Chapter 9 07／Day 3: Work hard until dawn

Adversity can create genius, and prosperity can make genius unable to develop. Horace * Where did these mosquitoes come from?In all the time I've been stuck here, I haven't seen a single insect all day, and now half a dozen vampires are buzzing around.Sitting in a safety harness I made myself this morning, I killed them one by one until they all went to heaven.At one point in my mind it occurred to me that I could eat those flat mosquitoes; but this idea was both ridiculous and unnecessary, since the insects could not provide nourishment.Besides, I still have more than half of my two pre-prepared burritos, which has 500 calories and is more appetizing than dead insects.

(It must be related to wanting to sleep. Wanting to sleep really makes people stupid.) Another breeze blowing toward the Great Fault brushed past me, taking what little warmth I had left.The cool breeze in the evening like this comes more frequently, not to mention how cold it will be at night. My drive to chip away at rock was gone.The continuation of this futile work is only to stimulate the metabolism, lest the cold wind make you weak.Even so, my progress is still only as much as yesterday. Although I have accepted that hacking rocks is useless, some irrational parts of my brain are still unwilling to accept this helpless state. , and finally you can get out of trouble.I rationalize my sleepiness by thinking that night is coming and I'm too stupid to give up on getting out.

(You're supposed to be fighting for your life, and you're too lazy to get over a little work and a little work. You lazy bastard. You're killing yourself here. You're dying.) In this way, I was like looking at my own X-ray diagnostic film, knowing what terminal conditions I may have.I can look forward to living another day and a half, maybe.or two days?But what does that matter?I hadn't anticipated the agony and anxiety of dying, thinking that death might come on a cold night, tomorrow, dehydrated, or the next day with a heart attack.Maybe this hour, the next hour, or the next hour.Any time before I approach death is likely to be fleeting, whether experienced or imagined, like an executioner's blade, falling ice, or an avalanche.I know my final voice won't have any esoteric intelligence, just a grunt of oh shit, maybe that's it, plus blood splattered everywhere.I never expected to fade away in a situation of procrastination, and I considered myself capable of handling any difficult task that I procrastinated for a long time, such as fighting in a storm, finding my way when I got lost, and healing an injured or sick body.I don't want to sit down to dinner with Death and say to him at the end of the long meal time: Well, then, I think it's time.

Luck has been with me so many times that even the way I feel when I am facing death is a tug-of-war between my dying fear and my desire to live.I think some people will think of these as adrenaline addictions, but I prefer to control the adrenaline than to be ridden by it.On less dangerous but still challenging journeys, I expand my capabilities for the sake of honing, engaging in extraordinarily long and grueling experiences to break down my inner walls, just don't want boredom and worldly pressures to take over my soul, And then go beyond yourself.Occasionally, with a detached mind like Lao Tzu, I think that fear and pain are just a thin line, and I take risks in order to overcome myself.Now, how to overcome myself in this canyon will affect my ability to judge anything in the future.However, my situation is practically impossible to overcome.I'm still in pain though, I have training to survive fear, but I can't get over my body's need for water.

water.I picked up my dark gray Nalgene water bottle and looked inside.This past day, I've been sipping fifty milliliters about every three hours, well, that means I've got two hundred milliliters left to get me through the night, maybe a little longer.It was after six o'clock in the evening, but I haven't had a drink of water since I put the VCR away at 3:15. Maybe I should skip this time and drink it next time.Because my tongue wasn't unusually puffy, sticky, or hard, and my lips felt normal.I often think of water, but maybe this stage of dehydration is like fasting. If you don’t reach the stage where you will die if you don’t eat, maybe after half a day, the desire to eat will stop and the hunger will disappear.And in a way, so does thirst.

①Nalgene: The water bottle used by Allen in the book is Nalgene brand, the largest manufacturer of laboratory and medical containers in the United States. (So, stop thinking about it and store the water bottle somewhere, like in the sand, so you don't keep staring at how much you have left. It's more practical to figure out how to spend the evening .) That's right, it's better to focus on my project.I put the water bottle on the sand under the rocks and contemplate the coming night, darkness at nine o'clock, and then nine hours of darkness.It's only been nine hours, but if I don't keep warm, the cold air keeps pouring in like an arctic winter.I set water at nine o'clock, midnight, three o'clock, and six o'clock, and I drink a little less than last night, so I can save a little more for tomorrow.And I'll need it for leftover tacos too, because that first bite three hours ago was so dry and sticky in my mouth, I figured the rest would only be worse.

Then there is the question of how to keep warm.Today seems to be colder than yesterday, with more clouds so the temperature is lower.Now that the clouds are gone, there is nothing to keep me warm once the sun goes down.I think of the few heat transfer principles in engineering class: between the ground and the sky, the loss of radiated or emitted heat is proportional to the temperature difference increase of the fourth energy.If I remember correctly, the air is now four hundred degrees colder than my body (this refers to absolute temperature).Taking that as the fourth energy, and multiplying it by a small constant I've forgotten, the net result is that I've radiated a lot of heat into the sky.Looks like I'll have to keep myself warm tonight and have to stay up until morning and worry about what's next.

I took off my backpack and took out the small black cloth bag in which the digital camera was stored. I put my teeth against the opening of the bag, held the knife in my left hand, and pressed hard on the sewn end of the bag. I had to be careful not to stab my face. Fortunately, the cloth bag The lightweight material is easy to tear apart. I pushed my left forearm hard into the fiber bag and pulled hard with my teeth to bring the nearer end of the bag over my elbow, so I had a makeshift long sleeve for my left forearm. I removed some of the pulley gear and reattached two lengths of strap around the right arm.In addition, I used my teeth to pull another piece of yellow sling from the fixed point system I had set up, and cut it to a length of 1.5m with a knife.I put the remaining two-thirds of the first taco in the left pocket, the whole unopened one in the bottom of my backpack, and wrapped the food plastic bag around my right bicep. muscle.Then tie up the plastic bag with yellow slings, so I also have a long sleeve on my right arm.

Now it's my lower body turn, I'm going to make the leg from the remaining fifty meters of climbing rope.Dirty green-yellow threads lay in a heap on the rocks in front of knees.I managed to wrap about thirty neat turns of rope from thigh to sock.I felt the pile of rope like circles of clay, as if I were being attacked by two green snakes.The loops hurt my knees when I sat in the harness, so I adjusted the loops and fixed myself on the anchor point, which was the most comfortable position from the time I was trapped. With the rope around the calf, I can lean against the rock in front of my shin, but I also worry that if this falling rock suddenly moves and falls, at best only the tibia and fibula fracture?However, if things happen quickly, how much time do I have to react?

When the accident happened and I decided to push that falling rock, there was really a lot to think about in that second.Why would I do that?Maybe I thought I could drive the boulder away like I did on Creston Peak. ②Creststones: Creststones, located in the Indian Holy Land Reserve in Colorado. I definitely didn't have a choice that time.If I hadn't changed the direction of that big rock, it would have crushed my chest and I would have fallen straight down from a height of 4,000 meters.It was the spring of 2000, and I had traversed the ridge between Curtisti and its summit after soloing up the deep northwest valley of Craston with trekking poles and crampons.At that time, I was very bold. I didn't take the easy route recorded in the data when traveling, but took a risk and made a change.I walked a sizable stretch north of the summit ridge from summit to summit, twice wearing hiking boots and snapping my own quick buckles, and soloing broken and loose fifths.Standing off a cliff somewhere, I had to find my way over the mountain to get to the south and better ground.Fifteen meters above me, there is a short, steep but loose-rock canyon that ends in a three-meter-high summit.The front of the small canyon is only 0.9 meters wide. I think that as long as I can stretch my body as far as possible to pull it, and then go up to the platform, then I can complete the traverse and reach the summit.

③Quick buckle: Quickdraw, refers to adding a hook and loop to each end of the belt. ④Top: roof.The part of the climb with the greatest overhang angle. But things are not as expected.I was moving meter by meter under that cliff when a thick piece of rock fell from between two towers.hateful!I instinctively held it, and fell backwards together until my body could turn to the left midair.When my back hit the rock wall on the right, the piece of rock immediately pressed on my chest, and I let out a breath.As I slid down to the steep debris pile, I pushed the piece of rock away from my upper body and dropped past my feet into the small canyon.The wind blew me forward. I grabbed the opposite rock wall with both hands and looked down. I saw the rock bounced twice in the debris pile, and then quickly bounced to the deeper edge of the ravine.If my back didn't hit the wall, keep me upright and redirect that slab, I'd be falling in tandem with it. too easy to cross. Half an hour later, at a distance of about nine meters from the summit, I moved calmly, but I couldn't forget the accident that was almost impossible to miss.I didn't change into my climbing shoes, just tried the final move and traversed successfully.I crossed the south face of the summit in treacherous conditions, skillfully used the rope sling, and descended a series of four jagged rock dikes and the deep valley in the middle, but the sling showed that I was not the first person to take this route .I'm a little disappointed.Back in the car, I plugged my favorite Pink Floyd ⑤CD into the truck stereo, listened to the song "Fearless" on repeat, and sang along.A few of them struck me as profound: People say that mountain is too steep not to climb. ⑤Pink Floyd Band: Pink Floyd, a British pre-psychedelic rock band. Although Ke Ruisi's challenge at the top of Dongshan Mountain failed, the song after his return gave me inspiration.The next morning, I was back on the summit, gazing at the point where I had stopped the day before, only a few feet away from the summit.In this experience, I learned that it is useless to be too conceited, and how dangerous it is to be too conceited when you are not sure.What I didn't learn, though, is that using your hands to redirect a falling boulder isn't always the best solution. I told myself that it was time to pray, and although I hadn't prayed yet, I was ready now.I put my left fist on the rock, closed my eyes, and leaned my forehead against my hand. God, I pray for your guidance.I'm stuck in Blue Eyed John Canyon.I've tried all possible ways to no avail, maybe I have to try some new ways to lift the rock or even saw off my arm, please give me some pointers. I lowered my head and waited for a minute, then slowly tilted my head back, looking at the gray light, trying to see some instructions from the sky.I even looked at the rock face unconsciously to see if there were any words that emerged naturally.Of course, there is nothing, and there cannot be any. So what exactly do I want to see?Tell me the time of rescue by the flow of clouds?Or a man with a knife emerging from a rock carving to rescue me?Excessive fatigue and disappointment make me pray again, every word is full of irony. Well, god, you're clearly busy.Devil, if you're listening, I need some help here.I trade with you my arms, my soul, anything you want.Just get me out of this damn place.You want me to never climb a mountain again, I can give up.Let's make an exchange. Alas, although my jokes are not funny at all, I am glad that I can keep my bitterness. I think this may be a test, a lesson.Once I understood this lesson, I was able to break free.Is that true?What can I gain from this matter?What lesson should I learn? I thought of my friend Rob.Guber, Rob doesn't talk much when it comes to his outlook on life, but he often proves his more reserved side in terse comments.Usually, our conversation pattern is that I start by telling Rob about my latest adventure, but he likes to answer irrelevant questions, and then suddenly say: It's not you, Alan, it's you. I changed the subject and spent the next ten minutes asking Rob what that sentence meant?However, he just kept repeating that adage so that by the end, I still didn't get it and tried to refute him. In my view, we define a person by what they do, and we discover our identity in our behavior.If we do nothing, we are nothing.I never understood what Rob meant.No matter how long I argued for my point of view, I never convinced him. Now, rethinking Rob's confusing comment, I had a breakthrough: Rob's answer told me that it didn't matter to him what I did or what I achieved.He sees me as a friend for who I am, not as a mountaineer, skier, or outdoorsy person.But I want him to respect me for my accomplishments.I've gotten used to putting value on achievements.Rob, and everyone I care about in my life, don't respect my accomplishments as a human being the way I treat everyone else.My adventure does not affect my value as a friend.ha.I think I understand now.Perhaps, that's what I'm trying to understand here? (Well, if that's the case, Alan, then the boulder should split in two and fall into the sand, right now.) As expected, however, nothing happened.Thirty seconds later, still nothing happened.How big is this boulder?Heavier than me, but when I tried to lift it yesterday, it moved a bit.But I doubt it weighs more than a few tens of kilograms, and I can't move it at all.With good leverage, I might be able to forcefully remove the boulder, but it's too late to re-equip the pulley system.I use all the usable parts of the fabric as insulation, and I don't want to give up any of their usefulness. The night was getting dark, I closed my eyes, made a wish, and endowed this wish with an imagination.I see myself riding out of here on the wave of the wind and the tide, letting the wind carry me like a crow over the desert scrub and straight up into space.I soar over the barren buttes, the maroon plateaus, and the connected mantle of central Utah, westward across the cold Great Black Basin, and the Sierra Nevada without city lights, watching the land perform magician-like spectral changes. Trick, at this point I give up the setting sun and catch the day again somewhere on the Pacific coast. When I was in the most pain, time slowed down, and three minutes of suffering felt like ten minutes.It was as if I had fallen into a wormhole and endured endless abuse just to wait to be rescued.Fortunately, I found the antidote to this pain: In my fantasy, I was advancing in the clouds above the sea level, I passed through the atmosphere, flew higher, pierced the icy vortex of water vapor, spun into In the huge sky, I let my body enter into a colorful mist of light and rotate with them. A chill stopped my fantasy, the dancing lights faded to black, and I opened my eyes.This inner journey felt so short, I looked at my watch, it was nine forty-five in the evening.It was past nine when I noticed it was dark enough to see the stars.The constellations seen last night reappear in the gap between the rock walls.Two stars stand out more than the others, resembling a pair of intertwined horseshoes.I wondered if one of them was the crooked spine of Scorpio, my birthday sign.October 27th is my birthday.Whatever their name, the lonely stars are a dim reminder that, without light pollution, I'm so far from civilization that I might be on the moon. Kaka.My teeth kept chattering, colliding like woodpecker drills, and a series of incomprehensible sounds came out of my throat. I rearranged that particular dress.It turned out that the loops on the climbing rope were loose, exposing the thighs to the cold.I tightened the covering a bit, hoping it would hold the hoop on my lap.Using the rope bag as a miniature camping bag, I put my left hand and arm into the stretched cloth tube, then tucked my head into the side of the tube.The taut edges of the bag force my head forward onto my wrist, which is more comfortable if I place my left hand on my right bicep, closer to my shoulder.I sat in the safety harness with my left hip leaning against the canyon wall. I rested my left hand on my right elbow, relaxed my upper body, and rested my head on it, like a schoolboy napping on a table. After creating enough warmth, I could sit still in the harness, but after about fifteen minutes, I started shaking again.And I started adjusting those covers again for half an hour because my body was shaking and the ropes came loose around my legs.Utilizing my headlamp, I was busy arranging the rope, sling sling around my right arm, adjusting the camera pouch on my left arm, twisting in the safety harness to stimulate circulation in both legs, and finally putting the arm and head tucks together. Put it back in the rope bag and adjust the proper position.Another fifteen minutes of blissful ease, then trembling again.I moved around randomly for half an hour to increase my metabolic output enough to be able to relax in the harness for fifteen minutes.But the cold always wins, and my jaw was clenched in uncontrollable spasms, and I thought my teeth were about to shatter. After fighting off the chills for the fourth time, it was midnight and it was my scheduled water time.Time didn't go by as fast as last night, but I saved more calories than last night.I picked up the water bottle from the sand, cursing myself for making the lid so tight because it was so hard to open.I squeezed the bottle between my legs, managed to open it, and brought the bottle to my lips, tilting it just enough for the water to splash on my tongue.Dangerously, I crave more.That sip set off a chain reaction of increasing thirst, making me want to drink up the rest of the water. (Don't do this! Ellen.) I ordered my hand to reseal the water bottle, trying to control the response of my biological needs and fighting the immature instinct with the rational strategy of the long-term battle. Back to where I was before, and for the next six hours, I allowed myself to mentally wander, eight more adjustments to the rope and cover, and dawn came.I can't sleep and have to sit very still to help me focus my energy.I avoided thinking about rescue or any self-help options.I focused on breathing most of the time, and keeping my headlights on for a few minutes each time I tucked my head into the bag felt reassuring and helped stave off claustrophobia.The bag is a bit larger than the plastic grocery bag, and it does a good job of reducing the amount of heat I radiate into the air at night.Once I got used to the black plastic interior, I turned off the headlights, listened to my breathing, felt the moisture build up inside the bag, and relaxed as much as I could in this position, waiting for the light. It's colder now.The thermometer on the watch showed twelve degrees Celsius, which was super cold.But I'm holding up just fine.Even as my body prepares for another bout of intense shaking, I'm thankful that my reflexes are still functioning well because of the unexpected stress and trauma that make them more likely to fail.How lucky I was that the rock didn't cause me to lose a lot of blood.Otherwise I would go into hemorrhagic shock, my heart would try to pump an insufficient amount of blood through the body's ductwork, and that would be pointless torture.When my body's metabolism is no longer working, then the merciless god of death will forcefully push me away from this only living corner. I decided to chisel stones to generate more warmth, just adjusting the leggings wasn't enough heat for work, and chiselling rocks also kept the mind busy.As I removed more gravel from that rock, I knew the rock would continue to weigh on my arms, making all night's work futile.But within five minutes, warmed up, I put the multitool back over the rock, pulled the rope bag over my head, and sat back down again.For the next five loops, I try to do something each time, tapping the knife into the rock. The sky gradually changed from black to white.My regular fidgeting and resting got me through another night, however, I wouldn't be happy with surviving this way.I seem to be kidding myself.During this time, I thought that if the dehydration and hypothermia did not take me away in the next few days, boredom might be the last straw that crushed my life.And thinking about how tired you'll be before killing yourself is the only joy in relieving this boredom? It was a featureless sunrise.The pale sky confuses me; I can't tell what I'm looking at now, is it the pale sky?Or a big cloud?Clouds are good at night because they help block radiative cooling.But the daytime clouds are less attractive, they will prevent the desert from warming up, and will probably bring rain, when the rapids in the canyon will flood, and my survival game will be over. Another hour passed and the day turned to a cloudless blue sky. Rather than wait for the canyon to warm up, I started retooling the rock-lifting system.I take the fabric off my arms.When I tried to lift that rock yesterday, I got sweaty and thought I was warming up from the effort.Based on previous SAR training, I used shackles and prussian rings, and tied a series of knots in the sling above the drop ring, using up all the straps and effectively tightening the retaining ring.When the anchor point rose a little higher and became harder to reach, I put the soles of my running shoes against the canyon wall, gaining about 0.6 meters of height, but at the cost of a very painful strain on my right wrist . If I can manage to lift that rock, not much, just a few centimeters, I can grab the mainline with the Prussian loop and reset the system.Calculated with a system ratio of six to one, as long as my drag line is 30 cm long, I can lift rocks by 5 cm each time.Because I designed the system to fit into a narrow 90cm space between the retaining ring and the rock, there is only about 0.3m of hauling distance until the system snaps into place.I had to raise the rock fifteen to twenty centimeters to free the upper half of my hand, so I had to reset the system at least three times.I have decided that once the palm has had a chance to free itself, if one or more fingers are still trapped, I will do anything to free my hand, amputating the pinched fingers if necessary. With the system in place, I hoist myself onto the rope and put my feet in the drag loops.I noticed a bit of excitement about the attempt, and the hope of being free again soon.But when I put weight on the haul loops and rope extensions, and the Prussian loops holding the mainline, the rock didn't budge.I'm disappointed, but not hopeless.I rechecked the system and adjusted the Prussian rings, wondering if I should shorten the anchor sling again.Because of the length of the rope, I needed more room for the system to grow before it would pull on the rock. I added two more knots to the drop loop and tried again, the system tightened, but the rock still didn't move and my wrist didn't feel any pain with any movement of the boulder. Damn, what is going on?I jump in the drag loop while pulling back on the drag line with my left hand.The rope was already taut under my grip, and I did everything in my power.But as I followed the rope with my fingers through the bends of the shackle, I felt it loosen at each turn.Immediately see what the problem is: there is no tension in the rope.Loose like I'm totally relaxed when I'm hauling.Every bit of strength I could muster was lost in the friction between the rope and the shackle.There are too many crooked places, too many loose places.Maybe there will be a chance with pulleys, but there are no pulleys now. Now I feel rather depressed.After I had already succumbed to trying to save myself yesterday to no avail, I was utterly disheartened only to be utterly annihilated a second time.When I stepped out of the drag ring, shoulders dropped heavily, and I removed the drag system so I could rest in the safety harness.I sighed desolately again and again, trying to comfort myself not to cry.I'm on the verge of giving up completely. I picture my friends in Aspen waking up this morning, going to work, and my roommates preparing an old send-off party for Leona, who is leaving.By this time tomorrow they will surely know what happened to me and start searching.My almost dashed hopes flickered again.The situation was not worse than yesterday, so I returned to the mood of waiting. Every time I look at my watch and see it's approaching the hour, I count how long I've been stuck.It's seven in the morning, and I've been stuck for forty hours.Forty hours without sleep or enough food or water, forty hours of shaking, forty hours of stress, fatigue and excruciating pain.Two days earlier, I had woken up in the back of the truck, cooked some oats, and thought about supplies for my canyoneering and bike tour. My thirst forced the memory to focus on the nineteen-liter jug ​​I bought from Moab, three-quarters of it in the bottom of my truck.I also thought about those two one-liter sports drinks I bought last Friday night at a convenience store in Green River.They were scattered on the floor of the passenger seat, along with grapefruits, oranges, muffins, tacos, and pastries that had been shaken out of plastic bags from bouncing and turning on dirt roads.I was thinking of the grapefruits on the floor mats, imagining their juiciness, which I had bought especially to eat after the trip, their juiciness being a nice prize at the end of a long journey.My tongue licks the roof of my mouth, and I have to shake off the image in my head before I can drink the half a liter of water left. This pathetic self-control was too much for me to take, so I reassessed my situation.I'm not going to try to move the rock anymore as that would be as useless as hammering it with a utility file, but there doesn't seem to be much of an option.For the twenty-fifth time I rethought and insisted that I might have missed something that worked. I'm not ready for an amputation.I didn't even try to cut myself yesterday.Is it because I'm not ready, or am I afraid the consequences will be dire?I thought of the sight of the metal blade against the wrist.I have no confidence in the tourniquet I made yesterday, perhaps suggesting that I need to prepare further for the strategy.Escape from this canyon by walking?Climbing this rugged, winding canyon, abseiling nineteen meters, and hiking twelve miles seemed like the only way to do it was amputation, but amputation required a world-class tourniquet, and I didn't care if the tourniquet Will damage the tissue or blood vessels of my remaining limb, the main question is, how can I improve my tourniquet? I ruled out the water hose as it was too stiff to tie a solid knot; the sling wasn't elastic enough and didn't fit the shape of my arm, and I was concerned about getting it tight.What I need is something more flexible than a tube, more retractable!It is flexible!The neoprine ⑤ edge tube of the water bag is elastic, soft and strong, which is perfect. ⑥ Neoprene: neoprene, a synthetic rubber. Just thinking about this idea excites me.I retrieve the discarded tube from my backpack.How did I not think of this before?With my left hand I wrap the tiny black neoprine around my right forearm, just five centimeters below the elbow, I tie a simple single knot with one end in my teeth and pull taut, then two more and three knots.I took the hook and loop and the purple marker tape, the one I used yesterday, and clamped the neoprine and looped it six times to strengthen my forearm.The material pinches my skin.I adjusted my hand hair under the tube, but it still hurts.But that pain made me happy, maybe because it let me know that tourniquets are useful. I could see my forearm fade from pink to fish-belly, and the muscle protruding between my elbow and the tourniquet quickly turn bright red.The pain in my arm erupted, but my self-satisfaction made me ignore it.I'm proud of the squeeze of the tourniquet at this point, but not masochistically, but with a renewed spark of hope.This feeling of taking action is pretty good. I'm ready to take the next step.I picked up the multitool and switched it from a flat file to the longer of the two blades, forgetting about the plan to use the sharper blade.Instead of sticking the tip of the blade into my wrist, I held the blade against a little bit above my upper arm.I pressed the blade and slowly drew the knife across my upper arm, and to my surprise, nothing happened.I repeated this action again, pressing the palm of my hand harder on the handle of the tool, still nothing.No cuts, no blood, nothing.I drew my short knife and sawed vigorously back and forth on my forearm, growing more and more frustrated with each fruitless attempt.I got annoyed and gave up.Pooh!Damn blades can't break skin.How am I going to cut through two bones with a knife that can't even cut through the skin?Terrible! In my rage, I put the knife on the boulder, let go of the clamped shackle, and loosened the tourniquet.After a while there were red lines after lines of skin where the knife had been sawing, and the scrape was the only evidence of my attempted amputation. (That's sad, Ellen, just sad. Go back to waiting.) Clap!A crow flew overhead.I looked at my watch.It was 8:15 in the morning, which coincided with the time when the crow was seen yesterday morning.I'm wondering if it's the same one?It seems extraordinary to me that a creature without a watch should have such a precise sense of time.Some response, perhaps caused by sunlight or air temperature, tells the bird it's time to feed. As expected, the sun's rays appeared about an hour later, and I reached out to do a ten-minute sun salutation at 9:35.With that crow and two visits from the sun's rays, I think my morning routine is done.At this moment, I felt the pressure in my bladder for the first time.I unzip my shorts and turn around to pee.The sand soaked up the pee before it was able to splash it wet, and seemed to absorb the pee faster than my pee could fall down.The urine didn't smell as bad or dark as I thought it would be since it's been two days since my last pee.At this time, I seemed to feel another physiological reaction. I took off the safety harness, pulled down my pants and tried to defecate.I don't want to stink up the canyon, but I have no choice.But my concerns soon became moot because it was just a false reaction. The cycle of early-morning hope-and-disappearance stresses me out.My thoughts started to wander, and I thought of Warren, an Australian who loves outdoor activities, I met at the Banff Mountain Film Festival last November.mcdonald.That festival screened a documentary about his hiking accident in Tasmania that cost Warren his legs. We met at a dinner, and Warren told me some of the details.That night, he left his campmates to go to the toilet, crossing a nearby creek bed, and spent a few minutes climbing rocks near the shore on his way back from the toilet.That's when a sizable rock hit him, crushing both legs and trapping himself in the shallow stream.When his partner found out what was wrong, a storm had already begun, and Warren found himself only waiting for rescue in the swollen stream.搜救人員花了兩天的時間才讓他脫困，用起重器撬起那如汽車般的大岩石。第二天晚上，我看了他的影片，華倫在岩石下的影像令我震驚，他的復元情形讓我感到吃驚，華倫在兩年之內學習使用義肢攀爬聯盟峰，那是塔斯曼尼亞最高的山岳之一。 現在，我對華倫所承受的事感同身受，好笑的是，在短短遇見他的六個月內，我成為自己所聽過第二位被大石壓住而動彈不得的背包客。或許也有其他人，我不知道。我很羨慕華倫在附近有同伴可以尋求救援。要是我也和某人在一起該多好。不過我想我也會跟華倫一樣，如果這次能死裡逃生，我也還是會繼續登山和享受野外活動。 整個白天的時間，我都在輪流做幾項活動，像是站著和坐著、有一搭沒一搭地鑿著岩石、觀察天空尋找是否有下雨的徵兆、拍打昆蟲、數著下次喝水的時間。終於，下午三點了，我一直在等待的時間，那是我第二個重要的關鍵時刻，我受困第二個整天的結束。 我再次從背包裡拿出攝影機，吹掉鏡頭上的砂，將攝影機放在岩石上方與我的臉對齊。這是我為自己在下午設計的重要活動，雖打破冗長乏味的等待令人感到振奮，但遺憾的是，我沒有什麼好消息可以分享。我嘆了口氣，開始說話。 整整受困四十八小時了。時間是週一的下午三點。我大約剩下一百五十毫升的水。只有一百五十毫升。我暫停了一下，想了一下我的冷靜對白。在被困的第一天，我對所擁有的水量很在意，現在那種感覺切斷了。水完全沒剩也沒有關係，不再影響我會活多久。我得接受那個事實，接受了，我的恐懼消失了，只留下空虛。 我下一個想到妹妹桑嘉。我想像將來某一天她坐在起居室裡看著這捲帶子，我彷彿看見她的臉和雙眼透過相機看著我。桑嘉，我非常以妳為榮。雖然我並沒有直接聽妳說錦標賽進行的狀況，但我從媽那裡聽到妳在全國性的比賽當中表現得很好，妳在全國演講和辯論賽裡得了第十名。我相當以妳為榮。不只是因為妳得名，而是因為妳這個人。 我一直在想那件事。我的朋友羅伯常跟我說不是你做的事，而是你這個人。我一直惦記著這句話。因為我一直在尋我自我，而且投入在我做的事情上。我快樂，那是因為我所做的事讓我開心。但如果妳做的事讓妳開心，那麼或許有一天它們也會讓妳不開心。 我想，那是我發現自己雄心勃勃和精力旺盛風打斷了我，我顫抖、低聲含糊地說：好冷。接著繼續說：去歸納我之前旅行的原因。 給桑嘉的錄影變成懺悔。雖然我並不後悔自己選擇去過這樣的生活，我想我在試著和桑嘉分享某些忠告，希望她會從這裡學到，幫助她快樂對待自己的事。我們要想達到完美主義的內心競爭感覺上很相似。我希望她不會有跟我一樣的慘痛經驗，失足落入我所掉進的圈套裡。沒錯，我是登山能手、工程師、愛好音樂、喜愛戶外活動。但我應不只如此，我同時也要是能豐富其他人生命的人，而其他人也會豐富了我的生命。 回想起來，我學到很多事情。我在這裡學到的一件事就是，我沒有充分享受，或者去珍惜身旁人的陪伴。很多真的很棒的人花很多時間和我在一起，但我過去卻經常忽略他們的存在。此刻，我明白了一些道理。 我的胡言亂語，減輕對自己的自私所感受到的內疚。我花了那麼多時間獨自一人旅行，把我的朋友們拋在後面，甚至和他們在一起時，為了想要有一些獨處時間而拋開他們，這些自我感覺良好，讓我很生氣。回憶起我生命中最感恩的時刻，是和家人還有朋友們在一起的時光，我開始了解他們的陪伴是無價的。 我錄了一些持續努力讓自己脫困的片段。目前這裡的狀況是，我一再重新裝配，甚至弄了一個六比一的滑輪系統，但摩擦力太大，我甚至無法把主繩拉緊，因為繩子上有太多明顯轉彎的地方。我想鑿掉部分岩石，也沒有辦法。疲倦和睡眠混亂了我的想法，不過，我沒提到我試著鋸自己的手臂。 接著我提到對救援感到渺茫，簡單的說，我了解要援救我的機會渺茫，而且我根本不認為會有及時救援這回事。我想到我的室友里歐娜，她和我的家人一樣擔心我，但我只告訴她我要去猶他州，我今晚沒有回去，她應該就會知道我超過預計回程的時間了。但即使她立即報警，到採取任何救援行動也是二十四小時之後的事。 我搖搖頭，凝視著背後那片銀色天空，還有零點三公尺寬的峽谷底部沙地與裝備，企圖避開我的臉在攝影機裡的自責面容。 布萊德和莉亞期待在週六有我的消息，但我想他們沒有我的消息時，可能也不會想太多。我應該要和他們去參加哥布林山谷州立公園外的派對。但我懷疑他們真的會想念我到採取行動。不管怎樣，他們並不知道我去了什麼地方。那時連我都不知道。 我知道當沒有事先詳細說明我的計畫時，就是打破自己的規則之一，而現在我自食苦果。改變旅行計畫而沒有通知旁人，從以前到現在我冒了多少次險？一直都是如此，但再也不會了。 我應該跟任職於外展教育基金會的女孩梅根和克莉絲蒂多說一些，我應該和她們一起去西岔口。 我再次自憐地搖搖頭，努力擠出一連串的眼淚，這是我活該。 上帝，我真的被困住了。接下來幾天，我會乾枯在這個地方。除非我有辦法結束這件事。真痛苦，好冷，我沒辦法讓風不要吹我，這還不只是微風而已，而是冷風，從後面那邊吹來的。 我做了所有能做的事，但真的很糟糕，而這狀態可能還有三至四天要熬。我的聲音漸漸變小成粗啞的低語，我希望不要再撐四天。我無法想像如果我週五還活著的話，會是什麼樣子。 我感覺到自己即將死亡的壓力，我開始安排自己的後事，縱使心裡很不爽，但是通知家人有關財產的處理，記錄遺言似乎是實際的。 我有一些美國運通保險，萬一有需要，應該足以支付復元手術的費用。銀行帳戶餘額應該可以處理我的卡債。爸媽，你們可以把我的房子賣了。還有，我不知道桑嘉是否會用我的電腦和攝影機？我口袋裡和相機裡的記憶晶片上有照片。我在新墨西哥的朋友契普可以擁有我的CD。桑嘉，所有我的戶外裝備，如果妳想要，歡迎拿去用。 我幾乎是流著淚說完的。我關掉攝影機，將螢幕折好，放回背包裡。我的頭埋在左手裡沮喪地搖著，吸著鼻涕，用手掌擦拭鼻子和嘴，我用手指頭抹一抹眼睫毛，再擦過鼻子下方和皺眉紋四周的臉毛。 半個小時後，約莫週一下午三點三十五分，我必須再尿尿。 How can this be?I wonder.儘管事實是我幾乎確定脫水，但是一天尿兩次。What is going on? （把它存下來，艾倫。尿進你的水袋裡。你會需要它的。） 我把尿液存進空的水袋裡，到時它會成為我唯一擁有的液體。我第一次尿的時候就該把它存下來，我太後知後覺了，那次會比這次的要清澈，也比較沒那麼難聞。我思考是否該把它喝下去？不過我還是把這個抉擇留到以後再說。 我第一次急切地找出數位相機，拍了一系列照片，一張是我的手臂消失在岩石裡的特寫，一張是把我懸掛在安全吊帶裡的固定點系統的細部照片。還有兩張自拍照，一張看著下面的峽谷，一張從我的左肩上方拍的，拍到我和那塊大石頭。回頭瀏覽這些照片時，我同時也看了假期的頭兩天在索普瑞斯山和莫亞布附近拍的照片，還有梅根和克莉絲蒂在藍眼約翰峽谷上半部的照片。這兩位天使，她們實在美極了。