There was a promotion for, and with, Ken Roczen, the World Champion motocross racer. In order for it to happen it needed to be outlined on the paper in front of me. Only, the paper wasn’t paper and it wasn’t digital either. At times it felt like white semi-translucent plastic. It had a couple holders sticking out perpendicular shaped like segments of ball point pens. If you pulled on the holders a piece would come out in the shape of mountain, a rough triangle with the point on top, and a bit to the left. It bothered me to take this out, it felt like things were getting worse when it was taken out. [Someone] was trying to help me but it wasn’t going well. I couldn’t understand how the promotion worked, what the words on the surface of this paper were supposed to say. I could move the words around but it didn’t seem like I had the correct words or enough of them. I didn’t know how to connect what was in front of me with Ken Roczen but it felt important to do so, and quickly.
John Wendl was there and he wanted to go for a bike ride. We were in San Luis Obispo area and that was comforting. There were a couple other people in our biking group. We were riding fast down a neighborhood street, all pedaling fast like we were racing, I was in the back of the pack. We headed down a street then made a right off the sidewalk and up a dirt hillside that already had many bike trails up and down it. We were all carrying a lot of speed and the initial climb resulted in an uphill jump. I wasn’t sure how much air I’d get on this. I wasn’t on my own bike but it felt comfortable. As I left the face of the jump I could see Wendl waiting for me up ahead, I decided to whip the bike more than I usually would—more than I ever have. I did so and the rear wheel was up over my head. I pulled it back just in time. I large whip for a small jump. I was extremely proud of myself.
That was the end of the fun part of the ride, now I knew I was in for a long climb. The hill was so large that you couldn’t see the top of it—it was starting to feel like a mountain. There were many trails, many options, all of them a bit too soft and steep for a mountain bike and I regretted losing Wendl as he probably knew the ridable way up. Lots of people were coming down, many of them on motorcycles. One of them looked at me rudely as if to say, “What are you doing riding up and on a bicycle?” I chose a trial that veered off to the right in hopes of avoiding any more confrontation then realized I could never peddle up this for any sustained period and got off to walk. I put the bike seat on my shoulder, it fit perfectly there and I got ready for a very long climb on foot. John was long gone as was whomever else was in our group. As usual, with my fitness, I was unobserved, in the back, and would catch up with them at some waypoint.
This climb was something like the one up Aspen mountain, which is 4000ft. I walked it much like I did back then, meditatively putting one foot in front of the other and not thinking about how far I’d come or how far I had to go. As such, the top just happened.
There was an old hut at the top the size of a small house. It was light blue with white roof trim, all of it aged many decades and from another time. There were old wooden tables out front in the patchy grass like a ski resort in the summertime. Likewise, they served some food up there. There were young kids running around.
As I walked away from the hut I came upon a white cemented platform that had long ago been painted but was now only showing that it once was. Bolted into the platform was three or four black metal hoist-like structures that extended out over the edge of what I could only describe as the edge of the world. On the end of each hoist was a black plastic pulley or wheel with nylon straps wrapped through it and then strung up and over the hoist arm in tangles. The hoists were made of 1.5” square tube iron and had extra extensions off the bases where they bolted over the edge and down to the side—though I couldn’t see that without looking over the edge and I didn’t want to do that. Just getting near the edge was terrifying. I say this was the edge of the world because there was no telling how far down it went. I couldn’t see anything below except for what seemed like the a mist or the top of a cloud.
Matt Miller was there beside me. He was excited to show me how this worked. He took hold of two of the nylon straps and wrapped each one around the palm of his hands and swung out over the endless void. The nylon straps, all wound around the pulley wheel and themselves, unravelled in such a way that he slowly descended into the void like this was a rope swing over a river and he was gone down and out of sight. Then, unexplainably, he was back by my side and eager for me to try it. I tried it without thinking but my straps got tangled. I was only lowered about 10 feet. Matt was annoyed and pulled me back to the edge of the platform. I backed away from the edge in absolute terror. It occurred to me, only then, that if the rope got tangled on the way down, say somewhere between 50 and 4000 feet, I’d neither be able to climb back up or drop to the bottom. I’d be alive only as long as I could hold onto the nylon strap.
I tried to explain this to Matt but he wouldn’t hear of it. He insisted it was easy and fun and was mildly annoyed with me in a way I am familiar from all our childhood adventures. I crawled to the edge of the platform again, this time acutely aware of the height—much more so than before—and felt lightheaded as I neared the edge. I thought I might pass out from the sensation of height. My muscles hurt and failed at the same time. The idea of doing this was almost certainly life ending. Again I tried to explain to Matt the risk/reward ratio on this was stupid. Why would we do this? I explained that the straps would have to untangle is just the right way for it to work and the odds on that were horrible. I went on to explain that if they untangled too fast I would drop and have to somehow keep hold when they did grab. He bowed his head in disappointment.
He took two straps in his hands and swung out like a gymnast and flipped over gracefully with his arms extended out. He didn’t descend at all, the straps didn’t let go. He did a few tricks and then swung back to the platform edge but on the other side. It was only then that I realized there was an other side, another platform about 30 feet away. When he landed on the other side the infinite void in front of me was gone, filled in by what was now the continuous aged cement surface that stretch from the grassy edge were I sat to a similar grassy edge on the other side. The void that was there now felt like it existed because some god-like eraser simply erased the middle of the cement platform revealing the infinite below. There was a white picket fence on the far side, the other side, and the hills continued off beyond it into the mountainous but beautiful summer landscape.
Matt walked slowly back across the platform toward me. He shrugged and smiled. It was like a carnival ride and now it was closed, turned off. The black metal hoists that never looked like they could hold my weight in the first place were still there, only now they seemed purposeless. I poked the pulley wheel of one with my finger, as if to see if it was real.