“What the heck are these?” I question. “How do you put them on?” I wonder picking up the safety harness.

“Tim,” Ryann says, “It’s backwards.”
“ Um…yeah…I know… I meant to do that,” I stutter.

“Sureee,” Ryann and Christina chime.
“Let’s get going!” I yell trying to get the attention off of me. After our second hour-long safety speech, I have to do my first challenge; The Bell Jump. I climb the twenty-foot-tall tree as my fingers cramp up trying to climb on the tiny pegs, and assert myself onto the narrow ledge on the top. I freeze for a moment when I look down at the shredded mulch below me. I jump and start to feel my stomach coming up to my mouth, miss the bell completely, and free-fall to the ground. I go limp under the strain of the harness while they lay me on the ground. That was scary! I thought.

After I nearly wet my pants on the bell jump, I walk over to inspect the ginourmous forty-foot rock wall. “All right, guys,” the guide says “who wants to go first?” A quiet murmur sweeps through my group. “I’ll go first,” Alec says.

“Good, who will belay?” the guide asks.

“I will,” I say.

“Let’s begin!” Alec makes it to the top of the rock wall before I could even blink. He scaled those rocks as gracefully as a spider monkey. “All right Tim, it’s your turn.” I gulp and take my position at the foot of the rock monster with Ryann belaying. How am I going to get through this? I have to act fast. “You have as much time as you need,” the guide states. I start climbing the wall, and about the time I got to the middle, I make a fake popping sound with my tongue. “OW!” I yell.

“What’s wrong?” they all ask.

“CRAMP!” I scream back.

“Ouch,” they say in unison, “try to make it to the top.”

“All right,” I fake the pain as I go about five more feet, but I get tired of the harness giving me a wedgie so I give up. I can’t believe they bought that! I think to myself. People are just so gullible! My leg never cramped up. I was just ‘playing it up,’ so I wouldn’t look like a weakling.

My last challenge of the day was the team ladder challenge. Whoever wins it would be given a pack of M&M’s. “Who will be my partner?” I question.

“I guess I will,” Brody says. I had just watched Mrs. Drallmeier and Brody climb it so I thought we are pretty experienced. Brody and I breeze through the first ladder and we both get stuck and I get an idea. “Hey, Brody, watch this,” I whisper. I step onto the rope holding all of the wooden slabs together, and pull myself up and on the next two-by-four. The next ladder Brody has to step on my knee and I grunt in pain. “C’mon you weenie,” Brody says.

“Dude, you weigh like three billion pounds!” I retort. “Let’s just get through this last slab, okay?”

“Sure thing.” he replies. This lump is too heavy!
I’m up onto the top platform and find myself having to pull a three billion pound lump of meat four feet to where I’m standing. We have to hurry! “Ten seconds!” one of the advisors yells.

“C’MON TIM!” Brody screams. “PULL ME UP!”

“Five, four, three, two,” the crowd chants. one last tug and my strength is zapped.

“ONE!” they scream. I sigh and pound my fist into the wooden structure.

“Time’s up,” the guide says.

“So close!” I yell. Dang it!

To this day I have not figured out who won the pack of M&Ms. But what I did figure out was: never give up, even if it was for a measly pack of M&Ms. Keep going even if it gets rough.