How to Move a Mountain - The Cloud City Highline (That Gap in My Resume)

To some, a career change is a horrifying concept. To others, it's a favorite, comforting daydream from the real world. To me, it was starting to feel like old news.

This is a story about why quitting my job, abandoning my career path (again), taking a year to go climb mountains in Colorado and writing about it, may not have been the dumbest thing for my future.

I - An Ungraceful Exit

To anyone who knew what they wanted to do for a job when they were young, I'm jealous. I never did. I used to tell people my plan after high school was to hop trains cross country, and write about it. It caused me a lot of cognitive dissonance, not knowing where I was headed. I had a great work-ethic, was a great self-starter, but finding that something I was willing to throw thousands of dollars worth of student loans at was just plain intimidating to me.

So, naturally, I went to college, and studied Sociology and English, figuring I'd be able to...find work, I guess.

And I did! First at restaurants, then in IT sales, back to restaurants, then in working with kids, then the time came where my life demanded a more concrete, scalable income. By this point, I'd stepped away from the height of my earning, in sales, and slowly scaled back down through the restaurant wages, through the teaching wages, and all the way down to a green electrical apprentice.

The trades are always hiring, and they'll take most. It was good, honest work, that I genuinely enjoyed. I loved being able to step back and point at that light I'd hung, or that circuit I'd pulled. None of that made the $15/hr to start any easier to swallow at age 30, though.

For those unfamiliar, electrical apprenticeships are managed by the state of residency, and in the states where I was concerned, the governing department expected 8,000 hours of field experience as an apprentice, with I believe 600 hours of supplemental schooling. The bit that irked me was that we were limited to 2,000 hours of "experience" a year, regardless of what sort of overtime we worked.

My apprenticeship began in Massachusetts, and carried over to Colorado when my wife and I relocated out here, just before COVID shut the world down. I was a super-senior of an apprentice by 2023, and thus was able to take my journeyman's exam, to become a fully licensed electrician.

The last few years were a nice mix of arrogance, ignorance, and I guess, you could call it perseverance. My joints had started to swell like crazy, particularly in my hands after a hard day on the job. My ankles, feet, knees, hips, back, neck, well, I guess just about every joint had it's turn.

On a daily basis, I was icing myself on work breaks, or after work, but usually both. My wife was needing to open ziplock bags or drink bottles for me. And it wasn't until around the time I was about to take that journeyman's exam that I began to wonder why I was the only one icing myself down on breaks.

One day, from atop a ladder, using hand tools to mount something or other, my hands gave out. A heavy tool, specifically a nut-driver, fell from my hand atop a 10ft ladder, all the way to the ground, where it just about shattered.

This meant that whatever issue was going on with me had escalated above the level of personal pain management. If someone were walking under my ladder when I dropped that... If I drop a tool, the next time I'm working in a panel...that's how electricians get maimed.

Time to get help. The doctors needed very little time to tell me that the psoriasis I'd had since I was a kid had developed into an auto-immune based form of arthritis, called psoriatic arthritis. My immune system was now, mistakenly, attacking my joints, and causing wild amounts of pain and swelling.

In the matter of a month, a month where my income was set to nearly double with obtaining my license, I completed my apprenticeship as an electrician, passed my exam, was diagnosed with this arthritis, and stepped away from my job. I'll be the first to say that I didn't handle all this in a particularly mature emotional manner, but I was heartbroken.

In the past, I'd opted out of careers I didn't want to pursue further. This was the first time I was being washed out.

II - Need Not Apply

It turned out, none of the 75+ construction, electrical and hvac companies I applied to out here in Colorado weren't all that interested in a resume that looked like Swiss Cheese, and reeked of commitment issues. I was outright told, on more than one occasion, that my resume prior to the trades (where I broke into at age 30) was irrelevant.

So to, then, were the ten combined years of management experience across a few industries, with teams of various sizes in my work experience. It turned out that regardless of hands-on experience managing projects directly, I hadn't managed projects. Or the right ones.

The one interview I got yielded an offer for a warehouse management position for an electrical supply company where, with weekly hour requirements, my salary would've shaken out to less than $9/hr. I'm willing to take a degraded salary to break back into the work force, both then and now, but as a college educated, very experienced, very hard worker, this was an absolute insult.

I am beyond lucky to have had the support of the partner that I have, and I am positive to tell her that on a daily basis.

It was because of this support that I did not need to rush into a warehouse management position with unlivable pay. I did not need to go back to work in the field and pretend my joints weren't screaming at me anymore. I had an opportunity to be selective about my next step, and so I took it. But in the mean time, until that next step appeared, I had to do something with this ridiculous amount of energy I had from hanging up the tool belt.

III - Hacking the Psyche

Funny thing about my flavor arthritis. Turns out, it can be just as painful to sit still for a prolonged period as it can to move all day. But it also turns out, moving too much can cause delayed pain and swelling. And, there are these thresholds that are different on a daily basis, and most times you're not going to know you're approaching the line til after you hit it.

I needed a challenge. I needed something to push myself towards. If the attitude behind every day was just "I need to move so I don't hurt," I'd be pointing toward an emotional nose-dive. So, I figured, if I gave myself some sort of challenge to do prepare for, all this moving would be in the name of training for that challenge.

At that point, in the summer of 2023, I could walk and jog lightly without causing much distress to the body. I'd had to stop climbing to conserve my hands for work in the last few years, so expected the same sort of issue from lifting weights. It also seemed like the weight rack would be causing some undue stress on my body.

Maybe some sort of race? Nope. First off, I don't know enough about this arthritis yet. If I'm signed up for a race, with a date, and that date comes at the same time as a flare-up, I know myself well enough to know that I'm not listening to my body...it's race day. The beautiful healthcare system of the US was making starting treatment for my arthritis near impossible, so I planned this challenge with the anticipation of facing symptoms on whatever day-of there was down my path.

I also knew myself well enough to know that this had to be a challenge worthy of holding my attention, almost, potentially, endlessly. It had to be a bottomless pit that I could throw effort, and training and planning into, and so it had to be something more than a half or full marathon.

If I'd set my sights on either of those, and reached that milage in my training, I didn't expect to be able to maintain that same drive I needed to have in every day. It had to be something I wouldn't know I could complete, no matter how much training I'd be able to do.

In a swirl of daydreaming, and logistical plausibility calculating, the challenge emerged.

IV - The Cloud City Highline

Spanning more than 30 miles, tallying over 14,000ft of vertical, and designed to link 3 of the 5 tallest peaks in Colorado in under 24 hours, this bespoke endurance trek takes one along the majority of the westward looking skyline from the nearby city, the highest incorporated city in North America, Leadville, Colorado. The route takes the attempting parties from the far left of the below wide-angled picture, to the very far right, in one day.

I wouldn't know it until I completed the attempt on September 14, 2024, but statistically speaking, I'd just posted one of the most significant, new routes in the single-day endurance challenge world. The Cloud City Highline places itself among other, more well known single-day efforts such as the Rim-to-Rim-to-Rim of the Grand Canyon, or the Presidential Traverse in New Hampshire.

The primary distinction of my route include the vast exposure on ridges and above tree-line, and the drastic elevation of the challenge compared to most, ranging between the high 9,000's and the mid 14,000's of feet above sea-level. That, and my route was not a previously known link up or established route.

To most, summiting a single peak above 14,000' in elevation in a single day is a significant effort, and it is indeed. The metrics associated for a single climb are typically in the 10 mile range, with around 4,000 feet of vertical gain. Do a little exercise for me, the next time you hike a mountain. When you get back to your car, look back at the trail, and try and tell yourself that you want to go back up that mountain again.

To be explicitly clear, this was an amateur attempt. There were no professionals brought in on consult, no nutritionists, no trainers, hell, only even a couple visits with the doctor. I hadn't exercised or ran regularly for over a decade before this.

Every one of the 1.3 million steps taken in training were pushed in one single direction, one cohesive effort. Every meal, every stretch, every PR and every bad day were mine to relish in, or sulk in. Every 5k, 10k, halfie, even my first full marathon. All neat achievements, and personal records, but none were the focus, none were the end goal.

Project Management? Check

Logistical Management? Check

Sure, my stakes were a little higher than the average PM, sure, but, hey if I can find a way to slide it into my resume, I sure will. Who cares that if I didn't sweat the small stuff, and things went wrong, this high-altitude challenge could prove life-threatening, in a hurry? It's not like I have experience in any of that...

V - Why am I telling you?

I'm sharing this for a few reasons, and depending on the reader, I hope at least one of them resonates with you.

I) If you do, or ever have felt overwhelmed, or behind the 8-ball in life, like things are piling up around you, I want to offer you verifiable proof that there's nothing stopping you from moving mountains in your life. You already have done more than you think yourself capable of. Keep swinging. Take no lazy steps, move one stone at a time, and I guarantee you that mountain in your life will start to move. I bit off more than I could chew, intentionally, to prove those very things to myself.

II) If you have, or ever do receive my resume, I promise that (most recent) gap in my resume was not time spent in vain. I don't know yet what my future holds for me, career-wise or otherwise, but I can say for the first time in a long time, with confidence and pride, that I'm ready for it, and will rise to the occasion.

Yeah, it probably would've been easier to go on disability, or play the weak link on my team, but I refuse to do that when there are still plenty of things I can give my all to. So, label me #opentowork.

If you'd like to read more in-depth coverage on the constructing and eventual attempting of this challenge, I encourage you to hop over to my page on The Trek, where I've written and posted a full account! How to Move a Mountain - The Trek