First Day on the Slopes

Intelligent people at least take a class before strapping on the skis. HA! It's much more interesting for everybody concerned to dismiss such time-sinks. Just go out there and ....

Photo by Oleg Smirnov on Unsplash

Some high schools have ski teams while some other schools have rodeo teams and others have chess teams. Geology and geography have a lot to do with that. My high school had the ski team and an easy way to parhiahdom was not to at least tried skiing. Salt Lake City, after all, hosted the Winter Olympics in 2002 and is vying again to host in 2046? The infrastructure is still in use for training purposes and other winter sports events.

I've shared my parents' romance on skis on Ring Around the Basin, so the DNA sort of backed me up. It was a social imperative to ski, even if I never made the team. My friends, Patty, her little brother, David, and Debbie all skied, but I hadn't yet broken a snowy path for myself. There were a pair of skis and boots my sister used that collected cobwebs under the basement stairs. My parents' skis still resided there too, but they were long and shredded from Dad's shooshing down Thane's Canyon through willows and reeds.

When Debbie invited me to join her and her brother, it didn't matter if I'd never skied or even had proper equipment. My sister's skis would do. My feet were a size bigger, so the boots snugged my toes a bit too tight. The concept of waxing skis hadn't even crossed my radar, nor had I ever attended a class just to learn the basics. Dad showed me how to snowplow in the living room and how to lean on one ski or the other to turn. Sounds simple. What more do I need to know? I got this.

When Debbie and I reached the lift house at the top of the hill, I performed the traditional face plant down the ramp. Debbie picked me up and led me down a powdery trail that wormed away from the Double-Diamond run just below the lift.

This trail traced a roadway through the forest, presenting enough challenge for my teetering snowplow. That wasn't the proper technique for powder snow. Debbie tried to show me how to straighten my skis and cut through the snow, but the increased speed inspired a graceful bum-plant to stop. The snow was already well-tracked by other skiers, but my derriere crater didn’t amuse anybody.

Then, Debbie led me along a narrow passage, barely wider than our bodies, through an aspen grove. I managed that quite well and burst out into the downhill traffic of a wide ski run. People bombarded passed me, shooshing and christying with various skill levels as I humped downward, ala Dad's method: point skis downhill and push off. Crouch over your skis, don't cross the tips, and for Pete's sake, don't lean back flailing your arms. It's bad form.

I fell several times. Debbie picked me up several times. Suddenly a ski patrol guy appeared out of nowhere and offered to help. Debbie said, "Yeah, she needs help," waved and disappeared among the crowd. In fairness to her, her little brother was also a newbie on skis and was testing her patience.

After ten or twenty minutes of clear instruction from this wonderful man, I was on my way. He went on to help the next bunny in distress as I traversed with new confidence back and forth across the run. "You can get a lot of skiing in if you do that," he had told me. Dragging my poles behind me, I glided along in a state of bliss, my hair blowing back in the breeze. Others whizzed around me, but I didn't care. Pure joy surrounded me in a protective bubble of total confidence and skill. Yeah, I got this!

We had time for one more run. Exiting the lift no longer scared me. Whipping down that snow-bound trail was a piece of cake. Then, we funneled through the aspens and my left ski veered off trail, wedging between two saplings. Skiers climbed over me, huffing expletives as they passed. Debbie went off to find the ski patrol. I pulled as far out off trail as I could, hoping the rescuer she brought back wouldn't be my mentor.

Soon, a couple of men arrived and dragged my dead weight onto a sled. Once there, they were able to fit a cardboard splint around my leg. Then the fun began. Zipped inside a breathable canvas bag, I felt the swish and twists through the snow as we cruised down the hill to Debbie's car.

Photo from Facebook: If You Grew Up in Salt Lake City ….

It was the end of that season's skiing for me, but the beginning of several years of fun. Continuing to askew formal ski lessons, I learned how to Christy from Patty, another school buddy. Her brother decided to take me down a Double Diamond trail he'd always wanted to try. It was a harrowing replay of my first bumbling run with Debbie. Almost got smacked by a shoosh-boomer careening down a chute where, once again, I had planted another bum print. Expletives hung in the air as he disappeared down the hil.

Another friend taught me how to ski moguls. I guess he felt sorry for me skiffing over the tops of them rather than using their sculpted forms to Christie around them. Maybe he heard the two guys on the hill who, in a theatrical aside, said, "I don't know about that girl."

I don't know about me either. Formal education has always been a bugaboo with me. I get it from my Dad. He proudly tells everyone how he did okay without going to school. Well, that's true for his case as an electrician. He survived several decades of work without frying himself, but his anti-education attitude sowed a seed of chronic stupidity in my wanderings through life. Knowing what you're doing is kind of important in today's world. I got only so far blustering my way through various jobs and activities. Things didn't improve, though, until I finally took advantage of whatever instruction was cheap and available.

One example happened while I struggled with those blasted moguls, crashing into them and wasting lots of energy. Again, a ski patrolman appeared and taught me how to USE the mogul. Plant the ski pole and swing around it to aid that downhill ski guiding the turn. Holy merde! What a difference it made to my enjoyment of the sport.

It wasn't until I moved to Truckee that I learned people actually die on ski hills. With that knowledge, I removed my wayward self from all such activities for the health and safety of others and to the relief of rescue teams everywhere. If I'm going to die in any physical activity, I don't want to take someone else with me. That definitely would be bad form.

If you enjoyed this post, feel free to explore other writings in the Ring Around the Basin Archive. I also love to read your comments, so please share your thoughts. Let’s start a conversation. And if you wish to support my writings, please consider subscribing or upgrading to a paid subscription. It’s now only $50/year. Even better, I would appreciate it if you could share Ring Around the Basin with your friends. Thank you!

All my books, Paradise Ridge, When the Horses Come and Go, and Ghost in the Forest are currently available on Kindle. Ghost in the Forest, is also available in paperback. Paradise Ridge is out-of-print, but the Kindle version is re-edited and better quality.

Book Review of Ghost in the Forest:

E.R. Flynn, Illustrator, Cartoonist, Storyteller and Creator of "Escape from Clowntown Comics" here on Substack.

"Ghost in The Forest' is a great read! Take note People. If you love stories about environmentalism and nature, its clash with urban mindsets, as well as personal transformation, this is the book for you!

"Ghost in The Forest" is a quick 126-page read. It's the story of Dori, a woman trapped in a mix of grief over parental loss and refusing to accept how her hometown and her friends have changed over the years. Because of this, Dori has become a recluse and a self-imposed misanthrope who finds more comfort amongst the hiking trails around her hometown of Morristown than in her dealings with the raw reality of other humans.

The book, in some ways, resembled Edward Abbey’s “Desert Solitaire” in that the story follows a protagonist's love of nature and angst about humans encroaching on it. In this case, it’s how Morristown is transforming into a mountain biking destination where cyclists run rampant on trails and nature.

However, a tragedy involving said mountain biking becomes a major pivot point for Dori, leading to a series of events that eventually bring about personal evolution and discovery.

If you're a nature lover, this book is a must-read. It beautifully portrays the clash between environmentalism and urban mindsets and the journey of personal transformation. The book's vivid descriptions of nature and the protagonist's love for it will surely intrigue you.

Paradise Ridge Review by western author D. B. Jackson:

If you draw circle roughly around an area that includes northern Nevada, southern Oregon, and southern Idaho, within that circle exists a culture and people who live a lifestyle largely untouched by modern values. These are the "buckaroos" and Basque characters author Sue Cauhape brings to life in her literary novel, "Paradise Ridge".

Leandro, the illegitimate seventh son of patriarch Xavier Arriaga and his mistress, Gisela, is at the center of this intriguing story that travels exceedingly successfully at both the personal level of the characters, as well as the compelling level where the story is told.

Cauhape writes in a literary style that reminds me of Annie Poulx. Paradise Ridge, on the surface, appears to be an upscale Western novel...once inside the pages, you will soon discover a potential classic waiting to be discovered.

I rated this book a 5...because that's all the stars there were.