Thursday, November 18, 2010

Between a Book and a Soft Place

Yesterday, trapped in the alternating confines of my bed and couch, I finished Between a Rock and a Hard Place, the book by hiker/climber Aron Ralston about the harrowing six days he spent wedged by a boulder in a Utah canyon in 2003. To escape, the severely dehydrated and sleep-deprived Ralston broke the bones in his forearm and cut through the flesh. Oh, and then he rappelled down a rocky cliff and hiked about seven miles to safety.

Much like when I read Into the Wild several years ago, I was struck not just by the physical circumstances (my mouth felt dry when Ralston described his parched tongue) but by the isolation, the vast wildness of being outside.

A single bird flying overhead, the shuffling of a rat in a nearby nest and a few pesky mosquitoes were the only interactions Ralston had with living things. Even sunlight only permeated the deep hole for a few minutes each day. But in spite--and maybe because--of this extreme solitude, Ralston found an incredible drive to survive.

I remembered hearing about the incident (it was around the time I was finishing college) when I saw a trailer for the new movie, 127 Hours. Now that I've read Ralston's book, I'm simultaneously yearning to see the movie and unsure if I want to know what Hollywood did to further dramatize what is already a compelling true story. (i.e. adding a romantic relationship, etc.) But I'll see it, even if only out of curiosity and a growing intrigue about Ralston.

Maybe Ralston's ego got the better of him in some of his climbing and skiing experiences--he was nearly attacked by a bear and almost buried in an avalanche--but in the interviews I've watched, he seems (for lack of a better phrase) pretty down-to-earth.

In his epilogue, called--appropriately and hilariously--A Farewell to Arm, he makes this cheesy-but-dynamic statement:

"Saying farewell is also a bold and powerful beginning."

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