Low in the Waterpocket Fold, I look upward at the stone. The chockstone. I take stock of what attends me. One dog, small and contraband. One camera nestled in a fannypack, heavy. A rope, short and spindly. Assorted water, clothing, nuts…yes, that’s the word I’ve been searching for: nuts. There’s this big nut stuck in this narrow Krak of a Canyon. I am nuts for thinking about climbing around this sucker. Do I have the nuts to go on alone?

This is the fourth, or is it the fifth, small canyon today, all different, all close and cool and wet.

Times like this, sitting on the gravel of some unknown stonefold in a 300 mile long upheaval breeds philosophy. How long did it take for this canyon to be made? How long has this stone been chocking? Was there a Someone directing the whole shebang? I ponder the parallels to a friends’ recent cardiac arterial blockage. The dog says spare me. He asks are ya gonna do it or not?

I look up under the stone, easy chair sized. All sealed up, as they all are. Then why did you look, the dog implies? Shut up, ya mutt. The wall beside the stone is grooved. I search for handholds, and find them. Little wedges of quartzlike stone, sharp and solid. Another, higher. And then a path around the stone. A slip would mean just a short jump to the gravel below. See ya, doggie. Enjoy your bowl of kibbles. I seek mystery, philosophy, and a view around the next bend. Onward and upward. Oh great, cliches, the dog says, JUST GO. Rather than philosophy, this canyon seems to be breeding imaginary conversations with a canine. I go.

The first try, with muddy boot bottoms, ends in slippage (snicker, snicker). The next try is an easier boost upward, and then I’m around. It is afternoon now, and the light is no longer vertical. The walls light up as I wind around, skipping over the pools that the recent rain has left. More bends, and then another. And then another chock. This one an easy boost. A polished sandstone slide and a sunny stretch, ending in another chockstone. I try a few holds and body presses. I can climb this one, but can I get back down? I always have the rope if I need it. I pull myself up and go on.

The canyon widens and then narrows again. And guess what? There’s a chockstone garden up above, and I’m in the tomato chute. That Indiana Jones flick where the stone rolls down the canyon just wouldn’t happen; the big stone would roll about 5 meters (remember, the Middle East is metric) and then get stuck. The following floods would seal any cracks full of smaller stones. This next chock is Indiana Jones’ sized. It would chock the tires of a 747 and then some. Can I climb it? Dunno.

This is the paragraph where I would be comparing chockstones to the difficulties in life. The one where I would draw parallels to overcoming the difficulties as they are presented and having faith that if I can just get over this one, then I can handle anything else that might come along. I’ll spare you. It’s a big damn rock, and I wanna see what’s above it.

I smear my boot toes. I apply friction body presses. I twist like a steelhead in a waterfall. Search for fingerholds. Find them. In the greatest American Tradition, I pull myself up by some semblance of my bootstraps. Boost/traps. How am I gonna get down this one? Dunno. Just another pull and I’m on top.

If I were a geology nut…oooh nuts, lets stop and crack a few to eat…I would see that I am through the Navajo sandstone layer and into the Kayenta layer, all layers being tilted at wild skyward angles here in The Fold. The canyon looks like it opens up after a bend or two into some steep tumbling upslopes toward the Wingate cliffs above. But first another narrow section, and…Ta Dah…the big rutabaga of all chockstones in Chockstone Canyon. Grown in some 20-hours-a-day Alaskan sunlight watershed and winning the blue ribbon at the Wachenga Valley Fairh. It blocks my path and most of the sunlight. Something bigger than me, finally. It leaves me with the satisfaction of Mysteries Beyond, a mirror to bounce philosophy and insult against, and a visceral knowledge of canyon bends beyond, unknown, and upward to the heights where ravens soar and the foot of man remains light-to-nonexistent. Where grammar and bad metaphors no know bounds. In an act of trite symbolism, I piss on the footrocks of the massive boulder and turn back.

The climbs down the already-climbed are unexpectedly effortless. Like life. Like other climbs done and to be done. I return to the ever-patient puppy down the last and hardest climb. I reach out to the canyon wall opposite for a press which makes it an easy step and a jump. Duh, it’s a whole canyon wall hanging there ignored on the climb up. The dog has scattered its bowl of hashy nuggets about in contempt. Fine. I wonder if its little radish brain remembers the long hot climb out from the main canyon hence.

But first, one more Fold to check out. I got the canyon fever, and haven’t yet had enough chockstone pills to be cured.