A Fevered Pitch
One young athlete rejects ordinary life to pursue his sport.
Story by Audra Anderson
The sky is darkening by the time Porter McMichael ducks into his 1998 Ford van — which he’s playfully dubbed “Vantasy” — escaping the mid-January downpour. The van looks out of place amid the array of bargain cars owned by cheap college students. It’s reminiscent of the vehicle your mom warned you to avoid accepting candy from, but inside, it’s a nomad’s haven.
The van has been converted into a livable space, with a bed in the back, storage space beneath it and a makeshift kitchen behind the front seats. Porter flips on a space heater, settles into a modified Ikea bench that he’s built into the wall and slides on a pair of worn black Crocs.
In the dim light, his skin is reddened and ruddy — except for a portion of his face that has escaped the sun’s brutal beating in the telltale shape of ski goggles. Hazel eyes pierce through the red, their golden flecks the same color as his bouncy curls and full beard.
Behind him, taped to the inside wall of his van, is a collection of 4x6 photos. In one, the 22-year-old Western Washington University student hunkers against brutal winds on the summit of South Twin Sister Mountain, southeast of Mount Baker. Snow-capped peaks loom behind him, their grandeur taunting the worn athlete.
The trek is only one of 50 alpine routes he has conquered.
“I’m motivated, maybe to a fault,” he said with a laugh. Smile lines crack and texturize his otherwise smooth skin, resembling a weathered rock face. “I’m bold in my climbing style. And, I don’t want to say foolish, but maybe I should.”
Unlike many of his fellow college students, Porter isn’t partying on the weekends, he’s at work. His office is Mount Rainier and the North Cascades, and his clients are ordinary people hungry for an extraordinary experience. Porter works for International Mountain Guides, where he leads ice climbs and summits nearly every weekend, every season since the summer of 2018.
Porter became interested in mountaineering when he met fellow athlete Peter Butler on the university’s cross country team. Peter, a seasoned climber, introduced Porter to the world of mountain climbing in the winter of their first year. He was instantly enchanted.
Having grown up in the Tri-Cities of Southeast Washington, Porter was unfamiliar with the belittling peaks and daunting slopes of Western Washington. Even so, he found solace in the blankets of untouched snow begging to be skied. He found music in the rhythmic crunch of an ice pick. Most significantly, he settled into the addicting exhilaration of the sport.
Each ascent flirted with death; for the athlete, it was a game of catch-me-if-you-can.
By the summer after his first year of mountaineering experience, Porter landed a guiding job. Natural talent on the mountain and his people skills gave him an irresistible charm, according to Peter’s sister and fellow mountain guide, Lael Butler.
Each ascent flirted with death; for the athlete, it was a game of catch-me-if-you-can.
Lael knows Porter to be a patient, motivating and mellow guide, but as soon as he gears up for a personal climb, Porter morphs into someone far more formidable. He is driven, focused, obsessive. Bad weather or risky routes are a challenge to him rather than a deterrent. When the mountains are telling him “No,” he bellows, “Yes!”
“[Porter] knows what he’s really stoked on and knows what he wants to do, so he just does it for himself,” Lael said. “It’s cool to see someone who already knows what they want to get out of life.”
Porter’s absolute submission to the sport is something Lael admires most about him.
“I don’t know why, but I sure as heck can’t stop,” Porter said, defiance tugging at the corners of his mouth.
Running, climbing, work and school duties don’t leave the athlete with much time for himself or other people. His lasting friends are the ones who can keep up with him on the mountain. He finds pockets of company wherever he parks his van. Many of his days are spent solo, puttering up rocky mountain roads or listening to the wind batter his van as he plans his next climb. His lifestyle doesn’t lend itself to company. At least not in the traditional sense.
Abbey Thomas, Porter’s ex-girlfriend, met the bubbly climber at Western’s Wade King Student Recreation Center. Abbey, a climber herself, was drawn to his goofy jokes and wayward smile, but also the intensity boiling beneath.
Abbey knew he was a dedicated mountaineer, and she was prepared for that, having grown up around esteemed climbers like Conrad Anker and Craig Zaspel.
What Abbey wasn’t prepared for was the loneliness.
Porter didn’t take her on his more intense climbs because he couldn’t bear the thought of putting a loved one at risk. When he was home, he spent his free time exercising or fiddling with his gear.
“I’ve sunk several relationships, not just by my obsessiveness about climbing, but also the risks I take were a lot for one or two significant others to take,” Porter said, gazing at the floor as if it could provide him answers. A deep sadness strains the smile that never leaves his face.
The sound of rain drums the top of his van as Porter wipes his hands on his shorts. An angry scar spans his left thumb, a battle wound from a climb that almost went fatally wrong.
“I’ve sunk several relationships, not just by my obsessiveness about climbing, but also the risks I take were a lot for one or two significant others to take,” Porter said.
Porter and his climbing partner, Peter, planned to scale Coleman Glacier Headwall, a route notorious for rockfall. Shortly after starting to climb, a couple of microwave-sized boulders careened down the route, narrowly missing them. Still, the pair decided to ski down the pre-planned slope. Their route out: A slender snowbridge spanning a bergschrund, a deep crevasse formed when glacier ice pulls away from stagnant ice.
“Our skis were barely holding over this bergschrund that wants to eat you,” Porter said.
As Porter prepared to cross the snowbridge, he noticed a crack in the bergschrund, causing him to lean back in his skis to prevent his tips from catching on the ice. He lost balance and tumbled down the slope, straight for the open crevasse. Right before he slid in, he whipped his skis around, stopping his fall. When he caught his breath, he looked down to see a portion of his thumb sliced off, painting the surrounding snow crimson.
“The hardest, most technical routes, I don’t usually come away from them feeling proud,” Porter said. “I sometimes come away from them feeling like I got lucky, or I got away with something I shouldn’t have.”
In the eight months they were together, Abbey never saw the athlete frightened by a route.
“Guilt inhibits him more than fear,” Abbey said. “Fear is something he feeds off of.”
Even after close calls like Coleman Glacier Headwall, Porter returns to the mountains days later with renewed resolve. His sport is wrought with situations that force him to face mortality. For Porter, it fuels his addiction.
Reaching the top isn’t as rewarding as the journey there. In a sport as volatile as mountaineering, an inability to summit is common. Befriending failure is as important as perseverance.
“Guilt inhibits him more than fear,” Abbey said. “Fear is something he feeds off of.”
For Porter, his tenacity was a learned behavior. From the age of four, Porter was knee-deep in snow, skiing with his family at resorts. Snow turned to dirt as Porter shifted his focus to cross country running. By the age of nine, Porter had picked up knife-making, turning a hobby into a profitable business by the end of high school. Porter adopted the “if you want something done, do it yourself,” mantra. Unlike his brother, a successful economist for the State of Montana, Porter knew his life wouldn’t be molded by other people’s expectations.
“Somehow my brother has a master’s degree and a real job, and I live in ‘a van down by the river,’” Porter said with a chuckle, tugging on his beard.
With his spring graduation around the corner, Porter plans to spend the summer guiding Denali Mountain in southern Alaska. He has no “Plan B” for his life because he is determined to climb for the rest of it. Eventually, he plans to take an ice axe to Aconcagua Mountain in Argentina and Mt. Everest in Nepal.
“I would never climb Everest for fun, but probably in the next five years I’ll guide it,” Porter said.
Even considering the threat of injury, the athlete would sooner join the disabled climbing community than quit. Porter has no desire for a family because he doesn’t want a child to grow up fatherless if something were to happen to him on the mountain. He does dream of marrying one day, under one condition: Whoever he loves will also marry his climbing.
As heavy rainfall slows its assault on the Vantasy’s roof, Porter crouches — unable to fully stand — and adjusts his royal blue jacket. Behind him, an empty McDonald’s fry box sits alone in the driver’s seat cup holder. The passenger’s seat is occupied by climbing gear and a pair of skis and poles; there’s no room left for anything or anyone else.
