“I have to pee and I’m starving, but other than that, I’m great,” my friend Amy said on the Aspen Mountain gondola last Saturday afternoon. That got a laugh out of everyone in the car, since we were all thinking the same thing, or some variation thereof.
By noon I was sore and exhausted, but like everyone, I knew that wasn’t going to stop me from, well, stopping. There is something simultaneously inexplicable and totally satisfying about big powder days this early in the season. It’s that time of year when people are saying things like, “Not too shabby for December third,” or “Dude, this is why we live here.”
Suddenly, high rent and low wages or spending $100 a week on groceries doesn’t seem so bad. We don’t have to think about what might be happening in Utah or Jackson or Tahoe because it’s snowing right here in our own backyard. It’s the kind of satisfaction one might feel during those happy moments in a love affair that everyone said was doomed from the start.
I love the crazed look on everyone’s faces, the guys with snow caked and frozen all over their beards, the energy of the crowd shuffling toward the gondola like a herd of powder warriors equipped with a substantial arsenal of poles and skis and boards. I love the way the gondola windows steam up from the defrosting snow that’s collected in our hoods and stuck to our hats and the way everyone becomes ageless, or at least a younger version of themselves.
The part that blows me away the most is how much I still love it after all these years. I started skiing when I was 4. I suffered through the damp, freezing Vermont winters and don’t remember actually being comfortable out there, but suffering with numb toes and frostbitten cheeks and thinking only of the hot chocolate or the big, greasy burger that was waiting for me in the lodge.
I went to high school in western Massachusetts and was on the varsity ski team. I spent a good part of the winter at a tiny hill called Mount Wachusett, bracing myself against sheer ice with gates drilled into it and trying to make sure I didn’t slice my fingers open carrying around skis with razor-sharp edges. We had to wear these horrendous smurf-blue GS suits that had to have been the most unflattering garment ever made.
In college, I somehow managed to get hired as a ski instructor at Copper Mountain, which basically entailed wiping the snot from the faces of dozens of 4-year-olds while they screamed, “I want my moooooommmmmmy!” at the top of their lungs for hours on end. I have the Professional Ski Instructors Association to thank for pushing me toward snowboarding when their rigid idea of a “round turn” took away what little fun was left in skiing away from me.
I know what you’re thinking, but let’s not even go there. Having spent so much time in both sports, I never participated in the skiers vs. snowboarders debate. As long as you’re still having fun, it’s good with me.
Besides, each sport is a different animal, and some of us are naturally adept at one over the other. When you’re 5 feet tall with a shorter inseam than waist, you’re talking seriously low center of gravity, which makes snowboarding a cinch. Unlike some of my high-flying acrobatic counterparts in the park and pipe, I like to ride fast. It doesn’t matter how fast you’re going when your hands are 5 inches from the ground – it’s just not that far to fall.
With this start of my 15th season on a snowboard and all this snow, I honestly can say my commitment to the sport is the only one in my life that has worked out so far. I moved to Aspen for it, I created my career around it, I have forsaken others for it.
I am still so in love with this sport, it makes me want to dance around the living room if for no other reason than to celebrate the simple joy it brings. My soul bubbles like it’s made from champagne, and my board feels like an extension of my own body. On that perfect day last Saturday, I was one of the lucky ones to be the first to ride the face of Bell, the longest fall line vertical on Aspen Mountain. There wasn’t a single track ahead of me as I descended pitch after pitch. I leaned on my back leg so my nose would stay afloat and lifted my arms above my head as I literally flew down that mountain.
With joy that pure, Amy was right. You have to forgo everything else and enjoy it while it lasts.
Freelance columnist Alison Berkley can be reached at alison@berkleymedia.com.
