Born to Ski
“Skiing is in her genes,” a friend announced the other day after a day on the slopes, and I believe she’s right. My love for skiing comes from deep within. There are other sports I’d love to try that I’m sure would be just as exhilarating, but starting as an adult is a whole different ball game.
I’ve always been intrigued by kiteboarding and long to feel what it’s like to race the wind across the open ocean, salt water spraying my sunlit face right before I launch off a wake and my kite lifts me airborne. The problem is, I can’t escape the thought of open jaws lurking in the murky depths, waiting for the precise moment to gobble me up!
Eliminating my fears is a work in progress, and as Hanukkah passes and Christmas gets ready to pounce, my unwanted emotions resurface. I feel as lit up as the giant tree outside the Sardy House, only my light is ready to implode. “You need to get on the slopes,” my friends urge, knowing skiing is the one place I’m free of all anxiety.
Back in 1986, I went heli-skiing in New Zealand with one of my best friends, Karen Hawkes. We rented antiquated ski gear, no doubt donated by the early ski pioneers, and took off in the helicopter. Although I was gripped by fear that I might spew my breakfast all over our adorable Kiwi pilot, all my other fears disappeared, and I silently thanked my father for his great determination to raise little skiers.
Jumping out onto the knife-edged peak with the helicopter’s blades whirling off into the distance, I felt an inner calm. Reveling in the pure sensation of being alive, I made a mental note to add to my husband wish list: “must share my passion for skiing.”
Last Saturday, Aspen Highlands opened for the season, and the man I vowed to share that passion with crushed me at rock-paper-scissors and took off to explore his manliness in the Bowl while I stayed home with lots of boys.
When it was my turn to get out there, the day was dreary and windy, the kind of day when staying home by the fire playing Rummikub was far more appealing than going outside. But the fire burning inside me to ski pushed me out the door to meet my friend Patty.
The parking lot at the resort was empty, and Patty and I looked at each other with doubt in our eyes. Downing a hot cider at the “kissing booth,” I asked the Ski Company ambassadors if they had heard any reports on the Bowl. Nothing to report, except that it might be windy.
Floating on our chairlift into complete fog, that feeling of adventure came over me. I looked at Patty and smiled, and she looked at me and laughed. “Are you sure?” she asked. “Darn straight,” I responded.
Hiking the Bowl in the wind and fog, I passed two ski patrollers fixing a boundary rope. “That’s the first time we’ve smiled since being up here,” they joked. Being up there on the Bowl was nothing short of spectacular, and it was our little secret for that moment.
Patty and I slowly made our way down until we reached the trees, where the visibility improved and we found heavenly soft snow. As we whooped our way down our beloved mountain, my fears and anxiety dissipated, and I thought of a local family who was grieving a terrible loss that week. Wanting to take their pain away, if just for a moment, I thought, “This one is for you.”
