The Black Hole

Yesterday I got the chance to watch icicles form, to feel snow melting in my hair, and to climb some new problems at Priest Draw. I went out in the morning prepared with a full thermos of tea and an extra layer to meet my friend Matt, who is showing me all the various boulder problems and link-ups on the assorted roofs in The Draw and surrounding area.
Matt is the kind of person whose excitement is uncontainable and who almost needs to be interrupted to take a breath. He climbs around the same level as I do and I think climbing with someone who, personality wise is polar to me. Matt gets me thrilled to climb something, and I make him pause between tries and rest.
 In a few ways, he reminds me of Jarod, a guy I spent years with in the car driving great distances to Hueco, Bishop, even Colorado. We shared the futon in the back of my truck, pressed against opposing sides of the camper shell, because who knows what might happen if one of our legs brushed the others in the middle of the night. We explored Bishop together, spotted each other on our first V10s, I even watched Jarod get arrested for an outstanding traffic ticket and picked him up from jail a few days later.
Now Jarod lives in Mammoth, California, where he spends as much time as possible on a snowboard flying through cold air at incredible speeds.

So yesterday after warming up in light flurries, Matt and I headed down to The Black Roof where, despite the snow, most of the problems were still climbable. The snow became more intentional and began to stick. Matt's dog, Roxanne, wandered the field and came back wet, shivering and happy. Conversation circled climbing, as always, but mysteriously diverted to apocalyptic subjects like volcanic eruptions and asteroid impacts.
The snow continued to fall and Matt showed me how to do The Black Hole, which, after I figured out how to keep my feet on, I climbed quickly. The Black Hole climbs well at first on large edges and pinches but the last few moves are awkward and the ending unsatisfying. We then worked out the moves on The Antimatter Traverse, which follows the same line of holds as The Black Hole but backwards to a different top out.
At a break in the snow we walked over to PBR roof, one I'd never been to. There are many exceptional looking problems on this roof including Cosmic Tricycle and the massive, thirty-foot long Pink Lightning.
I needed to get home so we walked back to the cars.
But my keys were gone.  On the way down a steep bank I'd slipped and pulled my hands out of my jacket pockets, unknowingly dropping my keys in the snow. So we went back to look for them while the snow became more serious. Roxanne immediately ran laps over the area I'd fallen, her tracks looking exactly like what I imagined the print my keys would have made. While I combed through the snow I wondered what I would do if Matt weren't there and an emergency ride home for my extra car keys wasn't in order. My phone was nearly dead and there's little service in the area anyway. I'd have to enter the played out horror movie scenario of knocking on a strangers door and asking to use the phone because my keys had been swallowed by the storm. I'd be that guy, desperate and wet, stumbling out of a blizzard into some family of cannibalistic chainsaw enthusiasts. At least my tea was still warm.
After a few minutes of desperate sifting I found my keys under a footprint in the snow exactly where I thought they'd be. Driving home on the icy roads I turned the heat way up and smiled, grateful to see the snow falling and happy that I'd taken the trouble to wear that extra layer.