Tag: midwest powder

Unknown Substance

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I don’t know why heavy impacts don’t make me stop doing what I do, but they don’t.

So why do I continue doing what I do? And, is it even about that?

Riding through powdery forests and down pillow lines of unknown rock and undergrowth is ideal. It’s not a thrill-seeking thing, nor is it a death wish. It’s about the substance I’m floating through and nothing else.

Whether I’m on skis or a board, not knowing what lies below is part of why we go out there. You know it’s mainly some sort of liquid, but the earth’s natural contours poke through with bumps and drops, and saplings and stumps.

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Sometimes an edge catches and we’re thrown. And sometimes you slam into a mound of snow that definitely wasn’t there when you saw it 2 seconds before airing out over that tree with the seemingly small yet generous cliff below.

Riding after a foot and a half of snowfall changes how much speed you carry to hit the downslope… Apparently I needed this lesson again.
Now in retrospect, I managed to yell “send it”, so that makes up for the lack of speed, right? Note: it did not. The trauma is always real.

“It’s not dumb. It’s just part of the challenge”

We have a similar feeling in surfing—not knowing what truly lurks beneath us—and I don’t mean your nightmares of Jaws, though fish are always a consideration.

Sometimes a rock pokes through the lineup where you hadn’t seen it before. Sometimes that rock is large driftwood that has up-ended in the sand permanently, always waiting for the day you forget to watch for it at low tide.

There are inherent risks involved with “extreme sports”, and while some think that participating may make them look “cooler” (yes, I’ve been asked if that’s why I surf), that’s not really where I’m going with this.

but… it definitely makes you cooler

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There are many things that riding through the two forms of liquid is not to me, and one very real thing that it is. One very real reason that I get churned up by the ocean and spat back out, and why I narrowly (and sometimes unknowingly) avoid cliffs, dodge trees, and tread carefully in avalanche country: a connection.

It’s a connection to something far greater that we live amongst. And it’s not the only way of finding that feeling, but that’s what it is to me. It’s feeling aware, it’s feeling the rhythm of the earth, it’s taking into account the nature that we so obliviously ignore as we rush around the rest of our time trying to “get places”.

I get an innate, instinctual feeling from floating through this part-solid, part-liquid material that ebbs and flows with the contours of nature. It’s something only the wild could give me. And there’s always a reckoning, as the picture in front of me becomes something it could never have been without somehow being much more powerful than I. Without the reality of a force much more powerful than us…

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That is why I do it. It’s not dumb. And it’s not about risking everything every time. It’s overwhelmingly not about that.
It’s just part of the challenge of finding yourself in this vast world. It’s part of the challenge of finding the connection to the soul.
The risk isn’t why. It’s just part of it.

However you choose to do it, ride the floaty substance—with what may be unknown beneath it—and find what makes you do it.

 

Daydreamers

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There’s a place I think of every minute.

For every month, for every week, for every day, for every hour. It’s all I can think about until I’m finally there.

Aspen, CO.

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It’s concrete. It’s tangible.
And if I wanted to, I could be there within 6 hours of any given moment.

I could give you a laundry list of reasons about why Aspen is one of the absolute best places to be. And I don’t mean just in winter. Anytime.

But that list of reasons is not what I dream about. It’s not what I find myself wondering about at 2pm on a Tuesday afternoon.

As I sit in a softly-lit meeting room, I look out of the window at the street below thinking about romping through 2 feet of snow. Bouncing softly as snow gradually builds into my beard, gently caressing my face and turning my blue and yellow jacket a softer hue.

I dream about the experiences I’ve had:

the feeling of cruising through a forest in a foot of freshly fallen powder with nothing but silence and the more-than-occasional release of that outrageous feeling that builds up waiting to billow out.

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“Whooo” and “yeah buddy!” heard as we sail through the wilderness, effortlessly gliding, weaving, slashing our way through the sparsely spread conifers and spruce into wide open fields of fluff.

The feeling from an hour of hiking up Aspen Highlands bowl and across to our drop-in spot, looking out across the Rocky Mountains.

Or standing humbled in front of the Maroon Bells, looking across the valley floor as it expands and swallows entire forests in its vast embrace.

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That’s what I crave.

It’s in that moment that I am alive.

 

Is It Enough.

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As skiers, snowboarders, snow-minded people we get caught up in the chase.

We chase snow all over the world.

When watching a ski film, it wouldn’t be unusual to see a new location about every 10 to 15 minutes. Each year I travel in the pursuit of snow. A lot. All in pursuit of the fluffy goodness that we all want to surf through.

So yeah, it’s the stuff we dream of and what we long for.

But how about our local hill? Is it enough?

If you’re like me and you work in some way with the snow, I hope you’ll say yes.

But for our purposes, let’s break this into 3 segments. Those that have a hill. Those that have a snowy hill. Those that have a mountain.

Let’s start with the mountain folk.

I was in Jackson Hole, Wyoming visiting my buddy Matt this year and had the opportunity to ride out the backcountry on a powder day. Need I go on? (I will…)

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It was as incredible as you’re probably thinking. We had near perfect conditions, and due to the storm that took down power-lines to Jackson and shut down the resort for a few days, much of the mountain was fair game for a good part of the day they reopened. But the backcountry was untouched.

However, it was the passionate folk that make this place up, that run these ski towns and the mountains, that stopped me in my tracks. The people in these towns are special. From Jackson to Aspen, it’s incredibly tough to earn what most would consider a “decent” living, and yet the locals scrape by. They love it. The rich and famous come and go, but the mainstays of these towns are hard-working, life-inspired mountain folks.

Clearly, “this” is enough. Locals sacrifice cushy jobs and the chance to earn higher income to be in places like Jackson Hole that just recorded 593” of snowfall for 2017.

Your soul is on fire, constantly fueled with the goods.

Ok, the snowy hill folk.

You know exactly who you are Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts. It’s not a ridiculous amount of snow, but the snow still falls on the hill. Enough to not rely on snowmaking, but not enough to have a full season without it.

This works out quite well, because while the yearning to chase powder elsewhere is still very much alive, there is still the promise of somewhat consistent snowfall year-to-year. Now, the changing climate and fluctuation in global weather patterns could diminish that, but for the most part there is still a feeling that the snow will come for at least a few more years. And this keeps the locals at bay. There’s enough to go at on the hill and the powder comes just enough to keep the bump lines from getting frozen entirely solid (though that’s not always the case).

And “that” is enough.

The fire is fueled with enough fresh snow and a mix of the blown crumble, and that gets you by until you visit the West again.

Ok, so what about Texas?

What about Texas? Well, unfortunately for now you still can’t ski in Texas (but you can surf).
How about New Jersey? Maryland? North Carolina? Surprisingly, you will actually find places to ride a couple planks down a hill on snow in each of these states. I patrol, teach, and coach every winter at my local hill in New Jersey. When I say hill, I do mean it’s a hill. And we don’t get much snow at all. This year however, we hit record lows as the spring thaw hit early and hit hard to the point that by mid-February I was patrolling the greenery, and less-so the public.
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This is a photo I took at the summit of Mountain Creek on February 25th, 2017. Those of you familiar with the area will notice the blue “Great Northern” trail sign in the top-left of this photo. You can see the trend for yourself here as more winters are experiencing the fluctuations of temperature and precipitation.

Now, I grew up in England.
Believe it or not, I put my first set of skis on with wet bristled matting underfoot at Sheffield Ski Village. And at a young age learned that falling meant a nasty rash from the wire carpet below. How welcome it was to feel snow underfoot for the first time in the French Alps just a year or two later. How fortunate I was to learn an appreciation as I began my journey with the fluffy stuff.
Because in New Jersey, I hear a whole lot of grumbling.

“Ugh, it’s icy, not going”
“Dude, why do you even wanna ski that? It’s not even fun”
“Yeah, it snowed, but its only like 2 inches”.

COME ON! OF COURSE WE WISH WE GOT MORE SNOW, but let’s be humble. We’re in New Jersey and at this stage we’re grateful to even get a nice snow.

But snow is snow, man-made or fallen from the sky, and I can tell you that I had just as much fun riding around on what snow we had left on February 25th as I did in Jackson Hole.

… are you kidding, I can’t say that. Jackson was a world of its own. I will say this, though. I have an absolute blast on my local mountain. Ice, rain, slush, sand, crud, and sometimes even snow.

And, I’m going to get serious for a minute because this is actually rather important.

The “need” for endless powder is actually a relatively small issue in the grand scheme of things and there really is nothing to complain about. Really, there isn’t. The snow is not our right, nor is it your right to be on the mountain. It’s a privilege that we are able to do any of this. And sure you can complain about the lack of “good qual snow” but it’s negative, and why be angry about something you can’t change? Attitude is a big player in the problems we see on the mountain, from angry aggressive snowboarders, to skiers who think no one else can be in their way. I say this sincerely but gritting my teeth: at that point you should just keep your gear packed away. I think I can comfortably say that the Mountain would be nicer without seeing you at all.

There’s a sense of entitlement, and a certain “better than this” attitude that has spread amongst some of the local skiing establishments in the Northeast, and I’m sure it pops up elsewhere too. And while it’s easy to see where it starts, it’s hard to understand why. There’s a sense that the lack of “real” snow and massive dumps is unfair. But you chose to live here. Furthermore, not a single one of us can reasonably say that we were skiing even reasonable powder lines on our first day, or laying out euro carves in the corduroy the second time we strapped in, or hitting bumps the 4th time we got off the chair lift. No, not even Candide. And yet every one of us had an immense amount of fun. Enough to keep you going this long. If you don’t believe me, ask any person in the beginner-intermediate range to go ski or ride and I’m about 80-90% sure that they’re unlikely to care about the conditions. Because that’s not what it’s about.

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If you’re wondering what my point is, here goes.

It is enough.

We ski and ride to connect. With nature, with ourselves, with other people, with the unknown. Not for the weather.

And you can recognize this yearning, or leave the thought right here, but there is some beauty in knowing why we do this, and hopefully in understanding the why, we can learn to leave the negative behind. At the end of the day, you make of it what you can.

So, ski, ride, shred it all. Appreciate every opportunity you have to put one plank or two under your feet. Whether you’re one of the New Jersey crowd like myself, or the Jackson Hole mountain folk like a few of my friends, don’t become someone who looks back at the season and wishes they got more days on the hill.

Because you could have. You just didn’t go.