“I try really hard to realize it when it’s amazing, and even when it’s not.” Driving south from Squamish I listened to those words from my favorite climbing video, ’35,’ as I had many, many times before. It was Thursday, July 25th 2019. I needed to be in Seattle, but I didn’t want to be; the frequent status quo of my summer. I’d been able to get away with limiting my time in the city for the most part over the course of the previous three months, but this and that obligation called me back week after week. Sometimes I would stay for a few days, sometimes just a night, occasionally not even that. Always the bare minimum so I could get back to Squamish as quickly as possible. Those long hours in the car gave me a lot of time to reflect and be grateful for all the memorable moments I’d had lately, and that day I was feeling particularly sentimental for my beautiful life of climbing and CR-V living. It had been a lot of amazing lately, and I was sure realizing it.
All of my previous city missions had been work related, but this one was different. I had promised a friend I would give a presentation at one of the local gyms several months before, not realizing how much I would come to regret that decision. I genuinely like public speaking, but in the days leading up to the event I held doubts that anyone would really care what I had to say. The gym had promised me that all I had to worry about was the slideshow; they would handle the attendance and marketing. Thus, I showed up expecting at least enough numbers to justify having driven all the way from Squamish. Blame the sunny weather, or the topic I had chosen, or the advertising, or that people would just rather be climbing, but next to no one came.
Naturally I was upset, frustrated, and more than a little embarrassed. Not only had I physically and financially gone pretty far out of my way for this, I had put myself out there, let myself be publicly vulnerable, and it had not paid off. Sometimes it’s amazing, and sometimes it’s not. I was ready to write it off as a loss and move on, but in order to at least justify the cost of the drive I returned to work for a few hours that night at my company’s nearby office in the International District.
It was around 8:20pm, so street parking was free for the night which allowed me to park about a block from my work. I stayed there for about an hour and a half, taking advantage of having the office to myself and having found a bit of leftover wine in the fridge to wash away the lingering negativity I felt about the night. As the hour grew late I started to feel more and more uncomfortable about being parked in that part of town, so I decided to call it a night before too long. I almost never drive to work for fear of something happening to my car or my belongings, but I had come straight from Squamish that day, so it seemed like it made sense.
I left the office close to 10:00pm with the remains of the bottle of wine in one hand and a tub of hummus I had also claimed from the fridge in the other. I thought I knew where I had parked. In fact I was almost certain, but my car was not where I had left it. I began to panic almost immediately, but I tried to reassure myself by remembering other times that I had feared the worst and just been mistaken about my car’s location. I circled the block, and then a different one, and then the first one two or three more times, feeling the world begin to spin around me.
I threw the wine into a bush, but clutched the hummus even tighter. I stumbled into the middle of the street to see better, walking right into traffic and not caring. I asked a janitor if he had seen anything. I called Eric and he said he would come get me, but I felt disconnected. There was no way this was real. I called the police; they were coming too. I circled the block again, and then one more time, not knowing what else to do with myself. Fear consumed me.
Eric arrived and tried to offer comfort as I finally accepted the truth: it was gone. My car, containing everything important that I owned, where I live full time, had been stolen. I was in real trouble this time. One of my worst nightmares was a reality. My world came crashing down around me.
Back at his house, Eric and I stayed up late drinking and talking in low voices. I told him I had only cried myself to sleep thrice in my life, expecting that night to be the fourth. The third had been the first few nights after I left Mexico the first time. He had been there for the second, when I had been uninvited from a climbing trip by someone I had considered a close friend. The first had been after watching a sad anime as a teenager.
That night as I lay awake, I couldn’t stop my anxious mind from playing out every worst case scenario I could imagine. I could be losing not only everything I owned, but my entire identity. In my car was not only my wallet and laptop, but my birth certificate, social security card, passport, title and registration for my car, the same plus license plates for my van, even my college diploma. Everything. The greatest sense of loss I felt however, was for the time it would take to come back from this. After all, time is one of the only things money can’t replace. That summer in Squamish had been some of the happiest times of my life and I had worked so hard for it. Now I didn’t even know if I would be able to get across the border again. In losing my car, my freedom was also stolen. The ability to choose how to live my life was no longer mine. I felt helpless. With a heavy heart I texted my friends in Canada that they might not see me for a while.
The next day I decided to go into work instead of simply staring at my phone, waiting for a call from the police that might never come. My bike had also been stolen earlier this year, but Eric had a spare that I took downtown with the intention of riding around searching for my car, just in case. My credit card had been used that morning at a 7-11 nearby, so I knew the thieves hadn’t gone too far.
There had been a day a few months ago when a cop had talked to me on the street where I was parked that came to mind. He had asked me if I worked in the area, to which I replied yes, though only as of recently. My company’s office had just moved. He usually recognized all the cars he saw parked on that block, and mine was an outsider. The ones that weren’t familiar were usually stolen vehicles, since it was one of the only places you could park for free downtown. Not long after that I saw someone walking the area looking in car windows with a golf club in one hand and a 6” knife in the other. I drove away and called the police. I thought if it was going to be anywhere, that would be the place to start looking.
The night before, Eric had mentioned how in times of loss the human brain can play a trick where you expect to find who or whatever thing is missing everywhere, in all the familiar places, even though logically and in your heart you know it won’t be there. A part of me was sure I would find my car upside down and burned out in a ditch somewhere, so when I saw it just sitting there, undamaged, on a street where I had parked so many times, I was half convinced I was dreaming.
My whole body started shaking as I almost fell off my bike in my haste to touch it, to prove it was really there. The police had told me not to drive away since it was still registered as stolen, but in that moment I wanted nothing more than to grab it and get as far away as possible. As I stood outside my car, overwhelmed with emotion, a stranger drove by and asked if I was okay. “My car was stolen last night and I just found it, so yes, I’m okay” I managed to choke out, half crying.
A quick inventory confirmed what I had been expecting: wallet and laptop gone. Also taken was my Goal Zero battery, food bin, and my bed platform was gone along with everything that had been on top of it (they most likely removed it to make use of the passenger seat). It was a mess, but I was quickly able to identify that not a single piece of my climbing gear had been stolen. More importantly, while they had found where I had hidden all my personal information (passport, birth certificate, car paperwork, etc.), it had not been taken. All things considered I had gotten very lucky. They even left me a bag of Doritos and some crack pipes, so something lost, something gained.
…
Putting things back together in a physical sense was easy. It only took me a day to clean the car out and make a passable new bed platform. Emotionally however, it’s taken a little longer.
I’ve always made the claim that I like just about everyone; I find it hard to genuinely dislike people. Working downtown, I’ve walked past the local flavor of tent-dwellers countless times before. If they would talk to me I would reply with a smile or at least an acknowledgement, holding compassion for my fellow humans. I never felt threatened nor unsafe by them. The day after recovering my car I was back near the scene of the crime and all I felt was fear and anger. Everyone I looked at seemed like a potential criminal. All I could think was, ‘was it you? Are you capable of something like that? Could you so heartlessly take everything from someone you don’t even know?‘ I felt a complete loss of my faith in humanity at that moment.
I hadn’t found enjoyment being in the city for some time now, but this was different. Everywhere I went I felt harsh anxiety. I would rush errands to avoid being parked anywhere too long, even in broad daylight. I would move from one parking spot to another, just because someone glanced my way. Things like that. I had to get away. I had to regain control. I headed for Squamish the moment I got a new driver’s license and enough cash to put some gas in my empty tank.
On all of my previous trips to Seattle I had been able to return to Squamish, what I considered to be my real life, and pick up right where I left off. This time was different. Everything felt different. I felt different. Emotionally drained from the ordeal, I didn’t feel the joy that had been ever present in so many of my Squamish moments before. I just felt empty. I wondered if that joy was lost for good.
I felt constantly torn between the need to surround myself with friends to try and get that feeling back, to distract myself, and the need to be alone to continue to process everything. It almost felt like I was running away from what had happened instead of facing it, and in a sense I definitely was by leaving Seattle having only taken care of the bare minimum. At the same time I also knew I was dealing with the trauma in the only real way I knew how: by going climbing.
The moment my feet left the ground for the first time (and then hit the ground again as I fell trying to get to the first bolt on Local Boys Do Good), I started to feel like myself again. Still, there were little things everywhere that reminded me of all that I’d lost. Being cold at a windy crag without my favorite jacket because it had been stolen. Being out at night without my headlamp, also stolen. Eating my dinner without any salt, because my food bin had been stolen and I forgot to buy more. I was (and still feel) hypersensitive to anything remotely emotional. When I didn’t send a route I burst into tears because I just wanted a win so badly. Something, anything, which would make me truly feel like I was back on track.
I truly do try and realize it when it’s amazing, and when it’s not. I have an amazing life. I have friends who will come and get me in the middle of the night and stay up late on a weeknight getting drunk with me when shit hits the fan. Friends who told me I was missed in Squamish while I was gone. Friends who offered to help me however they could. I have a family who is helping replace what was lost. Family who understands and respects why I’ve chosen a non-traditional lifestyle that runs the risk of putting me in this position. Family who believes in me and wants me to follow my heart and my calling, whatever the cost. I have a boss who didn’t care how much work was lost on my laptop, only how she could help me move forward. A boss who has let me get away with that bare minimum of work all summer to chase my dreams. I was able to get back to my life quicker than I would have ever dared hope. Yes, there were some things that happened that weren’t amazing. My heart still aches over what happened, but mostly I do feel lucky and grateful.
The same night that I cried over not sending, over not getting that win that I thought I was owed by the universe, I shared the Doritos that were left in my car with my friends. They didn’t taste like the leftovers of a tweaker who had stolen from me. They tasted like the resourcefulness of a good dumpster dive score. They tasted like cheesy MSG, and calories I had earned from a full day’s exercise. They tasted amazing.
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