fire and ice

Dear Snowbird,

When I came to your mountain as a hotel clerk back in the last century, I expected a whirlwind adventure in the interim of getting residency status for the true blue Aggies. I was fresh from Idaho, with two years under my belt at the religious still-sweet-as-elementary Ricks College.

What I did not expect, because your "little" canyon provided granite for the Salt Lake Mormon Temple back two centuries, well I didn't expect to be the minority mormon upon your hills. I never knew the "F" word could be an expletive, verb, and adjective at the same time, and also that it could be an exclamation of joy.

I also didn't know the beloved blissful joy of snowboarding in dry powder up to my knees, the prize of first tracks, or how an elevation climb above city smog could clear my lungs as well as head. I never knew that working weekend graveyard shifts would translate to me finishing up the nightly audit, only to have hours to sit alone looking upon the mountain clear of riders and trees, with moonbeam brandishing the snow with silver glow. I didn't expect to lay spiritual claim upon Dick Bass' massive physical investment, but claim it I did. Claim it I have. Snowbird belongs to my heart.

Though my process of ownership was independent, I found a new camaraderie that was surprising. Thirty-something resort bums with seasonal lives on the mountain in winter, on the river in summer, and who were in better shape than most people my age. Their livelihood kept them in the sun, active, happy, and alert. Gordon, my lodge bellman and a thirty-something goofball, taught me how to drop down powder-filled chutes while he glided effortlessly on telemark skis. "Link 'em like sausage! Link 'em like sausage!" he would yell as I jumped up to drop my board the opposite direction, dropping several feet with each effort.

Pat, the forty-something bellman and Gordon's river guide, only gave away his age because of his bald pate. He could slide down a mountain on telemarks faster than most punks on boards or skis.

Being new and in transition, I began to understand why they did it. It was free, beautiful, and adventurous living. It was my first drug.

Yet, somewhere in the back of my head, during my note-taking and life-planning I wondered how to hold on to adventure, health, and vitamin D into my thirties as well as they did. I looked upon Gordon and Pat as my peers, but one day I turned to them and wondered: "Do you have kids?"

Proudly, I was shown a picture of a pre-adolescent son on the other side of the country. The boy lived with his mom, he was good at A, B, C, and he would see him for a couple weeks that summer.

I smiled to see a mini-version of my friend, but sadly recognized the fallout from this prolonged lifestyle. While I'm sure that a ski bum "family" exists somewhere, I'm not doubting it would be a pretty rare thing, what with the need to raise babies, drop roots, have neighbors, communities, and school-mates.

So then I left, went to school, served a mission, boarded during my breaks, and eventually got married and became Mrs. Olsen. And this is what I said to myself in my head:

It's time to really grow up now. You need to cut back on road trips, snowboarding, and eating out. You need to pay bills, act like a grown up, and be a good wife and mom!

So I did.

And now? Decade plus later? I realize that I was partly wrong!

I haven't snowboarded in ten years! My snowpants don't fit me, and I'm too cheap to pay 100 smacks for new ones when I dread to be the weight that I am. I don't even WANT to go on the slopes, for fear my former self would mock me to shame...alone...at night...remembering my mountain and my dreams for growing thirty.

As my reaction to being a good mom, I totally pushed away my physical and spiritual NEEDS for mountain, for powder, and for lifetime passports to all National Parks.

I'm just starting to realize this. It's taken me a decade to figure out I can mostly be a good mom, and partly be a ski bum....if I didn't have those darned beautiful fat-producing pregnancies to throw me for a loop.

Balance is the key people!

So I sit, and wonder how to gain it back. Wonder if it's worth it. I mourn for that floating powder shredBetty lost somewhere inside my soccer mom-ness with square arse. I see women my age, hitting the slopes while their kids are in school, and think that maybe...with 3 salads a day for 3 years (sigh) I could be a little bit of a ski bum again and return home invigorated and ready to lift and serve my littles to greater mountainous heights.

Signed,
My Own Worst Enemy