It was New Year sometime in the 1990s. I’d separated my shoulder nine months previous and had re-injured it days before in a fight with my ex-wife when I threw an empty paper Dixie cup at her. I threw too hard. Now, according to the law of cause and effect (karma), I found myself at the Hueco Tanks with a shoulder that felt loose and sore and made a clicking noise.

Early on in the trip my partner Kevin Gallagher had bailed off the aptly named highball Badass Mama in Comanche Canyon, clipped the pad and shattered his heel. After a visit to the hospital, employing painkillers and characteristic stoicism, he agreed to hike to the 45-Degree Wall and give me a spot on the namesake problem (now closed). The problem tacks through a series of incut slots out a tilted wall of iron-rock to a lip-encounter and was considered one of the best V5s in the park.

I’d heard that Patrick Edlinger had recently figure-foured (brought one of his legs over his arm) and skipped a long move. In my hubris I decided to emulate the master and go for the onsight. I chalked up and promptly fell on the first moves and writhed about dramatically holding my shoulder until I remembered that Kevin had just hiked a mile with a broken heel.

After a rest I tried again and pulled through to the tight, left-hand mailbox near the center of the overhang. I wriggled my hand deep and set a finger lock in the right side of the slot, then curled up and lifted my right leg over my left arm. I attempted to move but couldn’t budge so, with reserves dying, I climbed out of the figure four, walked my feet high and dyno-ed, thinking—second try—but came up short and fell hard onto my locked hand. There was a whip crack of connective tissue. Several bystanders rushed over and off-weighted me. I released the lock and walked away to be alone and reflect on how much it sucks to be badly injured on a road trip, among other things.

My mood plunged further when I remembered it was a new year, and that I’d spent the better part of the last year injured. Was it a sign? Maybe it was time to settle down and stop throwing Dixie cups? Climbing was too hard. It hurt too much, took too much time. Made you too crazy.

And then I noticed that my shoulder was feeling pretty good. I lifted my arm, drew a circle with my elbow. The clicking was gone. I felt my neck relax. I tested a couple of holds. Hung straight-armed. Went back and sent the 45-Degree Wall that day. I was healed!

That afternoon I walked up East Mountain with Sherman and watched an eclipse. He had some beers and I seem to remember that he didn’t want to share but finally I talked him out of one. We didn’t agree on some things. It was mostly a long, bitter harangue. Obviously, John was injured. But for me it was a new year full of possibility. I’d just been reminded of the possibility of grace. What other wonderful and amazing things were going to happen? It occurred to me that this is the only appropriate attitude to augur in the presence of a New Year—much less an eclipse.

Finally John stopped talking. The moon passed in front of the sun and I was content for a moment.