Isabel Konty (she/xe)
When I found climbing four years ago, it offered me a comfortable space within a body that would soon be wracked with health issues and dysphoria. I had more surgeries and hospital visits in the year leading up to Flash Foxy than I would ever wish on someone. Despite this, I threw out a scholarship application on a whim. My bank account was emaciated, I possessed only a sliver of athletic endurance, and the festival was on the opposite side of the country.
I was surprised to find myself with a legitimate reason to make the pilgrimage out to Bishop, but this scholarship just barely made it possible and I’ll be dead in the ground before I pass up an opportunity like this. I can’t fly due to health conditions so the trek from Wisconsin to Bishop involved long bus rides, overnight train passage across landscape emptier than I’ve ever seen before, and a couple days road tripping with a part-time van-lifer and fellow festival attendee who possessed no shortage of kindness.
The festival weekend was physically and mentally challenging. I woke up cold in the van, struggled to afford food, and felt my two changes of clothes growing nastier and nastier. I have never felt more alive and connected to the people and land that make this world worth living in. I showed up to the festival with nothing more than “the clothes on my back” (as my van-mate put it) and the Flash Foxy community never failed to include, support, and uplift me.
I spent the festival with the Wall Dolls alternating between bouldering and roped climbing at the various locations around Bishop. I learned more about climbing in three days than I did in three years. There was no barrier to entry or participation and I was able to engage in experiences that have occupied my optimistic imagination since I was inducted into the climbing community. The physical experience left me breathless, and not just because of the altitude and exertion.
The festival also brought in performers from the local Paiute tribe, who’s cultural display was captivating and inspiring. One of the performers briefly played from a Navajo-style flute, a style that I had recently learned how to make by hand. Talking to her about the craft and nature of the instruments, their role in the land, their ability to bind its people, and the restorative powers they grant the spirit, left me giddy to continue to explore this art form. I played my flute at many of the crags I visited and felt an intimacy with the dirt under my bare feet and the perfectly blue sky cradling the edges of my perception that set my soul aloft as my body reached similar heights.
I would never have imagined the wonderful experience I had at this festival. I will be making it next year, and perhaps searching for similar community wherever it may be found.
