot — including the mysteries of my own back yard. But I can't help but look out toward the snow-capped Continental Divide, and want to go there right now.

The old forest road largely petered out, but I did run into some no-trespassing signs, so I turned around. I hadn't planned to climb all the way to the peak, fearing a scramble, but upon return from my "adventure," I changed my mind. Tentatively placing my stiff, weak fingers around holds — but refusing to put any weight on them — I managed to gain the summit. Atop that rocky outcropping were incredible views of every space I've explored so far, and so many more I haven't. I may be down sometimes, but I'm still grateful. Every day.

Between injury and recovery

On Friday I had carpal tunnel release surgery in my right hand. The procedure required a long vertical slit through the palm, where the surgeon cut the transverse carpal ligament to relieve pressure on the median nerve, and also removed a fair amount of scar tissue from the area. The scar tissue was especially surprising. A majority of people who suffer from chronic CTS - many for years before they seek treatment - never build up scar tissue and have better nerve response than I did after three months of symptoms. Everything about my case points to acute CTS, except for I never had a damaging wrist injury. Or did I? The long tunnel of scars and bruises is becoming increasingly murky.

What the surgery did determine is that this was never going to get better on its own, and may not still. It's up to the nerve to heal now that the compression has been released. It was, however, badly compressed. As soon as the wound heals I can employ massage to prevent scar tissue buildup and hand exercises to improve strength, but most of the actual healing process is beyond my control. Knowledge of this has admittedly brought me down, but that sad feeling could just be the pain and fatigue from surgery, and dealing with what is currently an utterly useless right hand. I lost my temper today when I failed to wrap a band around my hair - so I threw my hat across the room and stomped all over it. Childish as it is, sometimes a temper tantrum feels good.

When my mom heard about my surgery, she offered to spend her birthday driving across Colorado with my dad so they could drive me to the clinic and stay by my bedside as I woke up in a recovery room, groggy and begging for apple juice. My mom was very sweet to take care of me over the weekend, and I feel lucky to have her. It was especially fun to show my parents our new home and the surrounding mountains.

The hat-stomping incident occurred after they returned to Salt Lake, when I decided to get some fresh air by walking up to my neighbor's house to deliver a check. The process of getting ready - changing into outside clothes, adjusting my new arm sling, writing and signing a check with my left hand to a satisfying level of third-grade-penmanship, applying sunscreen, and putting on shoes and socks - took a frustratingly large amount of time. By the time I got to the hair tie and hat, I'd had it, and let my hair whip and tangle in the wind. Dark clouds built overhead as I walked. After three miles I still hadn't found my neighbor's house (turns out he moved his street sign) but by then there was thunder directly overhead, and I needed to hurry home. When it started to rain I tried jogging, but that was far too painful and ill-advised. Then the sky opened with heavy rain and nickel-sized hail, and all I could do was duck beneath a pine tree and hold my good hand over my neck as hail pelted my head and back, and rain soaked the bandages I wasn't supposed to get wet.

"Mom would not be happy with me," I thought. (Sorry, Mom.) I felt like crying, but I'd already spent all my tantrum energy on a hat.

Instead I waited for the hail to subside, then walked the rest of the way home in a downpour to change my bandages and dispose of the disintegrated check that I'd spent such a long time writing and carrying up the road for nothing. Sometimes it just feels like there's a dark cloud hovering overhead. But things get brighter. I know that.

Blame it on the Tetons

 Beat and I are often accused of failing to take "real" vacations. Every time we leave home, they say, it seems to be for some kind of difficult endeavor, steeped in suffering. Of course this isn't true, but any such argument requires dredging up philosophical musings about the subjective nature of enjoyment, and reasons why one woman's day at the beach is another woman's slow-roasting torture of sunburn and boredom.

Memorial Day brought an opportunity for a classically enjoyable vacation in the form of a Google employee retreat in Teton Village, Wyoming. There would be relaxing in a spacious suite, big breakfasts, nice dinners, a wine tasting, a rodeo, and access to any number of luxuries that come with a resort destination. Attendees were encouraged to enjoy scenic floats on the Snake River or bus tours to Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks, but warned that late May is still the pre-season and outdoor opportunities would be limited.

On Wednesday Beat and I drove from Boulder to Jackson, and the scenery and wildlife viewing was great right along the highway (Over the course of the weekend we saw elk, deer, bison, pronghorn, bighorn sheep, osprey, and a grizzly bear, all from the comfort of the car.) We enjoyed a few nice meals with Beat's colleagues. Somewhere in there I developed a crushing headache, which I can't even blame on the altitude as Teton Village is a thousand feet lower than our home in Boulder, but I'll go ahead and blame the altitude anyway.

I was feeling quite lousy, and sulked through Thursday's long breakfast followed by an afternoon wine tasting, where I drank bottles of water and struggled to hold down a light lunch of barley soup and salad. (If you're wondering how there's a winery in Jackson Hole — because I certainly was — it works because they grow their grapes in Sonoma County, California, and truck them into Wyoming for fermentation. Reportedly the high altitude and cool summers aid in this process.) Anyway, by mid-afternoon I was all relaxed out, so I angled for some fresh air and a short hike before dinner. Nothing too difficult — we could just walk up the ski hill, look out over the valley, and jog down.

 Our friend Liehann, who is racing the Freedom Challenge again in two weeks and has been exclusively bike training for the past six months, made the arguably poor choice to join us. Up we marched in a biting wind and intermittent sleet squalls. I wasn't anticipating an epic and was wearing a T-shirt and hiking pants, with only a 2-ounce Mountain Hardwear shell, a knit hat, and a fleece buff as extra layers. When I started to feel chilled, I put on the hat and buff but opted to leave my arms bare, relishing the sensation as the feeling left my extremities. See, ever since I developed carpal tunnel syndrome in late February, I've lived with a low-level pain in my hand that can partially be described as a mild case of the screaming barfies. Now that three months have passed, I've grown more accustomed to living with this constant tingling, but I do notice when it goes away. It feels wonderful. And the only thing that makes the pain go away is reduced circulation or actual numbness in my hand.

As we continued gaining elevation and the wind grew more fierce, I debated where to draw the line between my enjoyment of pain-free fingers and the increasing discomfort of the cold. It was about then that I took a sip from my Camelbak and drew a mouthful of slush — meaning the ambient temperature was below freezing.

"Windchill has got to be near single digits," I thought, and decided it was time to put on my jacket. The paper-thin material whipped wildly in the wind, and the fingers on my good hand were too stiff to open it up. Basically I'd become too chilled to put on my own coat, which was not a great coat to begin with. It's quite a dumb thing to do, and of course I knew this. At the same time, I knew enough to understand my body was uncomfortable but not dangerously cold, and that warming up would be quick the moment I turned around and sprinted down to sheltered elevations. So I stuffed the jacket in a pants pocket and continued marching up the hill in a T-shirt.

 It was all quite exhilarating, fighting those primal fears that spark at the edges of survivability. I wasn't yet shivering and actually my body was doing a great job of circulating warm blood through my core and legs — only my arms were icy cold. The frigid wind roared and sleet squalls hung like curtains from surrounding clouds, but overhead there was a patch of almost-sunlight, and I relished it all.

At Rendezvous Mountain, Beat and Liehann had ducked behind a closed tram station. Beat helped me put on my jacket, which was definitely better than a T-shirt but not great, and then we all pressed into the brunt of the wind for one more view of the snow-capped skyline beyond the summit. Running downhill, I managed to warm up quickly. After a half mile Beat graciously leant me his mittens to expedite the real screaming barfies feeling in my fingers (which is a lot worse than what I feel all the time. Lesson learned.)

We returned from what turned out to be a 14-mile, 4,200-feet-of-climbing outing just in time for dinner. My headache had finally abated, so I used up all of my bar tickets on glass after glass of Diet Pepsi.

 On Friday we cast a hopeful eye on a canyon loop in Grand Teton National Park, but we weren't well-equipped for spring conditions. (I did have a better jacket, which I carried on every other outing this weekend.) After parking on the wrong side of Jenny Lake, we'd already hiked nearly eight miles by the time we arrived at the mouth of Paintbrush Canyon. Slush line started at 7,500 feet, and by 8,000 feet we were post-holing to our knees. Over scree fields this kind of post-holing can be dangerous, because you don't know where your foot will land. It could be a deep crevice between two rocks, which could easily end in a sprained or broken ankle.

 The weather was volatile as well. It went from raining to sleeting to blue-sky sunshine in the span of about thirty minutes.

 We found a nice basin to have some lunch and called it good.

 Heading back down to String Lake, where we hitched a ride with Liehann and Trang. We could have trekked all the way back around Jenny Lake, but we were committed to our lazy resort weekend. This hike ended at 13.2 miles. Later that evening went out on the town with a large group of Googlers. There may or may not have been overconsumption of a massive funnel cake and the purchase of a fur-lined jock strap. (Beat was not the one who made this purchase, and wanted me to clarify this, although he did go on about how well a fur jock strap would work in Alaska.)

 Saturday morning, we weren't willing to brave the crowds in the national park, so we traveled to the other side of the valley to scope out a route to Jackson Peak. The best views came on the road walk to the trailhead, where clear skies revealed the entire Tetons skyline.

 Snowline consumed the trail at 8,500 feet and then it was a slog. We should have brought snowshoes to Wyoming. Wide backcountry skis would have been the way to go of course, but even snowshoes would have greatly improved our chances of getting to the places we wanted to see.

 Beat inadvertently volunteered to be the trail-breaker, and carefully tested every step. At this point were were all frequently collapsing into hip-deep crevasses.

We decided to turn around when we found ourselves on rotten snow atop table-sized boulders, where falling through might end in a head injury. This was also a nice lunch stop — Goodwin Lake.

 Beat's colleague Ben in one of the many leg-swallowing holes.

 Ben penguin-ing downhill. This helps solve the postholing issue, but it also results in a face full of snow.

All in all, it was a pleasant holiday weekend with lots of relaxation and hardly any exercise. I don't know why people assume we don't like to have fun.

Broken, not broken

Beat with our Iditarod-inspired tripod. He collected the markers from downed trees off the trail in March.

This week I've been less enthused about my runs, dragging around a sore leg and the knowledge that my hand is not going to get better on its own. Last Wednesday, a doctor performed a nerve conduction study and concluded I have "very severe" carpal tunnel syndrome. The numbers point to grade five, which is as advanced as this injury becomes before the nerve stops firing altogether, and the damage can be permanent. There's already muscle atrophy. My distal motor latency has actually deteriorated since I had a similar test done in March, even though I gave up the activity that prompted my symptoms (cycling), wore a wrist brace, performed PT exercises, and took anti-inflammatories. At this point, the cause is impossible to determine — my case is definitely not typical, and there's no way to say whether it's overuse from the race to Nome, acute injury from a crash, genetics, a combination, or something else entirely. All I know is it's bad, and getting worse. Both the doctor who conducted the test and the surgeon I originally consulted were adamant that I not mess around with this.

The results must have been concerning enough to fast-track through an overbooked schedule, because the surgeon offered an appointment next week. The next available dates weren't until July. I booked it, because the odds of full recovery after transverse carpal ligament release are high. Without surgery, the odds that I'd have to manage this for the rest of my life also are high. That's nerve injury. I learned a similar lesson in 2009 — "Frostbite is forever."

I did not expect busy Boulder doctors to expedite this process, so I'd already registered for what I hoped would be my first trail race in Colorado, the Golden Gate Dirty 30. The race is June 4, so clearly I won't be able to participate. Disappointment about this is among the many emotions the prospect of surgery has ignited.

Of course there's anticipation. (No more invisible spiders crawling all over my fingers, no more electric shock pain!)

And there's fear. (Unless you count wisdom teeth extraction when I was 15, I've never had surgery. I might die. That possibility is noted in the manual.)

There's disbelief. (Given my risky and high-impact sporting activities, I would have never guessed my first surgery would target a stereotypical typing injury.)

And hope. (I might be able to hand-write like an adult, draw, eat with a fork and knife, and ride bikes again by July!)

 I was bummed out after Wednesday's nerve conduction test. Beyond the bad numbers, the phrase "it's getting worse" is especially discouraging after you've spent two months avoiding something you loved because you believed abstinence would make your injury better. Adding to this helpless feeling was the full limp I was sporting after slipping in mud and bashing my leg on rocks during a run on Tuesday. A bruise the size and shape of a softball ballooned out from my shin, and hurt quite a bit. But it was "just a bruise," and I was feeling defiant about this pathetic array of limb injuries, so I took a couple of lunchtime hours to march up Fern Canyon.

Fern Canyon has become a personal nemesis, because it is perhaps the meanest of the mean (standard hiking) routes in the Flatirons. I maintain concerns that I will always be a flailing, stumbling, inadequate mountain runner/hiker. This is particularly sad if I continue as a non-cyclist, and my only running options are mountains. I love mountains. But they do not love me. At least, I believe they might be conspiring with gravity to knock me around a bit. I was thinking about this the other day as I crept down Gregory Canyon — no matter how much I practice this, I may not improve because the issue isn't limited skills or strength, it's balance perception. If I descend Gregory Canyon enough, eventually I'll have a stronger core and ankles, but I'll likely still feel the pull of vertigo with every step. How much training does it take to realign proprioception?

But yes, Fern Canyon. My leg hurt, but I tagged Bear Peak, and this weirdly made me feel a lot better.

 The rest of the week involved some running around with a painful bruised leg, because I was in training for the Dirty 30 and wanted to make sure my proprioception was dialed. Beat guided me on a tour of a couple of the semi-secret routes on Green Mountain, which were steep and fun but shattered any confidence I may have tenuously gained.

At least my writing projects are going well this week. I am really enjoying working on my Iditarod book, although a few hours of submersing myself in it often leaves me more exhausted than a long run. I'm also negotiating a contract to have "Be Brave, Be Strong" produced as an audio book. No, I won't be the narrator — therefore, it might actually be okay. The adventure genre is a challenging market for books, because a fair percentage of the audience are not regular readers. Audio books are great for busy folks who perhaps want a diversion while they're commuting or out for a long run. I've resisted offers to work on audio books in the past, because — full disclosure — I don't enjoy and don't listen to audio books (for me, something is lost when I'm being talked at, rather than reading. Perhaps I'm too attached to having full control of my reading experience. Or have too short an attention span.) But this is a good opportunity. I'm excited!

After my consultation with the surgeon on Monday, I was again bummed out, because there was admittedly a sliver of hope that she would look at my results and say "hey, I think a cortisone shot could fix this." (A cortisone shot probably wouldn't even mitigate the pain of grade 5 CTS.) It was again lunchtime, so I again went to the Cragmoor trailhead for another go at Fern Canyon. My leg was finally feeling less sore after I took a day off Sunday and the swelling had gone down, so I marched happily up to Bear Peak through intermittent rainstorms. My goal was to do the descent a bit better, so I furrowed my brow in concentration and employed my trekking pole for a little more stability as I hopped down rock steps. Near the bottom of Fern Canyon, when the 1,900 feet-in-0.8-mile-descent veers onto a nicely runnable doubletrack, I stepped up on a boulder and clumsily bashed my sore shin on the rock.

!!!! There were loud swear words.

I may have lost my temper and stabbed my trekking pole violently into the rock, multiple times, with enough force to make deep gouges in the surface. It's amazing the pole didn't snap. +1 Black Diamond carbon Z-Pole.

The bruise is swollen again, and larger than before.

Well. Clearly it's my turn to feel broken right now. I'll find another way around it.