Exploring The Crooked Crag

"Where The Poets Go To Die" Poem by Ben Smith Walking up and down again Across the field where the dead poets lay The names of whom are forgotten  Yet their words live on every day I tell people my feelings and thoughts In hopes they remember the person speaking rather than the words of which are being spoken I hope to never die as one of these poets My name dug into the ground where my body lay. "Where The Poets Go To Die" is a poem written to convey a message of the names of whom are forgotten. Throughout history many great writers have died and their names have been forgotten yet their works live on. One major inspiration for writing this was from "The Names" By Billy Collins, which describes the names of many people who passed during 9/11 whose names were forgotten. "Where The Poets Go To Die" expresses the natural fear of being forgotten, a fear that I too possess. B. Smith 26 November 2025

"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows" -Bob Dylan          I was asked a question by my girlfriend the other day. She asked me, "What would you do if you only had one hour to live?"  I wish I could have come up with a good answer in that moment, but I could only respond with "I'm not sure." After I was able to think about it for a few days I figured it out. Most people would expect me to say that I would spend time with family or friends, but that's not what I would do. Truly the only person that has been with me all my life is myself.           Now I'm not trying to sound like a narcissist by saying that I would spend my last hour by myself. I would genuinely want to be alone. I would likely sit in my room listening to music. I would try to listen to as much music as I could. An hour would be able to get me through about an album and a half. I would choose Blood on the Tracks by Bob Dylan and the s...

      "Climbing is a sport of fun, not a sport of right or wrong." -Lynn Hill     It's not often that you meet a legend. Lynn Hill is one that I had the honor to speak to. She truly was as interesting and intelligent as she had seemed in movies or clips I have seen of her.     If you don't know who Lynn Hill is, she is a climbing legend. She began her career at a young age climbing ground breaking ascents in the late 70's, 80's, and the early 90's. Her most recognizable feat was when she did the entire Nose of El Capitan in 23 hours on September 19, 1994. This day was one of the most important days in climbing history. What was so extraordinary about this was that she was the first person to free-climb it.      When I heard that she had arrived at Sportrock, I asked my boss if I could keep working a little longer to help set up for the coming Arc'teryx event that Lynn Hill was attending. Lynn Hill walked into the room of the gym where he...

     "We give up leisure in order that we may have leisure, just as we go to war in order that we may live in peace." ( Aristotle Bk. VII Ch. 13-17 ) * Although everyone has different hobbies we still all agree that hobbies are an important piece of our lives. I have many hobbies. I couldn't imagine a life without some of the things I do. It seems like they are not just activities that I do because I'm bored but they are also ways that I interpret my happiness into physical activities. When I am sad I will do one of my hobbies and it will make me feel better. First let me define what a hobby is.     To me a hobby is something we do for ourselves to create an ultimate good that brings us happiness. My favorite definition for hobbies comes from Aristotle when he says "If Eudaimonia, or happiness, is activity in accordance with excellence, it is reasonable that it should be in accordance with the highest excellence; and this will be that of the best thing is us....

 This is the blog on my friend, Zoltán Ágoston:  Pen and Rock  

     The Difficulty of Recovery How I'm Dealing with Recovery of a A3 Pulley Injury and How It Helps an Athletes Mentality Towards a Sport. By: Ben Smith      Recovery is a hard time that all athletes must deal with at sometime in their career. About two weeks ago I ruptured my A3 pulley while working on a V5 climb with plenty of crimps. I'm not going to act like this was absolutely crazy to me, since I had already had a growth plate injury from a week prior. My fingers are weak and I know that. My coaches knew an injury like this was bound to happen soon and were already preparing a plan to help keep my fingers safe. I never gave them the chance to give me this plan because I just wanted to climb.     I did a good warm-up like I always do. Its usually about 30 minutes consisting of 30 push-ups, 30 pull-ups, a good long passive mobility session, and finally finish up with about 10 mins of board training before I hop on the wall. Once I get out to ...

      Before I can begin to state my belief let me briefly summarize these two ideologies starting with Nihilism. In most definitions Nihilism is the belief is nothing. Albert Camus says "A nihilist is not one who believes in nothing, but one who does not believe in what exists."* I partially agree with Camus on this definition of Nihilism in the sense that it is not the belief in nothing, but the belief that nothing has its own meaning. Camus says that it is the absence in believing what exists, but I believe it is the belief that nothing has meaning. In my own words Nihilism is the absence of believing in the meaning of life.       But how does Nihilism contrast from the Absurd? The Absurd is that there are two options in life. My favorite definition of the Absurd is from Camus "The absurd is sin without a god."** I believe this relates with absurdism because the absurd brings us to the idea that nothing has meaning but that we should still live our ...

 July 13, 2025 Life is interesting. There are so many different things to do that we will never be capable of doing them all in one life time. The average lifespan is 75 years. That may seem like a lot but imagine you want to be a pro rock climber but you also want to be a police officer and a marine and a lawyer and a CEO Etc. We can not be all those things in one lifetime because there is not enough time to do it. Which is why instead of planning for a large future for myself I am going to start planning small pieces of my life. For example maybe for a month I will focus on getting up earlier and eating better rather than telling myself that I need to start training to make the 2028 Olympics. If I give myself smaller goals throughout time I can eventually give myself a big long term goal that I decided I want to do.  I also always want to strive to enjoy myself and have stories to tell down the line when I'm older. One story I want to share right now. I noticed lately a new ...

       Memories are a subject that are sometimes hard to talk about. It is completely subjective whether someone wants to talk about them or not. It depends on whether they are good or bad memories solely. But my question is what makes a memory bad. I did some light research on trying to answer this question (I only looked to Camus and Aristotle), but decided to try to answer it myself. To answer this question I think we first need to establish what a good memory is. A good memory could be different for literally everyone. A good memory for me was the first time I climbed because it became the introduction to my favorite thing ever. This same exact memory may not be the same for everyone because I have heard examples of people getting injured their first time climbing and never trying it again. For that same person that never tried climbing again they might have had an awesome time in high school and had lots of friends and tell people that is one of their good memor...

 There is a first time for everything we do in life. For example this is my first time writing in a blog. My good friend Zoltan inspired me to do this. I have had many firsts in my life. The one that sticks out to me though is my first time climbing. I know that as a child I climbed at birthday parties but it got serious in November of 2022 when I started taking lessons as just another fun thing to do. Next thing you know just two years later and climbing is the most important thing to me. I have made so many friends including my bbestfriend Robby. On that faithful day I met my instrcutor, Ana, she taught me thr basics such as what holds to use and the grading system. If you had asked me back then what I thought of this day I would have told you it was fun and that I would like to continue. But if you asked me today I would tell you that was the most important day of my life. So who knows, maybe this one blog post will turn out to be another of the most important days of my life. 6...