My dreams were full of poetry and strange wisdom this year. Lines would appear from the landscape, like “the water that baskets me full,” or “chasing questions in a manner of patience is the same as chasing the journey.” My dreams also foretold death. … More In Brief, 2020: Child Again
BivyTales is conducting a survey on topics of anxiety and disorder associated with public speaking, defined as glossophobia, particularly for writers and what their relationship may be with verbal communication versus written communication. Even if symptoms are not severe, or you believe to not suffer at all, we are still interested in what you have to say! And please, if you find this interesting, share this survey with your writer friends and family. … More SURVEY: Writers and Public Speaking
All our shoulders are sore. My feet incite anxiety when they get wet. Tired legs. Today is more or less a do-nothing day but my body is in a funk. I’m quiet. Almost somber. Energy low. Raging headache. I ask Hatie for some of her Advil. I’m in an endurance hangover, it seems. I don’t even want to expend the energy talking so I daydream about napping. … More Boundary Waters, Part 3: Memory of Sounds
I can’t explain everything, honestly. We got lost. We might have been in Canada for a few hours, who knows. The water levels this year are high, Hatie says, and the islands don’t look the same – nothing really was matching the map anymore. So we paddled and paddled. Sonya brought an Oru Kayak and her paddling was even more exhausting I’m sure. We also decided to wear stick-on mustaches today; I have my silver leggings, Hatie has gold, and Sonya is decked out in champagne leggings and a matching tutu. We could most certainly be the lost girls of Peter Pan. … More Boundary Waters, Part 2: Lost
Sonya has started the fire and the light against the lake fools you into believing that if you follow the stone steps down to the water’s edge, you’ll fall away, airborne. Yet as romantic as it all may be, the mosquitoes are what keep you sane and seated, layered in clothing and swatting, occasionally smearing blood that is hopefully yours. … More Boundary Waters, Part 1: Inception
In the middle of the night/I wish to split my pelvis open wide/place the middles on the cool side//with a lemon wedge, halved. … More Dither Me This #11: Midnight Must-Halves
Yesterday was the longest day of the year, the summer solstice. The sun lagged longer in the sky and higher than any other time of the year. There is something to be cherished about having such long days: the ability to go on 7PM bike rides, nearly mandated by the heat. In part, as a consequence of all of this photon energy, all of us in the mountains are treated to a flourish of water making way from the high peaks to the canyons and valleys below, eventually to the sea, adding a little more salt to the brine, picked up along the way. … More Dither Me This #10: Seasons
What’s the point in posting about rock climbing anymore? Alex Honnold already free soloed El Capitan! You’ll never do anything that cool and no one will ever be as impressed. I sent a 12c yesterday. It was a sport climb with a bunch of safe bolts that caught my numerous falls before I finally pulled it off. But Honnold free solos 5.13! … More Dither Me This #8: Honnold
“Breathe Patrick. Come on Patrick, please. Don’t hold your breath. Don’t. No. No. No Patrick…” then I’d pass out, go limp in her arms – my mother on the brink of panic watching her toddler refuse to cry by holding his breath instead. I don’t remember doing it, but she would tell me these stories among others, how she’d have to take me to the hospital in the middle of the night when my asthma got too bad, when the albuterol wouldn’t work. … More Dither Me This #7: Breathe
My palms erupt with sweat. THAT FAST PATRICK. That fast you could have died. I would have fallen over 100 feet and detonated on the jagged rocks next to Corey. Stunned, I finish what I was originally supposed to do, something that is so second-nature, something that I have done thousands of times and is so stupidly mundane. I do it all with shaky hands, and finally rap off the route. … More Toe the Edge
I step hesitantly across the catwalk, trying not to glance down into the ice-coated gorge. My steps are wobbly, partly because of the mountaineering boots, but more so, terror. I’m offered a rope as we descend a narrow iron ladder to secure it to my climbing harness in case I become apprehensive about falling deep into this yawning cavern. Sweat drenches my woolen undershirt. The inch-long barbed crampons make balancing… … More Dither Me This #6: Risk
Mad. Does thinking too deeply of one word mark a symptom of near madness? At what point does one fall into it? How deep does madness go? Can you fall out of it or do you have to climb? These thoughts can get disorienting. I can get lost. … More Dither Me This #5: Mad
I wake up before Sonya, eat granola, snap peas, and sweet tomatoes with the back of the Jeep as my awning. Chug water. Look at the other water jug I peed into last night. Man was that rough. I could barely control it… … More My 5Point Journey, Part 3: Writing the Future from Mountainous Nothings
First breath
I begin and morph
oval eyes
oval mouth
soft things and round roots of noise, touch— … More Dither Me This #4: Ovals
I get my shit together, even take a real shit by the trees, snap a few pictures of the marbled white and green grass before dusting off my Jeep for the cruise into town. Even find a note from Sonya tucked into the door handle. … More My 5Point Journey, Part 2: Twilight Zone Semantics and Backdoor Tequila
I want to start this conversation with a dare. Go watch a short adventure film about something sexy, like skiing big lines or biking in the sunset. Peruse the average outdoor magazine – pay attention to the photos of the sponsored athletes and gear models. … More Dither Me This #3: Dear Outdoor Media
by Sara Aranda 4.19.17 I flip on the high beams, hunch over the steering wheel glass-eyed and squinting to read the land of yet another unknown place. Pavement ends and my Jeep bounces deeper into the hills of Prince Creek Road. Residents in town had described dirt and cattle gates, then voilà, campsites on either … More My 5Point Journey, Part 1: Rising Bird of Night
It’s been windy here lately. Last weekend, while climbing on the Bastille in Eldorado Canyon, dirty particles beat into my eyes with such fervor and consistency that I couldn’t keep them open. The calls from my partner below were washed warbles, even though I was only 20 feet off the ground. I was cold. Unless I locked off and pressed my stomach flat against the wall, the invisible force would pry me off, howling high across the rocky outcrops and flooding my ears. … More Dither Me This #2: Wind
I feel a certain kinship to bats. Perhaps it’s because I was bitten by one in Ecuador and since then I have slowly been transforming into one of them. Perhaps it’s because I might describe my learning style as “echolocation,” or a clumsy mimicry thereof. … More Dither Me This #1: Echolocation
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