“You lucky son of a b****,” Aron Ralston said as he playfully punched me.
Find out why…after the break
It’s like The Bachelor all up in here.
I’ll get to why Aron said that to me in a minute, but first, how did I even get myself in that position? Aron was in Madison today as part of the Distinguished Lecture Series on the UW-Madison campus. In case you’re not familiar, Aron is “that guy who got stuck in a canyon and had to cut his arm off to get free.” My friend Mary told me about his upcoming appearance last week. Thanks, Mary! I’ve gone to previous lectures and they are always well attended, so I showed up nearly an hour early and it paid off. I had a great seat even though there were probably a thousand people there. Such a great turnout to hear him speak!
Aron’s presentation was fantastic. He walked us through his story, his presentation interspersed with both drama and humor. He punctuated parts of his story with the lessons he learned from selected events, like the importance of accountability and what he learned about courage and commitment from his ordeal. He also told us what it’s like to drink your own pee and yes, he went into detail about how he cut his arm off. Insane. The whole thing was a wonderful learning experience for a budding speaker like myself, too.
“I suppose drinking your own pee is better than drinking someone else’s pee.” True fact.
