Tag

skiing

Apr 15 2011
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March 11. 2011

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Monday, April 11

Today is the first day beyond winter.

I wake in the half-light of dawn to rain pelting my windows. Clouds cut the mountains half way to the ridges and snow draws a hard line between the clouds and the valley floor. Pulling the pillows up, I lean against them at the head of the bed, watching the weather, I think,

I am done with skiing. Done for the year.

The ski area closed yesterday. Well, not really. The mountain re-opens Wednesday for staff. As always, I plan on skiing staff day. The Elk runs early and then the Bear runs from 11 to 3:30. I’ll swing up once the snow softens and make a few token runs. After, the area hosts a dinner and such at the Griz. That’s far more appealing than the skiing.

Then there’s the RCR Fernie “Bonus Weekend” April 16 and 17th. The old side opens for one last shot at the year. Trooper will play a fee concert in the plaza at the base of the mountain. It’s more a gathering than a weekend of skiing. Take a couple runs. Sit in the sun. Drink a beer and enjoy the music, the day with friends. There will be skiing, but skiing will not be the point of going up.

This year closes in an unusual fashion. No morning pools of half frozen slush at the bottom of the mountain. Just snow. Fourteen and a half feet of compacted base. We close with perhaps twice the deepest base of anytime in last two years. We’re skiing an exceptional combination of mid-winter conditions and spring corn.

Every night the mountain freezes hard. The lows are 7 or 8 C below each night. Starting each morning on east facing slopes that collect the first sun so soften. As the sun warms the snow, I ski aspects and by noon move to the northern facing slopes, slopes the sun never touches and remain soft and unaffected for weeks after a storm.

And then I head down. Once the snow softens beyond an inch or two of corn, I bail.

Mid-day today, the weather turns nasty. A harsh wind sweeps into the valley. Gropple, mixed with real hail, occasionally turning to snow rushes across the streets and hides the mountains completely. Walking down to Mug Shots, the fresh snow drives into my cheeks with needle like intensity.

Yes, I am done with skiing for the year.

Late in the day, as the sun drops toward the ridges on the western edge of the valley, the wind dies, clouds break and the skies clear, leaving only remnants of weather stuck on the sharp peaks. The reflection of the setting sun on the cloud bottoms creates a gold glow the first alpen glow of the season. The peaks are lit and then dark. And cold again.

In the sunset, I start my spring summer habit of evening walks. Ambles, I walk to the river looking for ducks. None. No geese either. And walk back home composing this little epistle.

And I am really done with skiing this year. It’s all good. I’m balanced on my skis. Balanced on my feet. Climbing beckons. It’s time to head into another venue.

Jan 13 2011
Love0

A Place for Writing

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The Guardian book section publishes a series on “writers’ rooms” augmented by the occasional illustrator and composer tossed in for good measure.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/series/writersrooms

The series is as informative in detailing the creative manners of the individuals profiled as is about the creative spaces. Creatives tend to function best in certain defined environments—a personal combination of time and space. We nurture our space in the same way we nurture our work.

After reading these personal accounts of rooms, I sit here looking at my writing space. Actually, this is one of two spaces. This first, the primary space, is upstairs in my house. In front of a massive window, I placed an old kitchen table with a plain plank fir top. The window runs across the wall and joins a large single pane French door on the right opening to a small balcony. My desk holds several stacks of seemingly unsorted papers, little talismans that to the casual observer would appear to be more junk than holding any significant meaning. A couple of journals. Actually in counting right now, there are five journals and three small notebooks sitting on the table. A ten-inch tall verdigris cast bronze Thai Buddha sits on the right hand corner. On the left corner sit two used Freshies paper coffee cups waiting to be re-used as road cups. A save-the-date card with two happy faces for a wedding this coming summer. A CD of photos recording the moving of the old press into a final work place. A stapler. A roll of scotch tape. A phone number is taped to the window mullion. Next to the window on the wall, two quotes are taped.

The first is Gary Snyder

“poetry. . .the skilled and inspired use of the voice and language to embody rare and powerful states of mind that are in immediate origin personal to the singer, but at deep levels common to all who listen.”

The second reads, “Poets are the soldiers that liberate words from the steadfast possession of definition.” Eli Khamarov.

The window creates my space in actuality. Sitting at this table, I watch from Mt. Hosmer to the ski hill. The sweep lies, falls across my desk—the Sisters, Mt. Fernie, the Three Bears up in Island Lake, and finally FAR.

On a day like this, I only see the lower forested slopes broken by avalanche chutes and little else. The hill erased by a welcome combination of heavy snow and low clouds. Most of my life, I’ve spent a substantial portion of each day outside. This window brings the outside in while allowing me to write.

The bulk of my work occurs here.

Later today I will ski. I will join the view.

My second place serves as a “change the view” more for polishing pieces. In the final stages of a longer piece, I drag my laptop down to the living room. Curling up on one of the two couches in front of the fireplace, I physically and mentally leave my other projects upstairs and work on the final draft of the piece at hand.

Often at the very end of my editing, I will take a printed draft and head downtown for a cup of coffee. Coffee in front of me and pencil in hand, I run through the piece one final time.

This introspective look at personal space brought me to think of our public spaces and how we define our lives by both the private spaces and the public spaces we inhabit.

In truth, the public spaces we choose define our community. Our community in who we casually meet. With whom we converse. And whom we carry in our lives outside of the home.

Take a few.

FAR is open and with it, the Griz Bar. The Griz defines the classic spirit of skiing with a striking lack of modernity while infusing everyone who walks in the door with an infectious love of the outdoors, of skiing/boarding. Walk in after two or three this afternoon and the Griz will be filling with tired, invigorated skiers. We’ve had days of snow and most of the mountain has been closed as patrol tried to stabilize the never-ending accumulations. Today ropes will be dropping and the Griz will echo with tales of first and second and third tracks down favorite pitches. Of falls and of face shots. Of finding 20 turns of unbroken snow just beyond One Two Three in the trees. Beer and nachos will flow, for that is the character of the Griz. Skiing. Beer. Nachos. All embellished by classic Lange chick posters, skis we can no longer imagine turning and a long wooden slab of a table occasionally supporting a passing naked body.

There are other bars. The Corner Pocket. The Pub. Bull Dogs. The Fernie. The Central. The Brickhouse. The Picnic.

In the end, the bar we seek becomes the “Cheers” of choice. The social grouping creating the most comfortable space. Where Norm sits at the end of the bar answering fully the niggling questions in the back of our head.

Look at the day. The time between breakfast and that end-of-the-day-skiing beer. Look at the coffee shops in town. For a little burg, we offer a plethora of choices. From Timmy’s, A&W, MacDonald’s for the chains, to the homegrown local coffee houses lying scattered like jacks across downtown. There’s Cincott Farms on the highway. A thriving branch of the Hosmer organic farm. Both a coffee shop and a fine restaurant, they will expand over the next few months. In the old downtown, there is Freshies, Mugshots, Sweet Surrender, the Tea House, Big Bang Bagels and another to-be-named rumored chocolate-coffee roaster-coffee shop opening across from the Livery building.

All seem to do well filling a social niche of their own making. There are days I want to read a paper and I head to Freshies. Other days, I want to be left alone and drop into the Tea House curling into one of the overstuffed chairs in the window by the fireplace. Other days, I wander over to Big Bang Bagels or Mugshots for a late lunch.

A flavor of the day. The taste of community.

We choose. Sometimes unconsciously. Sometimes consciously. We choose our community one cup of coffee, one cup of tea, one pint of beer, one glass of wine at a time.

Jan 04 2011
Love0

January 4, 2011. The Morning.

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I woke this morning early, before light. The streetlight down the block silhouetted my cat sitting on the windowsill. Muted, the image appeared indistinct on the wall. I turn over and sit up. Snow. Fine cold snow drops straight down against the streetlight.

Since moving to Fernie I marvel at the lack of wind accompanying our snows. In Colorado, snow arrives with wind. Snow curls around corners and sifts into every nook and cranny. Drifts build waist high with every chance. Here, snow stacks itself high on every possible horizontal surface. Snow falls at rest

As the sun rises with a diffused light, I watch the day and the block become distinct.

Across the street stands an old branching mountain ash. The snow now sits three or four inches deep on the branches. The last remaining bunches of berries only show hints of the red under piles of flakes. To the left, one house down, the curves of a faded mid-80’s GMC pick-up mimics the berries on a far larger scale. Curves hidden, yet red still pokes from under the new white. The phone line across the street bears a stretched negative image of the line below. Four inches of snows sits stacked on the line.

Hard black against the snow, a raven flies up my street from the south. Immediately in front of my window he abruptly turns left, away, and flies to the next block over. He then turns right, back north and continues. I watch. One block up, he makes the same jog left one block, then right, continuing north. The raven becomes softer, paler moving up the grid of streets.

A flock of small birds fly by. Maybe 50, maybe 75. They fly in a moving ball. Black flittering specks loosely defining a sphere moving through a falling morning snow. They too fly north. Ignoring the grid of development, they angle across the blocks. Free. Swirling, like smoke in flight.

Now a couple hours after starting to write, the snow builds too high to hold to the phone wire. Sections have fallen off, the white strand broken above the wire.

I think I’ll go skiing

k

May 30 2010
Love0

The Barbarians at the Gate

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“Often overlooked is that though the barbarians of ancient times were not cultivated, in almost every case they had fastened upon one or more technical innovations that enabled them to defeat the superior civilizations they then were able to sack. The Huns and the Scythians had revolutionary tactics, the Parthians their fleeting shots, the Mongols their special bows and their techniques of mobility. Even Hannibal, not quite a barbarian expect perhaps in the Roman view, and ultimately unsuccessful, had his elephants.”

Mark Helprin, Digital Barbarism, A Writer’s Manifesto (Harper, 2009)

A “red plate” prejudice runs rampant around in Fernie. A feeling that the influx of Albertans damages our core values and the lifestyle of Fernie. The Albertans are thought of as the barbarians at the gate. An invasion we must defend against at all costs.

Let’s look at that for a minute. Or rather, let’s take a deeper look at Fernie and the effect of an influx of new blood on the existing civil and social structure.

Take the city council. The make up is divided equally between long-term residents and newbie’s—three and three–with the mayor, Cindy, adding one more vote on the long-term side. The previous six years, the make of the council was similar except the previous mayor, Randal, fell on the newbie side.

Look at new businesses we already take for granted. Start with Big Bang Bagels. Two years ago, Carolyn operated in the morning corners of Just Pizza. Moving into the former Cappuccino Corner on Victoria in the heart of the historic downtown Big Bang ramps into the stratosphere. In nine short months, Big Bang developed a huge following, gathered the three top business awards at the Chamber of Commerce annual dinner and expanded successfully to the mountain. Shortly after the new store opened, the line-ups stretched out the door on Saturdays and Sundays. In the waiting hordes, locals stood only a sprinkling with the vast bulk of customers being visiting red platers. On the hill, the customer base developed into the season pass crowd. A mix of mountain employees, local families, Non-Stoppers and Calgary folks, all skiing with a pass. A mix that values and savors fresh locally baked bagels with flavorful oddball sandwich options.

Look at the current Fernie trend of remodeling rather than building from scratch. It’s a matter of economics—not much is being built to sell and there is added value created in upgrading an existing property. When you look at the families remodeling homes, a large percentage are red platers. Folks from Calgary who appreciate Fernie and decided to make a commitment to live and play here.

When you look at the ‘play’ in Fernie, the influx becomes really interesting. A recent study shows the average second homeowner spends in excess of 60 days in Fernie over the course of a year. That’s just under a fifth of the year. And that’s the average—there are some that spend a week and some that spend months. A substantial percentage of these homeowners plan on moving to Fernie in the future.

People complain that houses cost too much, but look at what we get. Incredible views. A trail system with 10’s of kilometers of trails spreading out from town, most of the close-in trails maintained with no user fee by the city. Unparalleled fishing lies literally at our doorstep. An abiding awareness of the tenuous place we hold in the valley and the needs of the wildlife we might displace leads to programs like Bear Aware dramatically reducing contact between residents and bears and thus almost completely eliminating of the need to kill “problem bears”. (Many would say it was the people that are the problem, not the bears. There are arguments for both sides. Shooting “problem people” is a practice we have moved beyond in modern society.) For the most part, the non-resident second homeowner shares the same values as those that live here. That’s why they chose Fernie to repeatedly visit, to buy into and to bring their friends.

In the early days of snowboarding, only a few resorts allowed boards on the lifts. Boarders were looked at as crass, impolite, and even dangerous on the ski hill. One of the first areas welcoming boards was Mount Baker, just over the US border in Washington State. When you talk to Duncan Howat, the long time manager of Mount Baker about those early days and how they dealt with boarders, he explains it was a matter of culture. Most skiers come to the sport from a skiing family or with skiing friends. Most early boarders came to the sport out of skateboarding, the park rat culture. The two couldn’t be more different. One is understated. The other is overstated.

Duncan recognized this anomaly and created same awareness in his employees. The ski area initiated an employee program to educate the newbie boarders to the ethos and ethics in the culture of skiing. If an employee saw someone doing something contrary to the established way—say jumping off a blind lip—they explained to the boarder the problem and rather than just say “No”, offer an alternative site or place that was safe. The ski area effort was not about stopping behavior, rather the effort channeled the behavior into accepted norms.

On a Friday night late this winter, a friend was driving down from Calgary for a weekend in Fernie. Slowing to 70 in a whiteout driving the winding section of road in Crowsnest Pass, she ambled along in the long line of slow moving cars. Looking behind, she saw a car pull out and start to pass the seemingly endless line of red plate cars aimed at Fernie. There was a double yellow line. Dark. Blowing snow. Minimal visibility. As the Yukon XL passed, she recognized the license plate. The red Alberta plate belonged to her ex-husband. And, at that same moment, she realized her two kids were in the car with him. She was fine ambling along knowing she had Fernie at the end of the line. Who knows what he was thinking, taking that risk with their two kids in the car and a potential nightmare ahead.

These two stories illustrate the answer to the barbarians at tout gate. They have no greater technology. They have no greater society than ours. Rather, what they seek is our society. They seek to share in our life. A life with a different pace, a settled and balanced manner of walking through the day.

What remains is a matter of education. We must educate and eliminate the habits that run counter to our ways. We stop for pedestrians wanting to cross the street—where ever. We don’t pass on blind corners. We take the time to greet and talk to people on the street. It may take half an hour to get to the bank and back, but that’s ok. And we’re willing to wait a little longer for something special, like a Banger on Saturday morning.

So let’s open the gate, but extract a toll for all who desire passage. Let’s require a change of habit from the barbarians. An acceptance of the ethos and ethic of a Fernie life.

They’ll never know what hit them.

Jun 25 2009
Love0

On Writing

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On Ted.com, Elizabeth Gilbert provides a great take on creativity. The Greeks believing creativity a divine creature that visited you, a demon. Or the Romans calling it genius and believing it lived in the walls, coming out only to urge you on.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/elizabeth_gilbert_on_genius.html

In the movie Coming in the Evening, Leonard talks of following his characters, writing about his characters until they do something interesting, implying most of the time they are pretty boring.

In the blog Why We Write < http://whywewriteseries.wordpress.com> created by the Screenwriters Guild during the strike, the answers ranged from “I have to” to “to get laid”. Each essay carried an equal weight. And a distinct viewpoint.

When I am stuck, I walk. I ride my bike. I go climbing. I head up to the hill for a few laps. I hike up Fairy Creek hoping I run into a grizzly.

In one of the essays in Zen and the Art of Writing, Ray Bradbury says something along the lines of 90% of his best writing happens when he’s asleep.

What is it that compels some of us to write, or the even greater question, why do those that don’t write aspire to write?

Luanne Armstrong said in a workshop “There are three parts to writing. You have to write. You have to re-write, to edit. And, last, you have to share. Put it out there for others to see.”

The last is the fearful aspect of writing. Standing in front of a crowded room, reading a piece of humor for the first time and wondering, “Will they laugh?” Or reading a piece about a close friend, blending into eleven snowmobilers dying in an avalanche, then back to Cory. Climbing together. Skiing together. And his dying, skiing alone, in an avalanche only days before the snowmobilers.

About the void. Daily, we stand at the edge of a void gazing in. Without speaking of the void itself, we write of what we see.

The risks we take. Physical. Emotional. Professional. Just getting out of bed in the morning can be a wonder.

Waking up after open-heart surgery. Your sternum now sawn in half. Your heart was stopped, then cut in half. A little stitch ‘n bitch as he made his way out, patching, nipping and tucking. Hoping he can start your heart again before the final close. Waking, your sternum now wired together. All your ribs broken. Some in two places. And wondering at the pain. Feeling a fire driving down your limbs with every breath. Feeling pain in the very webs of your fingers. Will it ever go away? Can I last until it goes away?

And wondering at the void recently visited.

Three months later, sitting down in the kitchen with a bottle of wine, red, and the clinical report written by the surgeon. Leaving halfway down the first page. Deciding, this is not the time. Let’s just drink the wine.

In the end, I believe there are long frequency creative tides and short frequency personal storms. Equally, they move our writing. The question remains, when you share, will they see what you see?

The answer is simple. No.

The real question becomes will they see anything? Will they feel something?

That question forces us to look into the void again and consider jumping. So we share and hope, with that leap, we will soar on winds we will never see, will never know.

Mar 17 2009
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To the Maker

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(originally published in the Edmonton Vue and the Valley.)

Once a year, on the occasion of St. Patrick’s Day, I celebrate the Irish origins of skiing. Many do not know the Irish actually invented skiing. The Norse stole the sport on one of their frequent holidays (some called them coastal raids) to the Emerald Isle.

In a small monastery lies a delicate ancient parchment illustrated manuscript I have been granted complete freedom to study and copy. From this revered manuscript I have assembled the tales around the true roots of skiing.

Father James cared for a small parish in the heart of the mountains of Ireland (There were mountains in Ireland then, too. How they came to disappear no one knows for sure, but some blame the Norse on holidays for that loss too). It snowed for many days. On Sunday people struggled through drifts of snow to celebrate Mass. And struggled home after. On Monday, the snows abated with a few patches of blue sky. On Tuesday the skies cleared. The mountains stood sheathed in new snow set off by a brilliant bluebird sky. There was not a whisper of wind.

That morning, Father James stood outside his small stone church in awe and wonder at the beauty of the land in which he and his parishioners lived. He vowed to give thanks to the Lord on this wondrous day. Fretting at how he could best give thanks, he decided to climb to the top of the tallest mountain and pray his thanks to the Lord. He figured the closer he got to the Lord, the more likely the Lord would hear the prayers. At the top of the mountain, it would almost be whispering in the ear of the Lord.

So he started out. At times the snow reached his waist. He struggled on, knowing his task was holy. To whisper in the ear of the Lord. After much of a day he could finally see the summit of the mountain. He stopped and stared. It had been some time since he visited the summit, but he did not remember anything but rocks. Clearly, there was some structure or at least some sort of artificial assemblage on the top. He wondered who would have carried something to this height and left it on top of the mountain.

And then, putting the questions out of his mind, he put his head down and began his last struggling steps through the waist deep powder,

At long last he reached the summit. There he found two flat boards maybe ten or twelve feet long planted in the snow on very highest point of the mountain. One end of each board was pointed and bent up. When he pulled the boards out of the snow, he found the other end was square. One side was very smooth and had a groove the width and depth of his fore finger running down the middle. The other side was slightly peaked to the center. In the middle of that side was a leather loop.

Father James held one of these boards in his hands and turned it this way and that way wondering at how they arrived on the summit and what they could possibly be used for? He pulled them out of the snow and laid them flat on the snow with the grove side up. That looked odd. He flipped them over so the pointed end bent up and the leather strap cleared the snow and that looked pretty cool.

Standing looking at the boards sitting flat in the snow, Father James (a thinking and observant man) realized that the leather straps were just about the size of the toe of his boot. He wondered what would happen if he slid the toes of his boots under the straps. Being as curious as a cat, he slid his toes into the straps. As he stood there, he felt comfortable and safe.

A raven flew by squawking. He waved it off. The slight motion of the wave broke the connection of the boards to the snow and the boards, with the Father firmly attached, started sliding down the mountain pointed end first. At first this did not bother Father James. He was an athletic man having played rugby, football and surfed as a lad. And surfing in Ireland in those days was something harsh with real long boards of twenty foot or more and no wet suits in the monster waves of the North Atlantic. None of this warm water wimp surfing of the Hawaiians. So he managed to remain upright although not very gracefully, as the boards gradually accelerated down the mountain.

At this point, it is time to look a little closer at the mountain, just as Father James did at this point in the story. This was a massive peak. On three sides the slopes rose steeply but smoothly to the summit. On the fourth side, the mountain dropped vertically for over a thousand meters. As luck would have it, Father James, standing awkwardly on his newfound boards, accelerated toward this massive vertical drop. Warp speed and serious air time approached soon.

Father James realized he was about to meet his Maker. Wanting to get in one last prayer to set things right, he closed his eyes, lifted his arms to the heavens, called out “To the Maker” and dropped to one knee to pray. The boards swept into a turn and came to a stop. He opened his eyes. Stunned, standing, he looked around. He was still a couple hundred meters from the drop.

Another raven flew by squawking. Again he waved it off and again the boards started down the hill. Again right toward the drop. Calling out “To the Maker”, again he dropped to one knee to make his peace before leaving his world. Again the boards swept into a turn and came to a stop.

He thought about it for only a minute before realizing these boards were a gift the Lord left on the mountaintop for him. That in honoring the Maker with the prayer the Lord saved him from certain death. These must be holy boards.

Standing there he, gave a little push down the hill and started down on his own. Eyes wide open, he lifted his arms. Calling “To the Maker”, he tried paying on the other knee and found the boards turned the other direction. Without stopping, this time he stood, lifted his arms and prayed with the other knee. He turned the other direction.

Those were the first two linked turns in the history of skiing.

At the end of that day, the village looked up the mountain wondering if their priest had lost his mind as he swept down the mountain lifting his arms in praise, hollering “To the Maker” with each sweeping turn. They gathered and marveled as he told of leaving to become closer to the Lord. Of climbing the mountain and how the Lord placed these holy boards on the summit for him to find. How believing he was about to die, he dropped into prayer and the Lord taught him to turn and saved him one more time.

And that is the story of how skis were given to the Irish. Of course in time, with a lack of understanding of the thick brogue so many speak, the turn lost the original “To the Maker” and became simply a “telemark” turn. But it does not diminish the fact that every telemark turn is a manner of prayer and puts one closer to our Lord. And that is why all Tele skiers are just a little more holy that the rest.

Mar 16 2009
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Year to Year

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Year to Year

A couple weeks ago the State of California informed farmers the delivery of irrigation water will cease for three weeks in March. Reservoirs are low from the last two months of literally no rain. Drought grips the state again. Much of California’s water comes from snowmelt. Rain the valleys and snow in the mountains over the winter. Neither occurred to any real extent so fat this year.

In the mountains, this drought leaves hard snow. Almost racer chaser snow. Long looping high speed GS to Super G turns become the norm. The “Legendary Powder” of Fernie takes on the mythic characteristics of King Arthur’s Court. Legendary in precisely the same manner.

Last winter was average in total, but instead of scattered big dumps, we received a steady diet of 10 and 20 cm daily deposits. My routine last February–first light I’d open my curtains and look out at my car parked at the curb. If the Thule kayak racks and their blue pads were covered, I was skiing. I’d bang away on the little white box to finish the imminent deadlines and everything else could wait until later in the day. There were a handful of days over the month of February and the first couple of weeks of March that I didn’t hit the hill early. They were a mix of too imminent a deadline and/or having to demonstrate I really cared enough about a project to show up for a 10 or an 11 o’clock meeting.

It was a great winter.

This winter runs as a contrast to the last. From the end of December to the beginning of March we received little snow. A few skiffs ran through town. The most 10cm over night. In Fernie, that’s a dusting.

Now the pattern has changed again. The clouds hide the peaks and snow falls in quarter sized flakes. The snow of right at 0. It slants across the window backlit by the streetlight.

No matter how deep the racks are buried, tomorrow will not be a morning on the hill. I’ll sit writing, watching the snow and wondering how it is, knowing the next day, Tuesday, I’ll be up when I want.

Feb 11 2009
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A Writing Life-1

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A writing life-1

So I am stuck.

8 am on a cloudy half-snowy day. The streets melted yesterday and now are a sheet of ice under an overnight skiff of snow. Only a skiff. A tease. When we are looking, hoping for meters. The piece I am working on lacks a cohesive structure. A thread or theme. Yes, Angie, I look for themes, too.
It’s a ski piece on waiting for snow. Early season training. And waiting for the mountain to open. We’re a week late opening now as it is.

I take a shower. I set the dishes from the last day (or maybe two) in the sink in hot water and dish soap to soak. I make a cup of tea. I boil water in a small saucepan, add oatmeal, letting it cook. It’s unprocessed organic oatmeal. In ten minutes, I take it off, plop it into small bowl, slice off a slab of butter, drop in a spoonful of brown sugar and fill the bowl with milk. I think of cold days in Palo Alto (not so cold) when my mom would tell stories of growing up on the prairies of Saskatchewan (very cold) and how oatmeal kept them going on the short walk to school. How they always put in butter, real butter. How we always had butter. Real butter, because my grandfather owned a creamery.

I think back to the early days of skiing as a child. Foggy days with streetlight only half visible in the still dark mornings as we leave to drive into the Sierras. Waking hours later on Donner Summit with the snow sheds covering the railroad tracks across the valley, granite walls and a blue bird Sierra sky. To ski for the weekend.

And I find my link. My theme. The preparations of those days. The wait and the first day on the mountain.

Feb 09 2009
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Edge of the Void

By Blog, Uncategorized

On the Edge of the Void.

(This piece appeared in the Feb. Fernie Fix)

On the afternoon of December 14th, Cory Brettman rode the Silver Queen Gondola rising out of the town of Aspen 3,267 feet to the summit of Ajax Mountain. At the top, he skied off to skier’s right, passed through a ski area boundary gate and entered the Richmond Ridge “side-country” of Ajax Mountain.
With the advent of open gates on ski areas, there is an in-between zone that has become known as the “side-country”. Not true backcountry, side-country is frequently skied terrain close to the ski area. Not patrolled or controlled, side-country is the casual backcountry.
Cory and I go way back. For years we lived in Breckenridge where he skied on pro-patrol and eventually became one of the top snow control folks on the mountain. He skis like a panther. Smooth. Strong. Nothing seems to faze him. Terrain. Conditions. Visibility. He simply skis.
On off-days we climbed. A lot of ice and a bit of rock. One Fall he went down to the Yosenite Valley returning with a string of great climbs and even better stories. Close to twenty years ago, he moved from Breckenridge to Aspen where he carried on as pro patrol and continued snow safety work.

We live on the edge of a void. Hold your finger and thumb together, just touching. Hold them in front of you. That is the distance between this life and the void beyond.
What you believe doesn’t matter. A life after death. Heaven. Hell. Nothing at all. Or a reincarnation reflecting your acquired karma in this incarnation. On the other side lies a void.

Our valley gazed into the void this week with the death of eight snowmobilers. An avalanche buried three of a party of seven. Two were quickly pulled out and all turned to working to extract the last buried member of their party. Soon joined by four more, they worked feverishly together to rescue the last man. Another avalanche dropped off the mountain and buried the entire group. All of them. One man managed to break free. He uncovered another lying close to the surface. Together they found a third man and started to uncover him. Another avalanche roars off the mountain, they run for their lives leaving the half uncovered friend pleading, “Don’t leave me”. He is buried a third time. They rush back, unbury him completely and help him to the surface of the snow.
In a quick search, the sole transceiver they locate is the signal from the last man still buried in the first avalanche, now covered by a second and a third. They leave believing the area too dangerous to stay while hoping a GPS 911 signal has been received by the outside world.
As they reach the edge of the bowl, the whole middle of the mountain’s face lets loose and roars down running across the area where only minutes before they stood. As they watch, where they had been standing, and the snow under which their friends lie, is buried once again. This time by a wall of running snow 15 feet high and half a kilometer wide moving at maybe 90 kilometers an hour. Turning again, they continue walking down the very track they rode in on not so very long ago. Maybe 30 or 40 minutes earlier.
Their lives. The lives of every person in the valley changed in one way or another. Husbands killed. Father and son killed. Brothers killed. Buried. In a moment. Helping. One still buried and 10 trying to get him out. Eleven buried. Two get out. One partially uncovered and then buried again. He is finally pulled out. The three walk away.
They have stood at the edge of the void. The point there the thumb and the forefinger touch. The point where there is no space, none, between life and death.
And they walked.

Cory dropped into a little chute called Powerline.
At eight that night concerned friends called search and rescue. He’d not showed up for dinner as planned. The Aspen Ski Patrol found Cory, one of their own, a little after nine. The slide was small. Only three feet at the fracture and dropped a couple hundred feet. It threw him into some trees and buried him. One ski broke the surface of the disturbed snow and he was found by probing close by. He was skiing alone without a transceiver, probe or shovel. Just dropping in for a quick shot.
He left a wife of almost two decades, a five and an eight-year-old daughter. And changed the meaning of December 14th for a host of us forever.
Over the years, maybe Cory skied that little side-country chute a thousand, two thousand times? I have the same favorite duck-into spots. A host of them in Breckenridge. And several here newly found in my few years on this mountain.
Familiarity. Complacency. Comfortable. Easy.

We forget the distance between the thumb and the forefinger, just touching, at the very edge of our vision.
I already have a reason to remember December 14th. My daughter’s birthday. Now I have another reason to remember that day. As we age, individual dates stack up like books across a shelf with remembered lives. Some still here and some gone. All mixed up.
The platitude “They died doing what they loved” is only that, a platitude. Trite. Meaningless. It speaks nothing to the life that was lived, the life lost and the lives left behind now moving on alone.
Waking, we start the next day, wondering “Why them?”
And me?
On December 14th Cory dropped into a chute on Aspen Mountain. On December 26th, I became the oldest living member, the oldest male, on one side of my family. On December 28th eleven men rode into an alpine bowl and forty-five traumatic minutes later three walked out.
We live on the edge of the void.