Like most of American soccer fans, I wrote off this game as hopeless and little more than an opportunity to practice (and fail) defensively for 90 minutes against some of the most prolific attacking players in the world. And like most fans I had to rub my eyes in disbelief when I saw the referee point to the spot after Eddie Johnson first stumbled over the ball for a few seconds before gratefully taking a foul and putting the US up 1-0.
At halftime I thought we could get out of this at 1-1. If anyone on the American side had stayed after practice for some free kicks they would have had a crack at taking the game as their own. Instead, with the tremendous defensive effort beginning to take a toll, Bob Bradley took a peek at his notecards and decided on Eddie Gaven to change the game.
Most readers are now ready for my lambasting of his laziness and overall ineptitude on the international level. Well, that's as far as I'm going to take it. But I should add one other thing. I feel bad for Gaven that he was placed on the field at that critical moment. It was truly embarrassing and I'm sure he wanted to go stick his head in a hole on the right side of the field the moment he saw Lionel Messi target his dribbling at Gaven's trembling feet.
Now the game was not lost by poor Eddie G. Team USA ran out of gas after a monumental display of defensive, and at times skillful offensive, pressure. While the postgame press conference has the Argentinian coach lauded his team for their offensive patience and persistence, it was evident they were flustered by a youthful American team unwilling to sit back and get shit on. Unsurprisingly the man leading the charge was DC United's Hercules, Benny Olsen, and it was a pleasure to watch. If only his legs could be five years fresher, he would be a joy to have around in the years to come and help the youth along in this program. Kudos to Team USA for 60 minutes of wonderful soccer, and the same to Argentina for showing their class in producing four goals of the highest level.
Friday, June 29, 2007
DC - Colorado 6/28
I'll just make this brief. I was glad to see United recover from what could have been a dagger off Jacob Peterson's head. The backline was obviously fragile and consistently produced poor distribution. That the early goal proved not to unravel the team that also lost starting forward in the earlygoing was comforting and inspiring to a fan.
After the debacle in Utah there was no doubt a despairing emotion after seeing United fall behind again. Then there was the fortuitous penalty call that many people couldn't see without a replay but referee Alex Prus got just right. Good - Gomez buries the penalty. Bad - Nicholas Addlery doesn't bury the shot just before from the penalty spot in the run of play, something that will be critical down the road in the playoffs.
There has been a sometimes not so quiet murmuring that Clavijo is on a short rope as the Rapids head coach. After watching this game I'd have to be a supporting voice in hurrying his departure. The city of Denver (or at least a near suburb) just sprung for a new stadium. Their team is on a four game skid. Coach pulls the squad's defensive stopper out of a midfield against a DC team whose strength continues to be distribution from Gomez right up the pipe. As soon as I saw that sub I knew United's chances were just bumped up to bring home three points and it only took a couple seconds for Addlery to battle home a header.
Glad to see United get back on track after a miserable effort against Salt Lake the game before. Moose looked tireless in his effort, maybe he's learned something valuable just by watching Ben Olsen pour his guts out every game even if Moose doesn't have the finer skill set quite yet. That said, his Gomez imitation scoop pass over the backline should have earned him a point if Emilio could, and should have, slotted the ball home.
Fred gets on the board finally and Emilio keeps on producing even though he could have put the game at leisure before the lightning. Good result and not a bad game given the haphazardly produced back four.
Travelin' Light - Part V
I fell off the face of the blogging earth for a while... sorry for anyone that might have missed me.
** If you want to read this whole piece from the beginning, check out previous post listings in May and start at Senior Project
The green and black comforter I brought is a little piece of home which, along with Spike, the stuffed dog Ashley gave me, is one of the few comforts I travel with. Dropping Ashley off at the airport was just twenty-four hours ago, but it feels like a distant memory. I’m still feeling the effects of little sleep on New Year’s, but yesterday, ski patrol told us that Tucker Mountain, Copper’s little outpost of backcountry hiking, would open today. Mark and I are determined to put our skis down first on its untracked face, so we’re up before the sun, frying eggs in darkness while the rest of the house sleeps.
We warm up by taking laps on the Mountain Chief lift, dutifully eyeing the area where the snowcat will pick up skiers and carry them where no lift is in place. We arrive in line behind only the Copper Mountain Pro Team. They’re going up to scan the best area’s and film for Copper’s website. The rest of our crew arrives, and we learn we’ll be the first of the public on Tucker Mountain this year. The locals eye us a little warily while we lounge on the snow, munching down some backpacked lunch with a portable Ipod stereo playing.
The snowcat gracefully carves out a groomed highway down a gap in the steeply tilted bowl of the mountain; ten of us pile into its small cab. Most of us have helmets locking our goggles over our eyes.
Detecting emotion was like trying to read a poker player, but the ski patrol didn’t soothe any nerves. If you make a wrong turn up on the Taco, we’re looking at a slide for life situation.
I tell Brad that after knowing him for so long, I don’t want to be the one making the phone call to his parents that their son died sliding down a trail named for a Mexican snack.
We’re dropped off almost a mile away from the avalanche blasted area safe for skiing. The hike is daunting. None of us are in peak physical form and ski boots don’t smooth the effort any. Phil, our group’s lone snowboarder, and I lead the pack with adrenaline urging us on. By the end, Phil is almost stripped to his boxers despite the frigid air above twelve thousand feet. Dripping with sweat and drooling at the steep glades, we impatiently wait for the rest of our friends.
The next forms to appear over the ridge, though, are unrecognizable. Some of the next snowcat’s passengers have passed our friends. For fear of losing out on the untouched path, we unapologetically drop into fresh snow up to our knees. The first couple turns are a feeling out process, switching from the typical style of groomed or thin snow to the task of clearing out our own path. We turn less, gathering the speed needed for pushing between tightly packed trees. Every so often I see a little blur to my right, when Phil and I come close enough to high five, but relishing the run won’t come until we’re at the bottom.
My legs are on fire as I chase Phil down the mountain and the finish is capped by a little hop over a running creek. We have to climb our way out of the woods before collapsing, exhausted, next to the lift and staring up at our freshly carved paths, grinning broadly at the art we’ve just created.
Between the hiking and marathon runs, I’m left spent for the day. In some down time waiting for the rest of the group, I decide to inspect the bottom of my skis where I felt some rocks under the snow. The damage is worse than I thought – I absolutely shredded my skis. In just two long runs my skis chocked up four core shots. They’ll need a patch up trip to the repair shop to fill the dime sized holes in the epoxy of my skis where the wooden base is exposed.
On the way around to the base side of the mountain, I ride up the lift with a kid with rainbow styled Armada skis. He looks about my age, and we talk about school for a while before I find out he’s a sixth year senior finance major from Littleton. We both smile knowingly after he stutters on sixth year. The battered skis he has on might be part of the reason for the delay and I silently wish that I had the guts to join him on his extended adventure.
This morning I was selfish and amassed excuses so I could take those first tracks of the year on Tucker Mountain. My roommate from school, Jeffries, wanted me to pick him and his friend up at the airport that morning but I had to tell him it just wasn’t going to happen. When I arrive at the base, quadriceps burning from the day of hiking and capped by the last draining trip down Glade 1, our last additional roommates were waiting outside.
They both get their first Western skiing experience on January 3. Jeffries is a soccer player with strong legs, stocky, and looks made for skiing fast, big arcing turns. He sports aging, neon green Scott goggles and takes to his new wide open surroundings with ease. Dave is the polar opposite and we lose him every fifteen minutes. While he has the thick beard associated with comfort in the wilderness, he’s nervous about skiing on a mountain this size and slips away, sometimes intentionally.
He picks at the snow with his poles and often slides slowly down the steep entry to runs. You guys just go ahead I’ll find you later. I don’t want to slow you down.
He’s not a bad skier, just extremely timid in an environment that doesn’t reward shyness. Skiing in the Rockies is an activity that often rewards a little audacity and courageousness. Some moments require disregarding the risks of injury or fear of falling if you want to look over your shoulder and see that you’ve conquered something that seemed impossible.
In the afternoon I get to make my triumphant return to the Dillon Dam Brewery. I point out the best pints and generally organize the operation – with that many people it really does turn into an operation. With Mark taking full advantage of the happy hour specials, we raise a ruckus and take an unceremonious leave among families arriving for a peaceful dinner.
When we arrive back at Copper, the party spills into a bar crawl around the village. We’ve been running around on a frozen pond in t-shirts before settling by a blazing campfire. Brad and Jeffries convince two of the girls that I’m training for a new Olympic sport called Ice Running. By the looks of it, I probably wouldn’t win the gold, as I retire next to a fire, bruised and shivering.
We all take a place around a bonfire formerly occupied by more reasonable vacationers that scurry away upon our noisy approach. We tilt our necks up in awe at the moon and, because of the shifting clouds, determine it’s moving at an amazing pace across the night sky. We scream our heads off in gleeful dismay; the world could end at any moment and we wouldn’t be disappointed.
With Natrisha’s impending departure in two days, I start to consider other places to sleep. Luckily the next couple of couches are lining themselves up without much of a fight – Breckenridge, Boulder, then Denver. I’m calling anyone I can get a number for: friends of friends.
Each day I’m waking up later as my body wears down a little bit, working on ten days of skiing in a row. When I’m on the lift, my vocabulary shifts towards “my” mountain or “us” as if I’m a local. I’ve convinced myself that this is where I belong. Even though the group in the condo hasn’t been together all that long, I’m already looking forward a little bit to the freedom from the familiar group and staying with some new faces. I feel again, that I need to move. Why cross the country and live nomadically for a month if I’m just going to fall into another routine?
Since my skis needed repair from yesterday, I got my older pair tuned and waxed. They feel great, and riding on them is like reacquainting with an old friend. Their now perfect edge, reborn from what used to be depraved and rusty, makes for a nice boost out of the halfpipe. The relatively new addition to mountain landscapes, carved out late at night by enormous machines called ‘pipe dragons’, is my challenge for the trip.
Few mountains in the East offer this type of imposing feature with eighteen foot vertical walls. When approached with enough speed it leaves you’re left floating out of the lip into the crystal blue, before turning and briefly planting your skis before again launching into a few glorious moments of zero gravity.
While most people at Copper are here on vacation and say it’s just for fun, I’m out here determined and sweating as I climb back up to the top of the pipe. I wonder what gives me the elation of conquering a new level of achievement, when I climb just a little higher into the air or land just a little smoother. And I realize it’s the sheer hazard of challenging the new. Even though I have a helmet on, I’m pushing myself beyond reasonable limits. The same reason I decided to drive instead of fly – because others said I was crazy to do it.
At some point in life we need some recklessness – as when people go skydiving or bungee jumping. At the onset this trip didn’t make a whole lot of sense; I’m broke and piecing together meals and beds. As much as people say that college is four years of learning and exposure to new, it ends up turning tedious towards the end – the same place, the same people.
So skiing becomes my little breath of fresh air that allows me to return refreshed and inspired regardless of any tedious day to day regularity. I’ll climb up the several hundred feet and drop into the halfpipe again, seeing if I can get more space between my skis and the top of the pipe than last time – maybe I’ll hear an ohhh from the lift – and hope that I don’t crash and ragdoll down the icy wall.
Our descent in the morning down Patrol Chute in Spaulding Bowl shows off some of Colorado’s best qualities and it takes some serious coaxing to get Dave into his first turn. Once we got him started on an easier route, we drop into a skinny route between to rock outcroppings. The top is steep and requires a couple quick jump turns in the thick snow. Powder punches us in the mouth after the sharp entry turn making for a refreshing wake up call.
Fresh tracks lasted late into the afternoon and we settle into a few beers, stretching our legs still heavy from the day’s workout. A man next door just gave us garlic and milk for some mashed potatoes making us feel a part of a shared community, working as a unit out of necessity. We’re working up a hearty dinner to refuel after this morning served up fresh snow that lasted all day long.
There’s no doubt I’m going to miss the people this condo brings together just feet from the lift. Emi and Phil are curled on the couch. Jeffries is headfirst in a book with Dave peering over his shoulder. Natrisha and Sarah are perched in the kitchen concocting a drink. Everyone seems perfectly content.
This is the last night we’ll all spend together and we talk about the future. We’re all studying in school – geology, business, physics, writing – and we all seem to want to push the near future away for enough time to “find ourselves” and what it is we really want to do. Maybe it’s the nature of the traveler, searching for what will make them stay put. Pico Iyer suggests when we travel to learn about other ways of life and see the beauty of the world, we often learn as much about ourselves.
About three-quarters of the way up the American Eagle lift I sneak into a couples conversation. I already recognized their accent as British and it turns out they’re on vacation from New Zealand.
So how long are you out here? Just for the week?
Hah, no no. We’ve already been here a week and are staying for three more. We drove up to Copper Mountain after a couple of weeks in Baja, Mexico. When you fly that far you don’t just stay for a week.
I’m moved by how easily they abandon home for long stretches. My family has never been away for more than what seems to me the typical week at a time. For me, that’s always been the prescribed vacation length; not too much time removed from reality but just enough time away to want back the conveniences and established social place of friends and occupation.
And when the lift crests at the top they’re gone from my life. People from those nationalities seem to be the happiest moving around – their own country is so beautiful it makes me wonder why. When I traveled through Europe last spring, sleeping in hostels of different shapes and sizes, I almost invariably ran into an Australian or New Zealander. Most were younger than twenty-five and not traveling, just living. When they left they didn’t have jobs lined up, only plane tickets.
The Australians obviously come for reasons other than the Jamaicans or Peruvians who mostly clean the rooms and load the lifts; it’s not adventure that drives them, it’s money. There are a whole range of privileges that define a person’s reason for traveling and movement from one place to another. Many try to find a role operating the mountain because that is where money can be made. You don’t need to speak perfect English to make more money here than you would at home.
One man I meet, Jeremy, came all the way from Kingston, Jamaica. He tells me he made the trip because work at home is very hard. He smiles after I introduce myself and says that his older brother is named Chris. We share our mutual thoughts about missing our families.
Leaving was very sad, but I talk to my family every day over the phone. I’m used to tourists because many people visit beaches of Negrad that are near my home, but I don’t know why people like this cold.
He works as a housekeeper, but after two months hasn’t yet tried skiing or snowboarding. Our talk makes me realize where I fit in this mountain society; I can afford not to work and still front as a so-called ski bum.
Skiing is one of the most luxurious sports in the world – apres-ski in fur coats, moving walkways at Beaver Creek to limit your physical exertion. The seduction of adventure is there if you want it. There are screaming turns in blistering wind, sex in the gondola, the romance of the hot tub, the thrill of a ski town night life under a dusting snow, where only the strong make it to last call and rise to ski in the morning. But someone still has to clean up the mess.
Throughout the trip I’ve been trying to plant seeds with anyone that might be worth a future contact. I make sure to ask locals what they do in hopes of a potential tip. What I find is that no matter what they do, almost all of them are happy.
One person from Denver works at a pizza shop and says I always take off Fridays and Saturdays for riding; one day for friends and the other day for my serious riding.
I’m deeply envious every time I hear this and wonder if it wouldn’t be such a bad deal. Then I consider the anxiety attack my mother would have upon hearing pizza delivery after four years of Ithaca College tuition.
While a cause of mine was what George Santayana describes as a traveler’s curiosity to discover new lands as inseparable from the desire to potentially appropriate them, I’m becoming blinded by the accumulating troubles of my transience. My clothes haven’t been washed in days and when I’m not on the slopes I’m bleary eyed from exhaustion. Talking to Ashley over the phone is getting old.
At least the wind died down today, except at the peak where the cold still pierces my jacket. On one lift ride I receive some much needed encouragement on my aspirations as a writer when a local assures me I’ll be fine after graduation because writing is such a valuable commodity.
Go where you want to be and you’ll find a place there. If it’s where you’re happy you can make a place for yourself.
He tells me he grew up in a military family moving every couple years. Now he’s found his own place, starting a business in Littleton about an hour away and shredding turns when the snow is good.
It’s easy to tell the locals apart from the outsiders just by their distinct dialect. Locals’ conversation is full of barely recognizable terms when they talk about the mountain – groms instead of young skiers or boarders, OB instead of out of bounds, or S-chair for the Sierra chair lift.
When I ride up with a group of three teenagers from Dillon, they speak at machine gun pace and I struggle to translate for myself. I mostly keep my mouth shut and listen. They jeer from the lift in between discussion about their new marijuana pipe that looks like an elephant. They don’t want to share their time with me.
After all, I’m in their space, intruding on the dream they’re living every day while I pretend, with a two hundred dollar ski jacket and an attempt at grace on the slopes. Maybe it’s just some ingrained competitive nature from a bustling suburban upbringing that whenever I do something, I need to compete with the next person. I notice many of the locals I meet aren’t even talented skiers, but for them that’s not necessarily what the mountain is about.
Most of the time I realize the experience is a mutual pleasure rather than a competition, and everyone loves a powder day. Two years ago, a friend got a ski pole jammed between his legs by a pleasant looking middle aged woman fending us off the first chair. No friends on a powder day she yelled over her shoulder.
After the day ends a light snow is dusting the entire town. It’s so beautiful it’s almost cheesy. Mark and Dave are out snapping photos but I stay inside next to the fire, considering myself above this touristy behavior even though I’m sure I’ll ask him for copies later. I’ve been the tourist before, but this time I hardly spectate at all, aside from the unavoidable gawking at the enormity of the mountains.
** If you want to read this whole piece from the beginning, check out previous post listings in May and start at Senior Project
The green and black comforter I brought is a little piece of home which, along with Spike, the stuffed dog Ashley gave me, is one of the few comforts I travel with. Dropping Ashley off at the airport was just twenty-four hours ago, but it feels like a distant memory. I’m still feeling the effects of little sleep on New Year’s, but yesterday, ski patrol told us that Tucker Mountain, Copper’s little outpost of backcountry hiking, would open today. Mark and I are determined to put our skis down first on its untracked face, so we’re up before the sun, frying eggs in darkness while the rest of the house sleeps.
We warm up by taking laps on the Mountain Chief lift, dutifully eyeing the area where the snowcat will pick up skiers and carry them where no lift is in place. We arrive in line behind only the Copper Mountain Pro Team. They’re going up to scan the best area’s and film for Copper’s website. The rest of our crew arrives, and we learn we’ll be the first of the public on Tucker Mountain this year. The locals eye us a little warily while we lounge on the snow, munching down some backpacked lunch with a portable Ipod stereo playing.
The snowcat gracefully carves out a groomed highway down a gap in the steeply tilted bowl of the mountain; ten of us pile into its small cab. Most of us have helmets locking our goggles over our eyes.
Detecting emotion was like trying to read a poker player, but the ski patrol didn’t soothe any nerves. If you make a wrong turn up on the Taco, we’re looking at a slide for life situation.
I tell Brad that after knowing him for so long, I don’t want to be the one making the phone call to his parents that their son died sliding down a trail named for a Mexican snack.
We’re dropped off almost a mile away from the avalanche blasted area safe for skiing. The hike is daunting. None of us are in peak physical form and ski boots don’t smooth the effort any. Phil, our group’s lone snowboarder, and I lead the pack with adrenaline urging us on. By the end, Phil is almost stripped to his boxers despite the frigid air above twelve thousand feet. Dripping with sweat and drooling at the steep glades, we impatiently wait for the rest of our friends.
The next forms to appear over the ridge, though, are unrecognizable. Some of the next snowcat’s passengers have passed our friends. For fear of losing out on the untouched path, we unapologetically drop into fresh snow up to our knees. The first couple turns are a feeling out process, switching from the typical style of groomed or thin snow to the task of clearing out our own path. We turn less, gathering the speed needed for pushing between tightly packed trees. Every so often I see a little blur to my right, when Phil and I come close enough to high five, but relishing the run won’t come until we’re at the bottom.
My legs are on fire as I chase Phil down the mountain and the finish is capped by a little hop over a running creek. We have to climb our way out of the woods before collapsing, exhausted, next to the lift and staring up at our freshly carved paths, grinning broadly at the art we’ve just created.
Between the hiking and marathon runs, I’m left spent for the day. In some down time waiting for the rest of the group, I decide to inspect the bottom of my skis where I felt some rocks under the snow. The damage is worse than I thought – I absolutely shredded my skis. In just two long runs my skis chocked up four core shots. They’ll need a patch up trip to the repair shop to fill the dime sized holes in the epoxy of my skis where the wooden base is exposed.
On the way around to the base side of the mountain, I ride up the lift with a kid with rainbow styled Armada skis. He looks about my age, and we talk about school for a while before I find out he’s a sixth year senior finance major from Littleton. We both smile knowingly after he stutters on sixth year. The battered skis he has on might be part of the reason for the delay and I silently wish that I had the guts to join him on his extended adventure.
This morning I was selfish and amassed excuses so I could take those first tracks of the year on Tucker Mountain. My roommate from school, Jeffries, wanted me to pick him and his friend up at the airport that morning but I had to tell him it just wasn’t going to happen. When I arrive at the base, quadriceps burning from the day of hiking and capped by the last draining trip down Glade 1, our last additional roommates were waiting outside.
They both get their first Western skiing experience on January 3. Jeffries is a soccer player with strong legs, stocky, and looks made for skiing fast, big arcing turns. He sports aging, neon green Scott goggles and takes to his new wide open surroundings with ease. Dave is the polar opposite and we lose him every fifteen minutes. While he has the thick beard associated with comfort in the wilderness, he’s nervous about skiing on a mountain this size and slips away, sometimes intentionally.
He picks at the snow with his poles and often slides slowly down the steep entry to runs. You guys just go ahead I’ll find you later. I don’t want to slow you down.
He’s not a bad skier, just extremely timid in an environment that doesn’t reward shyness. Skiing in the Rockies is an activity that often rewards a little audacity and courageousness. Some moments require disregarding the risks of injury or fear of falling if you want to look over your shoulder and see that you’ve conquered something that seemed impossible.
In the afternoon I get to make my triumphant return to the Dillon Dam Brewery. I point out the best pints and generally organize the operation – with that many people it really does turn into an operation. With Mark taking full advantage of the happy hour specials, we raise a ruckus and take an unceremonious leave among families arriving for a peaceful dinner.
When we arrive back at Copper, the party spills into a bar crawl around the village. We’ve been running around on a frozen pond in t-shirts before settling by a blazing campfire. Brad and Jeffries convince two of the girls that I’m training for a new Olympic sport called Ice Running. By the looks of it, I probably wouldn’t win the gold, as I retire next to a fire, bruised and shivering.
We all take a place around a bonfire formerly occupied by more reasonable vacationers that scurry away upon our noisy approach. We tilt our necks up in awe at the moon and, because of the shifting clouds, determine it’s moving at an amazing pace across the night sky. We scream our heads off in gleeful dismay; the world could end at any moment and we wouldn’t be disappointed.
With Natrisha’s impending departure in two days, I start to consider other places to sleep. Luckily the next couple of couches are lining themselves up without much of a fight – Breckenridge, Boulder, then Denver. I’m calling anyone I can get a number for: friends of friends.
Each day I’m waking up later as my body wears down a little bit, working on ten days of skiing in a row. When I’m on the lift, my vocabulary shifts towards “my” mountain or “us” as if I’m a local. I’ve convinced myself that this is where I belong. Even though the group in the condo hasn’t been together all that long, I’m already looking forward a little bit to the freedom from the familiar group and staying with some new faces. I feel again, that I need to move. Why cross the country and live nomadically for a month if I’m just going to fall into another routine?
Since my skis needed repair from yesterday, I got my older pair tuned and waxed. They feel great, and riding on them is like reacquainting with an old friend. Their now perfect edge, reborn from what used to be depraved and rusty, makes for a nice boost out of the halfpipe. The relatively new addition to mountain landscapes, carved out late at night by enormous machines called ‘pipe dragons’, is my challenge for the trip.
Few mountains in the East offer this type of imposing feature with eighteen foot vertical walls. When approached with enough speed it leaves you’re left floating out of the lip into the crystal blue, before turning and briefly planting your skis before again launching into a few glorious moments of zero gravity.
While most people at Copper are here on vacation and say it’s just for fun, I’m out here determined and sweating as I climb back up to the top of the pipe. I wonder what gives me the elation of conquering a new level of achievement, when I climb just a little higher into the air or land just a little smoother. And I realize it’s the sheer hazard of challenging the new. Even though I have a helmet on, I’m pushing myself beyond reasonable limits. The same reason I decided to drive instead of fly – because others said I was crazy to do it.
At some point in life we need some recklessness – as when people go skydiving or bungee jumping. At the onset this trip didn’t make a whole lot of sense; I’m broke and piecing together meals and beds. As much as people say that college is four years of learning and exposure to new, it ends up turning tedious towards the end – the same place, the same people.
So skiing becomes my little breath of fresh air that allows me to return refreshed and inspired regardless of any tedious day to day regularity. I’ll climb up the several hundred feet and drop into the halfpipe again, seeing if I can get more space between my skis and the top of the pipe than last time – maybe I’ll hear an ohhh from the lift – and hope that I don’t crash and ragdoll down the icy wall.
Our descent in the morning down Patrol Chute in Spaulding Bowl shows off some of Colorado’s best qualities and it takes some serious coaxing to get Dave into his first turn. Once we got him started on an easier route, we drop into a skinny route between to rock outcroppings. The top is steep and requires a couple quick jump turns in the thick snow. Powder punches us in the mouth after the sharp entry turn making for a refreshing wake up call.
Fresh tracks lasted late into the afternoon and we settle into a few beers, stretching our legs still heavy from the day’s workout. A man next door just gave us garlic and milk for some mashed potatoes making us feel a part of a shared community, working as a unit out of necessity. We’re working up a hearty dinner to refuel after this morning served up fresh snow that lasted all day long.
There’s no doubt I’m going to miss the people this condo brings together just feet from the lift. Emi and Phil are curled on the couch. Jeffries is headfirst in a book with Dave peering over his shoulder. Natrisha and Sarah are perched in the kitchen concocting a drink. Everyone seems perfectly content.
This is the last night we’ll all spend together and we talk about the future. We’re all studying in school – geology, business, physics, writing – and we all seem to want to push the near future away for enough time to “find ourselves” and what it is we really want to do. Maybe it’s the nature of the traveler, searching for what will make them stay put. Pico Iyer suggests when we travel to learn about other ways of life and see the beauty of the world, we often learn as much about ourselves.
About three-quarters of the way up the American Eagle lift I sneak into a couples conversation. I already recognized their accent as British and it turns out they’re on vacation from New Zealand.
So how long are you out here? Just for the week?
Hah, no no. We’ve already been here a week and are staying for three more. We drove up to Copper Mountain after a couple of weeks in Baja, Mexico. When you fly that far you don’t just stay for a week.
I’m moved by how easily they abandon home for long stretches. My family has never been away for more than what seems to me the typical week at a time. For me, that’s always been the prescribed vacation length; not too much time removed from reality but just enough time away to want back the conveniences and established social place of friends and occupation.
And when the lift crests at the top they’re gone from my life. People from those nationalities seem to be the happiest moving around – their own country is so beautiful it makes me wonder why. When I traveled through Europe last spring, sleeping in hostels of different shapes and sizes, I almost invariably ran into an Australian or New Zealander. Most were younger than twenty-five and not traveling, just living. When they left they didn’t have jobs lined up, only plane tickets.
The Australians obviously come for reasons other than the Jamaicans or Peruvians who mostly clean the rooms and load the lifts; it’s not adventure that drives them, it’s money. There are a whole range of privileges that define a person’s reason for traveling and movement from one place to another. Many try to find a role operating the mountain because that is where money can be made. You don’t need to speak perfect English to make more money here than you would at home.
One man I meet, Jeremy, came all the way from Kingston, Jamaica. He tells me he made the trip because work at home is very hard. He smiles after I introduce myself and says that his older brother is named Chris. We share our mutual thoughts about missing our families.
Leaving was very sad, but I talk to my family every day over the phone. I’m used to tourists because many people visit beaches of Negrad that are near my home, but I don’t know why people like this cold.
He works as a housekeeper, but after two months hasn’t yet tried skiing or snowboarding. Our talk makes me realize where I fit in this mountain society; I can afford not to work and still front as a so-called ski bum.
Skiing is one of the most luxurious sports in the world – apres-ski in fur coats, moving walkways at Beaver Creek to limit your physical exertion. The seduction of adventure is there if you want it. There are screaming turns in blistering wind, sex in the gondola, the romance of the hot tub, the thrill of a ski town night life under a dusting snow, where only the strong make it to last call and rise to ski in the morning. But someone still has to clean up the mess.
Throughout the trip I’ve been trying to plant seeds with anyone that might be worth a future contact. I make sure to ask locals what they do in hopes of a potential tip. What I find is that no matter what they do, almost all of them are happy.
One person from Denver works at a pizza shop and says I always take off Fridays and Saturdays for riding; one day for friends and the other day for my serious riding.
I’m deeply envious every time I hear this and wonder if it wouldn’t be such a bad deal. Then I consider the anxiety attack my mother would have upon hearing pizza delivery after four years of Ithaca College tuition.
While a cause of mine was what George Santayana describes as a traveler’s curiosity to discover new lands as inseparable from the desire to potentially appropriate them, I’m becoming blinded by the accumulating troubles of my transience. My clothes haven’t been washed in days and when I’m not on the slopes I’m bleary eyed from exhaustion. Talking to Ashley over the phone is getting old.
At least the wind died down today, except at the peak where the cold still pierces my jacket. On one lift ride I receive some much needed encouragement on my aspirations as a writer when a local assures me I’ll be fine after graduation because writing is such a valuable commodity.
Go where you want to be and you’ll find a place there. If it’s where you’re happy you can make a place for yourself.
He tells me he grew up in a military family moving every couple years. Now he’s found his own place, starting a business in Littleton about an hour away and shredding turns when the snow is good.
It’s easy to tell the locals apart from the outsiders just by their distinct dialect. Locals’ conversation is full of barely recognizable terms when they talk about the mountain – groms instead of young skiers or boarders, OB instead of out of bounds, or S-chair for the Sierra chair lift.
When I ride up with a group of three teenagers from Dillon, they speak at machine gun pace and I struggle to translate for myself. I mostly keep my mouth shut and listen. They jeer from the lift in between discussion about their new marijuana pipe that looks like an elephant. They don’t want to share their time with me.
After all, I’m in their space, intruding on the dream they’re living every day while I pretend, with a two hundred dollar ski jacket and an attempt at grace on the slopes. Maybe it’s just some ingrained competitive nature from a bustling suburban upbringing that whenever I do something, I need to compete with the next person. I notice many of the locals I meet aren’t even talented skiers, but for them that’s not necessarily what the mountain is about.
Most of the time I realize the experience is a mutual pleasure rather than a competition, and everyone loves a powder day. Two years ago, a friend got a ski pole jammed between his legs by a pleasant looking middle aged woman fending us off the first chair. No friends on a powder day she yelled over her shoulder.
After the day ends a light snow is dusting the entire town. It’s so beautiful it’s almost cheesy. Mark and Dave are out snapping photos but I stay inside next to the fire, considering myself above this touristy behavior even though I’m sure I’ll ask him for copies later. I’ve been the tourist before, but this time I hardly spectate at all, aside from the unavoidable gawking at the enormity of the mountains.
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
I Want This Guy On My Team
For anyone that likes beerpong or ping pong ball tossing related activities, this guy may be the greatest there's ever been.
http://www.costaricanproperty.net/ball.html
http://www.costaricanproperty.net/ball.html
Travelin' Light - Part IV
** If you want to read this whole piece from the beginning, check out previous post listings in May and start at Senior Project
After three days of skiing, Ashley and I were just getting comfortable when it was already time to move again. She’s starting an internship back in Ithaca and has to fly out the morning of New Years Day. Drew and Arienne, two friends that graduated from school last year, are helping to make our holiday in Denver a little less foreign. They’ve made their home in Lakewood, twenty minutes outside the city, and they take us in without question. They see in us some of the same spirit of adventure that brought them to Colorado just three months ago.
They’ve made their home where they happen to be, surrounding themselves with the familiar. A painting by Drew’s sister hangs above the fireplace next to the nose of his surfboard with the sandy wax still clinging to memories of last summer. A Christmas tree and cards from family are propped neatly upright and open on the table next to their couch – all tools easing the transition from one place to another, keeping an open connection until the local becomes their own.
Drew has heard of a nearby event with entertainment and an open bar. Ashley and I are sold with extravagant images of a New Year’s gala we arrive early in the night. We all exchange uncomfortable looks when we should be smiling for the photographer at the door. We wonder if we’re out of our league when the next couple enters sporting a suit and evening gown. I have on jeans and a collared shirt.
The room is a well-decorated, tiered dinner theatre under a high ceiling. But the performers are disappointing and the room stays mostly empty late into the night. Only the two comedians, who get laughed off stage, are worse than the musicians.
All along I’m lamenting the abundance of elderly in attendance. I get bolder with my volume until finally I’m chastised with some loud shhh’s to lower my voice from Drew and Arienne. Grinning, they point to the two senior citizens across the row from us. Things are getting dull before Drew is tapped on the shoulder. Some familiar faces arrive, fellow employees from his ski shop who are under the age of forty-five.
The saving grace of the evening is a long-haired karate master, who when he first emerges, we can’t definitively provide for his sex. Alone on stage, armed with various weapons and flowing blond hair, he at least performs his routine with some passion, probably envisioning enemies approaching a la the Matrix. Most of his segments are capped with an extravagant, leaping split. Each successive landing invokes cringes among the men but inspires furious applause that conveniently stifles the giggles evoked from the seriousness etched on the performer’s face.
Regardless of the strange circumstances, I’m glad to be holding Ashley when we count down the seconds. I’m reminded that sometimes, as bad as my skills are, I even enjoy dancing. Confetti drops and we cheers to the next three hundred and sixty five days before locking in a New Years kiss that we’ve never had through our two year relationship. Hugs are exchanged and the dancing begins with renewed energy.
Everything is beautiful until we pile into the backseat for our ride home. Only then does it set in that five hours from now, Ashley and I will separate at the airport. The conversation evaporates into a silent, brooding sadness of our impending separation. After Ashley lifts off towards Ithaca early this morning, I take the tired and hangover ridden drive back out to the mountains.
On my first days out I had been hellbent on introducing myself to everyone I could meet on the ski lift rides. I like getting little seven-minute peeks of who the people around me were and why they ended up on a mountain with heavy equipment strapped to their feet. I think about Edward Norton on the airplane in Fight Club and his “single serving friends.”
Riding by up alone seems like a waste because the lift is a perfect place for conversation. Two girls from Boulder were talking about a roommate who was causing trouble and promised me they weren’t bitches. What better place though for confessions of grievances? On the lift, people often mention where they’re from, assuming they’ll be alien and unfamiliar. One couple is from Potomac, Maryland.
Before they turn away, I smile and say that I’m from practically down the street. It’s funny to gauge peoples’ reactions: One will almost fly out of their seat, joyfully indulging in our shared background; the next will wish they hadn’t spoken, disinterested in someone that isn’t more exotic. I often consider lying.
While I love hearing about different places when I travel, I don’t mind being around someone who’s taken nearly the same path. Hearing their story usually gave mine more clarity; I wasn’t just vacationing or taking the day off from work. I liked to tell them mine was an adventure full of uncertainty. Maybe if I was lucky they’d let me sleep on their couch. I typically tell them I’d like to return and ski for a while or after graduating I’d like to settle in Denver. Then again, maybe all those words are just like going to the grocery store hungry; once I get my fill of fun in the snow it’s possible my reasons will ring hollow.
This morning I’m just not in the mood as my mind lingers on Ashley’s departure. I try not to eavesdrop, but it’s not easy to tune out a conversation from a foot away. Most of the time if you’re riding solo and join a couple on the lift they’ll either invite you into conversation or give a polite hello and get on with their lives. I’m caught somewhere in between, uninvited but still sitting within earshot huddled up against the corner of the chair lift.
I just don’t know what to do… Her mother’s been on life support for eighteen months. At some point you just have to accept what is happening and not let it control your life and your emotions. At some point you just have to let go. I don’t know how to suggest that to my friend and that if she were in the same position she’d want a friend to do the same. What can you do except suggest mentally switching places with the sick person?
Without turning her head the woman aims her voice at me. What do you think?
I snap back from disconnectedly staring down at the passing snow.
Uhhh, I don’t know, I guess you’re right?
I can’t believe she’s asked for my thoughts, but she lets me off the hook as she looks at me and smiles.
You go skiing right?
Before I answer I reflect for just a second.
Yeah. You let go, and then you go skiing.
It reminds me of Raymond Carver’s story, “The Bath,” where the mother of a son, who has slipped into a coma, meets a random family in the waiting room of the hospital. Without any real cause she tells the whole day’s story, why she’s in the hospital and what happened to her son. Despair and uncertainty bring an impulse to share our experience with whoever we can.
In this place so distanced from a home, we find ourselves in isolated situations where it can be a relief to unload experience on people we’ll probably never see again. It’s as comforting as visiting a therapist who you know will keep your secrets safe. Instead of professional security you get the spongy ears of the mountain.
In the first days of traveling, my brain is occupied by overindulgence in the new. But after a couple days, when the escape starts to feel normal, I start to miss little conveniences. I feel disconnected without the internet which is such an integral attachment to the world for me at school. Some of the things, news about soccer and access to fresh music provide stability. It’s a habit that soothes me. I twitch at the thought of an overflowing email inbox.
When traveling, it’s necessary to strike a balance between keeping certain things we know close while at the same time casting off securities that come with regularity. Maybe that’s one of the beauties of moving and traveling: the chance to exercise the human capacity for new experience and drift from daily assurances. Creating that space makes it possible to recognize where we’ve been, and what it is we want to hold on to from each particular place we visit. We discover what we want to make our own.
Over the phone I find myself telling people that after going to the store I’m returning home, and then I clarify – to Copper. Is home really just where we park ourselves at night? I don’t think so, but it is so easy for me to attach quickly to this place I’ve been before, where there are familiar friends that are comfortable in the same place together. We’re all distanced from our normal lives, so we form that protective unit ourselves. We keep familiarity of where we come from through conversation and shared memories.
After three days of skiing, Ashley and I were just getting comfortable when it was already time to move again. She’s starting an internship back in Ithaca and has to fly out the morning of New Years Day. Drew and Arienne, two friends that graduated from school last year, are helping to make our holiday in Denver a little less foreign. They’ve made their home in Lakewood, twenty minutes outside the city, and they take us in without question. They see in us some of the same spirit of adventure that brought them to Colorado just three months ago.
They’ve made their home where they happen to be, surrounding themselves with the familiar. A painting by Drew’s sister hangs above the fireplace next to the nose of his surfboard with the sandy wax still clinging to memories of last summer. A Christmas tree and cards from family are propped neatly upright and open on the table next to their couch – all tools easing the transition from one place to another, keeping an open connection until the local becomes their own.
Drew has heard of a nearby event with entertainment and an open bar. Ashley and I are sold with extravagant images of a New Year’s gala we arrive early in the night. We all exchange uncomfortable looks when we should be smiling for the photographer at the door. We wonder if we’re out of our league when the next couple enters sporting a suit and evening gown. I have on jeans and a collared shirt.
The room is a well-decorated, tiered dinner theatre under a high ceiling. But the performers are disappointing and the room stays mostly empty late into the night. Only the two comedians, who get laughed off stage, are worse than the musicians.
All along I’m lamenting the abundance of elderly in attendance. I get bolder with my volume until finally I’m chastised with some loud shhh’s to lower my voice from Drew and Arienne. Grinning, they point to the two senior citizens across the row from us. Things are getting dull before Drew is tapped on the shoulder. Some familiar faces arrive, fellow employees from his ski shop who are under the age of forty-five.
The saving grace of the evening is a long-haired karate master, who when he first emerges, we can’t definitively provide for his sex. Alone on stage, armed with various weapons and flowing blond hair, he at least performs his routine with some passion, probably envisioning enemies approaching a la the Matrix. Most of his segments are capped with an extravagant, leaping split. Each successive landing invokes cringes among the men but inspires furious applause that conveniently stifles the giggles evoked from the seriousness etched on the performer’s face.
Regardless of the strange circumstances, I’m glad to be holding Ashley when we count down the seconds. I’m reminded that sometimes, as bad as my skills are, I even enjoy dancing. Confetti drops and we cheers to the next three hundred and sixty five days before locking in a New Years kiss that we’ve never had through our two year relationship. Hugs are exchanged and the dancing begins with renewed energy.
Everything is beautiful until we pile into the backseat for our ride home. Only then does it set in that five hours from now, Ashley and I will separate at the airport. The conversation evaporates into a silent, brooding sadness of our impending separation. After Ashley lifts off towards Ithaca early this morning, I take the tired and hangover ridden drive back out to the mountains.
On my first days out I had been hellbent on introducing myself to everyone I could meet on the ski lift rides. I like getting little seven-minute peeks of who the people around me were and why they ended up on a mountain with heavy equipment strapped to their feet. I think about Edward Norton on the airplane in Fight Club and his “single serving friends.”
Riding by up alone seems like a waste because the lift is a perfect place for conversation. Two girls from Boulder were talking about a roommate who was causing trouble and promised me they weren’t bitches. What better place though for confessions of grievances? On the lift, people often mention where they’re from, assuming they’ll be alien and unfamiliar. One couple is from Potomac, Maryland.
Before they turn away, I smile and say that I’m from practically down the street. It’s funny to gauge peoples’ reactions: One will almost fly out of their seat, joyfully indulging in our shared background; the next will wish they hadn’t spoken, disinterested in someone that isn’t more exotic. I often consider lying.
While I love hearing about different places when I travel, I don’t mind being around someone who’s taken nearly the same path. Hearing their story usually gave mine more clarity; I wasn’t just vacationing or taking the day off from work. I liked to tell them mine was an adventure full of uncertainty. Maybe if I was lucky they’d let me sleep on their couch. I typically tell them I’d like to return and ski for a while or after graduating I’d like to settle in Denver. Then again, maybe all those words are just like going to the grocery store hungry; once I get my fill of fun in the snow it’s possible my reasons will ring hollow.
This morning I’m just not in the mood as my mind lingers on Ashley’s departure. I try not to eavesdrop, but it’s not easy to tune out a conversation from a foot away. Most of the time if you’re riding solo and join a couple on the lift they’ll either invite you into conversation or give a polite hello and get on with their lives. I’m caught somewhere in between, uninvited but still sitting within earshot huddled up against the corner of the chair lift.
I just don’t know what to do… Her mother’s been on life support for eighteen months. At some point you just have to accept what is happening and not let it control your life and your emotions. At some point you just have to let go. I don’t know how to suggest that to my friend and that if she were in the same position she’d want a friend to do the same. What can you do except suggest mentally switching places with the sick person?
Without turning her head the woman aims her voice at me. What do you think?
I snap back from disconnectedly staring down at the passing snow.
Uhhh, I don’t know, I guess you’re right?
I can’t believe she’s asked for my thoughts, but she lets me off the hook as she looks at me and smiles.
You go skiing right?
Before I answer I reflect for just a second.
Yeah. You let go, and then you go skiing.
It reminds me of Raymond Carver’s story, “The Bath,” where the mother of a son, who has slipped into a coma, meets a random family in the waiting room of the hospital. Without any real cause she tells the whole day’s story, why she’s in the hospital and what happened to her son. Despair and uncertainty bring an impulse to share our experience with whoever we can.
In this place so distanced from a home, we find ourselves in isolated situations where it can be a relief to unload experience on people we’ll probably never see again. It’s as comforting as visiting a therapist who you know will keep your secrets safe. Instead of professional security you get the spongy ears of the mountain.
In the first days of traveling, my brain is occupied by overindulgence in the new. But after a couple days, when the escape starts to feel normal, I start to miss little conveniences. I feel disconnected without the internet which is such an integral attachment to the world for me at school. Some of the things, news about soccer and access to fresh music provide stability. It’s a habit that soothes me. I twitch at the thought of an overflowing email inbox.
When traveling, it’s necessary to strike a balance between keeping certain things we know close while at the same time casting off securities that come with regularity. Maybe that’s one of the beauties of moving and traveling: the chance to exercise the human capacity for new experience and drift from daily assurances. Creating that space makes it possible to recognize where we’ve been, and what it is we want to hold on to from each particular place we visit. We discover what we want to make our own.
Over the phone I find myself telling people that after going to the store I’m returning home, and then I clarify – to Copper. Is home really just where we park ourselves at night? I don’t think so, but it is so easy for me to attach quickly to this place I’ve been before, where there are familiar friends that are comfortable in the same place together. We’re all distanced from our normal lives, so we form that protective unit ourselves. We keep familiarity of where we come from through conversation and shared memories.
Monday, June 4, 2007
Democratice Debate - 6/03
It was encouraging to witness a field of strong candidates on stage last night in New Hampshire and presents democratic and independent voters with a significant dilemma, albeit not necessarily an unwanted one, in determining a strong presidential candidate. Outside of the big three, I was fairly unfamiliar with where the other candidates were coming from and how they lined up against Clinton, Obama and Edwards.
Edwards seemed determined as the in house antagonist, frequently trying to expose shortcomings in the judgment of his colleagues on stage and we never learned a whole lot more about his plan for the presidency but more why the others shouldn't be nominated. Outside of strong performances from Obama, who was elegant and firm, and Clinton, although she was at times unconvincing when staving off allegations of poor leadership and misinformation on the war, Joe Biden showed impressively.
From a democratic who has taken what is at the time a particularly unique position for his party on voting FOR war funding, he was strong in defending his policy choices as well as unwilling to alienate himself from the other candidates by criticizing their particular choices.
In fact, the relative unity throughout the party appears as a good selling point. Still, I'm struck by how little attention Biden received despite being the loudest and honest one on stage. I suppose without the celebrity spotlight you're doomed to also ran in this election. The way Clinton positioned her arguments it appears she is bunkering down with her lead in the polls and the Democratic nomination may be hers to lose.
Edwards seemed determined as the in house antagonist, frequently trying to expose shortcomings in the judgment of his colleagues on stage and we never learned a whole lot more about his plan for the presidency but more why the others shouldn't be nominated. Outside of strong performances from Obama, who was elegant and firm, and Clinton, although she was at times unconvincing when staving off allegations of poor leadership and misinformation on the war, Joe Biden showed impressively.
From a democratic who has taken what is at the time a particularly unique position for his party on voting FOR war funding, he was strong in defending his policy choices as well as unwilling to alienate himself from the other candidates by criticizing their particular choices.
We hear people telling everybody, "Just stop the war, Congress." We have 50 votes. We're busting our neck every single day. So I respect them. But look, I cannot, as long as there is a single troop in Iraq that I know if I take action by funding them, I increase the prospect they'll live or not be injured, I cannot and will not vote no to fund them.
In fact, the relative unity throughout the party appears as a good selling point. Still, I'm struck by how little attention Biden received despite being the loudest and honest one on stage. I suppose without the celebrity spotlight you're doomed to also ran in this election. The way Clinton positioned her arguments it appears she is bunkering down with her lead in the polls and the Democratic nomination may be hers to lose.
Sunday, June 3, 2007
Travelin' Light - Part III
** If you want to read this whole piece from the beginning, check out previous post listings in May and start at Senior Project
We wake up with the sun creeping in the window of Jeff’s hotel room; it naturally illuminates the space and pries open our eyes. The first thing we do is squint against the cold glass and debate whether the lights on my car are still futilely shining. We couldn’t get them to turn off last night despite flipping every switch in the thing. After some back and forth we decide that yes, miraculously, my car battery is not dead. With buoyed spirits, we hurry our few belongings back out of the room we entered less than twelve hours ago. It finally feels like we’ve arrived in Colorado.
The car starts without an issue. We give a short goodbye and thanks to Jeff with promises of returning soon. He’s moving into his new apartment today, alone, in downtown Denver. After graduating early from Western State College in December, he landed a job at a local accounting firm and is the first of my close friends to step out into the world. I’m still at least partially under my parents’ financial wings; without them I wouldn’t be able to make this journey. It all seemed a little far-fetched that Jeff would be working a nine to five though he looks comfortably ready for professionalism in his button down and neatly cropped hair.
He can be a little terse, and is often closed – so much that I often forget the dedicated artist and guitar player behind the mathematical mind. Later in the trip I would stumble on his sketchbook that holds nearly a hundred pieces of work. His friends have requested the tattoos for their own body, mostly from the array of tribal looking images that are Jeff’s favorite. It’s strange seeing him out of the backdrop of his home and his parents and his dog Raider, who I’d watched pass an entire lifetime.
In a couple of days, on January 2nd, Jeff begins what people around me keep calling real life. He says he’ll probably be too busy to snowboard, since the crunch on accounting starts now and extends through April; he’ll be working six day weeks until then. I cringe at the thought and pull out of the parking lot with my own youthful dreams of carefree skiing intact.
It feels like Ashley and I are escaping Denver. The grocery store was ransacked last night with the threat of another storm bearing down on the area. Reports suggested the weather would worsen throughout the day. As we start our drive into the mountains I imagine a snowstorm nipping at our heels, but just into the foothills I stop having to conjure up an image as snow begins dotting the windshield. It’s the first of our trip. By the time we pass Idaho Springs, about halfway between Denver and Dillon, we’re slowed to half the speed limit. Trucks start to stall on the stop-and-go climb.
After coming to a halt on an incline, we stare at the back of a semi like it’s the cart in front of us on a roller coaster. I wonder what’s inside as its tires spin vainly. It inches backwards towards the nose of my car and Ashley squirms when I whip just past the back corner. Not long after, a car coming in the opposite direction fishtails once before plowing into the median packed with snow. We ponder how the young woman inside is going to escape her car with drifts piled up against the edges of her windows. Heavier traffic in our direction might have been a blessing, forcing people into a little more caution on the tightly packed two-lane road.
There are still cars lodged in the shoulder, like bricks lain by a mortar of snow, from the past storm with orange ties around their antennas. The Eisenhower Tunnel is a welcome beacon of hope because the weather isn’t improving. It’s a sign that at least we’re not far from Summit County, home to several of the countries most vaunted ski resorts. The mouth of the tunnel splits Loveland Ski Area in half. As we burrow through our last physical barrier, I’m less worried about my white knuckles wrapped around the steering wheel than whether we can get on the slopes today.
We arrive at Copper Mountain too late. Most people are off the slopes by three in the afternoon, ignoring the temptation offered by another hour of turns. Everyone makes an effort to beat traffic but no one really succeeds. Ashley and I have a different, but equally frustrating issue. We’re stuck in the homeowner’s office of Mountain Plaza, the site of Natrisha’s condo at Copper’s base, trying to get the attention of distracted employees who are ruing their desks and wistfully peering out the window at the falling snow.
We’re slowly explaining to them that we’d like to move into Natrisha’s condo, although she won’t arrive until tomorrow. After a brief attempt at accommodation, they apologize for being full and send us away before returning to their cubicles where skis are propped against the wall instead of playfully sliding across nature’s playground. I don’t feel bad for them because we’re homeless again.
Summit County, Colorado, is not a good place to be without a reserved bed during the holidays. There’s simply nothing available. Flakes fall heavily as we bounce around from Frisco to Dillon and then to Silverthorne, from one no-vacancy sign to the next.
Teddy, a former soccer teammate at Ithaca, says he can give us a place in Winter Park, but that option just went from unappealing because of the weather, to impossible. Just an hour or so after we emerged from the tunnel, a rash of accidents forced police to close I-70 Eastbound. Even if we wanted to get to Winter Park, it would be hours before traffic moved.
A little more desperate, we continue our quest for a bed. We’ve resorted to asking places that claim unavailability and it finally it pays off. Ashley exits the lobby of the Luxury Inn with a look of unfortunate satisfaction. The room’s going to cost us $140, but at least we won’t have to sleep in the car, which is what a real ski bum might do. I hesitantly shell out the money.
The room isn’t luxurious, like the establishment’s name might suggest, and it reeks of smoke. We get our first encounter with the diversity of the area – the staff barely speaks English. We want to open the window to clear the rank smell, but it’s entirely too cold. Choking down the air, we dump our belongings into the room and quickly break for some food. We haven’t eaten at all today. My car lights still won’t turn off and we’re waiting for it to sputter instead of start.
A stagnant millipede of cars snakes down the hill from the direction of Copper and Vail and spills over into the streets of Dillon. People are asleep behind the wheel in parking lots. We see one man make a dead sprint for the liquor store, abandoning his Jeep in the standstill on the interstate about a mile away.
Famished, we choose a Chinese buffet more for the quantity than the quality. We watch a young girl argue as only a child can, convincing her embarrassed mother to scratch the child from the bill because she doesn’t like anything they offer. I feel bad for the waitress, a good-looking woman with an accent that I can’t particularly pinpoint, but drips Eastern European.
Most of the people eating are stranded by the closed road. The pair across from us kills time by piling so much food on their plate it looks like an eating competition. They’re locals, a character type I’ll confront often and will be conflicted by in the coming weeks when I’m mistaken for one. They’re such a distinct persona I could pick them almost perfectly out of a lineup by the end of my stay.
I know where to go now if I’m stranded without a room again. Ashley and I speak to another couple during happy hour at the Dillon Dam Brewery who, like us, are in limbo. Their flight for the next day has already been canceled. After our parting, they return a few minutes later.
Misunderstanding that we had actually found a room down the road, they offer: Here’s my cell phone number, and Matt’s too. If you can’t find someplace to stay, we’re staying at my parent’s house up the road near Keystone. There’s plenty of room, so give us a call later if you want, we really wouldn’t mind if you stayed with us.
I’m more than surprised with their hospitality and extension of friendship. It isn’t an empty offer – maybe even hopeful for a phone call. One traveler offering their place to another didn’t seem uncommon, but it was unexpected from strangers we had just met. Matt is a freelance writer and recently moved to Portland, Oregon where he is trying to break into several publications after abandoning scholarship halfway through his Ph.D. in history. We share dissatisfaction with the opportunities for writers, and an interest in taking up public relations to put some money in the bank.
Maybe it’s the small connection of writing that led them to invite us back to their home. Maybe they are serial killers. But more and more I think it’s just a unique understanding, and an interest in delving into unknown experience, into knowing people and uncovering beauty through the unseen. They moved to Oregon without direction, without jobs; they knew the place was where they wanted to be. Ashley and I came to Colorado because this is where we wanted to spend the New Year together. Place brought us all together at this moment in time.
Inexplicably, I couldn’t see this same gesture being extended in many places on the East Coast. In fact, I probably wouldn’t feel comfortable accepting the invitation there. But there was a sense of security in the mutual unknown. The two were warm to us, and if we could have gone to the hotel and taken back our money back, we would have.
The next morning we head back to Copper, making the fifteen minute drive west on I-70 that takes us around a bend and spits us out the last exit before the road winds up through Vail Pass. I already had my season pass, so I picked up a discounted day ticket for Ashley. Natrisha and company, who have entry to the condo, aren’t in yet and won’t arrive until later this afternoon. We suit up in the free parking lot for our first day of skiing, a pleasantly active reward after three days of driving and restlessly searching for a bed.
In our moment of triumph after parking the car, with the mountain in full view, I have a moment of dread. I realize that overnight I broke a rule in the code of skiing. I left my boots in the car. So here we are, excited to make our first turns and I’m having a battle of epic proportions in the parking lot trying to put on my right boot. After several minutes of noisy struggle, and only after I think I’m going to sever my foot off at the ankle with icy plastic, I hurl my boot against the ground with tears in my eyes. Disappointed, I pathetically resign that I won’t ski today. Only then do I think about turning the car back on and blasting the heat.
By the time my boots thaw enough for me to force my cringing feet into them, most of the parking lot is only abandoned cars. Most people have taken the shuttle over to the main lodge and started their day. I never want to listen to Oasis again. Between the arduous drive through the mountains that had us too focused to reach back and grab a new CD to the monumental struggle with the ski boot supplemented by whiny British voices, it was enough to consider snapping the CD in half.
It’s the first day of skiing this year for both of us, so we take the morning pretty easy, cruising comfortably around familiar parts of the mountain. It’s like visiting a city you’ve been through so many times, but you still stop by some of the same sites, if not to show someone around, then just to get your bearings right before you explore the unknown. Ashley likes Oh No and I ski nearby and watch her yellow jacket steering confidently through the run’s winding turns and regular tilt without any moguls.
Not too long into the day we’re starving. After a few hours of skiing, our continental breakfast seems distant. Skiing only looks effortless. The famished feeling at four o'clock after a full day on the slopes is unmatched but staying hydrated is the biggest challenge. In the cold you hardly notice the pouring sweat and the loss of water underneath the layers keeping you warm. The effects set in at the après-ski, when two beers deep you decide it’s best to retire for a nap and stagger lightheaded back to bed.
The price of a lift ticket is disturbing until you wander into any of the mountain’s cafeterias. First, you’re blown into stunned gaping, and then you’re appalled. After picking my jaw up off the ground I weigh the consequences of eating hot dogs and Taco Bell for the rest of my trip in fear of not being able to pay my credit card bill at the end of the month. A slice of pizza for $4.50. A cheeseburger for almost $8. It makes an honest man want to steal as much as possible.
But out of options and sucked into the tourist trap, we close our eyes and hold out a ten dollar bill at the cashier, hoping for good news. All we get in return is a couple of coins. Solemnly we head out to the deck to slowly savor our fries and single slice of pizza under the warm gaze of the Colorado sun as it ebbs behind the ridge where the American Eagle lift disappears from sight.
We glance up at the screened in porch of Natrisha’s condo, visible from near the lifts and see some ski boots set outside. Friends have arrived and we decide to join them. While we’re cutting the day a little bit short, we’re satisfied with our efforts. Our legs are feeling a little shaky after not working them for weeks and then shocking them for a few intense hours. The lack of oxygen available at nine thousand feet is getting to us a little. Panting under the warmth of our winter clothes we tromp into the elevator. We both stare at the glowing number four in silent exhaustion.
I make wordless noise walking as fast as my stiff boots will allow. I get a return shout from inside the room. Pushing open the door that was already ajar, I find exactly what I expected. Two shirtless dudes lounging on separate couches, hat hair still shooting in all directions and long underwear exposed from the top of their unbuttoned ski pants. They’re the first of a party of six – some of us have been meeting annually at Copper in the same condo for five years.
I’ve known Brad since childhood but haven’t seen him since the summer. We’ve been in and out of each other’s lives since playing on our first soccer team at five years old. While he traveled the world with his family, who accepted foreign assignments for Exxon Mobil, I was jealously stuck in Fairfax, Virginia. He loves to travel more than anyone I know, falling prey to its seduction at a young age. He’s been to six continents now with his girlfriend who he’s dated for less than a year.
Last year, his curiosity got the best of him and he asked to meet us in Colorado despite limited skiing experience – just two days of my teaching at a little hill in Southern Pennsylvania. I geared him up at the ski shop where I worked and he hasn’t turned back since, or turned on the slope for that matter, preferring an approach reminiscent of a missile.
Mark, who’s situated on the other couch, was an acquaintance through high school and became a closer friend when the trips to Copper Mountain began. He’s not the first person brought into my life by skiing. He’s a member of the race team at the University of Virginia – yes, a ski race team south of the Mason-Dixon Line. Of our whole crew, he’s the one most likely to get drunk and do something stupid.
We get a surprise when a guy named Casey pushes through the open door. He introduces himself as a friend of Natrisha’s, but we don’t know who he is, or quite what to say. We don’t bar the door, but I’m sure our first impression wasn’t the best. It’s probably difficult to walk into a room of established friends by yourself and go for it cold, but if there’s ever a door you’d want to walk through, it’s probably the one that leads to our room. He promptly receives the title of “new guy” after disappearing to unpack. Within minutes, Ashley casually asks if she could borrow his shoes. After complying without much hesitation, he was in.
We recover all our belongings from the car, liberating it from the cold and making ourselves a temporary home base. We’ve slept in five different beds over the course of a week and I’m happy to familiarize with this one for a couple days. Ashley collapses her short frame onto the bed while the rest of the crew trickles into the condo, each greeted with the same round of smiles and hugs, like a separated family reuniting in their old home.
When Natrisha arrives, her first concern is that her missing purse that’s disappeared sometime between checking in down the street and getting to the room.
We scour the room and take turns assuring her it’s around; there was nothing that could have happened to it. No one would steal your purse here, everyone is already rich.
We agree there’s not much incentive for those that are wealthy enough to ski here; they’re in a position to return a purse to you. We soon find it hanging off the nose of a snowboard on our own porch.
We crack open the owner’s closet and extricate some bottles of liquor. The catch up is on but blurred by everybody’s travel weariness. Most of the house crashes early after talking up a big night of partying. About half the house is stuck without luggage, lost in movement from airport to airport because Denver is still in disarray from the effect of two monster storms. Sarah would wear borrowed clothes for the next couple days. There still weren’t eggs or bread in the grocery store, so our rations include mostly hot dogs, peanut butter and jelly and the little loaf of bread we have left.
In the morning, after a skimpy breakfast and a couple warm up runs, we discover some higher power has spited our naiveté from the day before. Both Brad and Mark’s skis were stolen overnight. We all feel a twinge of sympathy and share the misfortune that it had to happen to them and not someone else. I can’t even voice my thoughts: they were idiotic for leaving their skis outside and unlocked all night.
There are certain levels of trust that probably can’t be reached in a small area with a mostly transient population. As many honest people as there are, there are at least a few looking to abuse that honesty. It would take about three minutes for someone to get in and out of the base area where there are hundreds of skis. That’s how long it probably took for theirs to disappear. The silver lining for Mark was that they were his older pair, beat up and on their last legs – he had brought another set with him.
Brad didn’t have the same fortune. He was a newcomer to the sport and had just been outfitted last year. It was a fairly hefty investment that just vanished. He was disenchanted, his face twisted in a mixture of disbelief and anger. Skiing on rentals the rest of the week wasn’t as fun and it took a while before a smile would reappear on his scruffy, unshaved face. The adrenaline rush and the purity of skiing had lost its innocence. The free spirited nature of the mountain vanished in a flash.
We wake up with the sun creeping in the window of Jeff’s hotel room; it naturally illuminates the space and pries open our eyes. The first thing we do is squint against the cold glass and debate whether the lights on my car are still futilely shining. We couldn’t get them to turn off last night despite flipping every switch in the thing. After some back and forth we decide that yes, miraculously, my car battery is not dead. With buoyed spirits, we hurry our few belongings back out of the room we entered less than twelve hours ago. It finally feels like we’ve arrived in Colorado.
The car starts without an issue. We give a short goodbye and thanks to Jeff with promises of returning soon. He’s moving into his new apartment today, alone, in downtown Denver. After graduating early from Western State College in December, he landed a job at a local accounting firm and is the first of my close friends to step out into the world. I’m still at least partially under my parents’ financial wings; without them I wouldn’t be able to make this journey. It all seemed a little far-fetched that Jeff would be working a nine to five though he looks comfortably ready for professionalism in his button down and neatly cropped hair.
He can be a little terse, and is often closed – so much that I often forget the dedicated artist and guitar player behind the mathematical mind. Later in the trip I would stumble on his sketchbook that holds nearly a hundred pieces of work. His friends have requested the tattoos for their own body, mostly from the array of tribal looking images that are Jeff’s favorite. It’s strange seeing him out of the backdrop of his home and his parents and his dog Raider, who I’d watched pass an entire lifetime.
In a couple of days, on January 2nd, Jeff begins what people around me keep calling real life. He says he’ll probably be too busy to snowboard, since the crunch on accounting starts now and extends through April; he’ll be working six day weeks until then. I cringe at the thought and pull out of the parking lot with my own youthful dreams of carefree skiing intact.
It feels like Ashley and I are escaping Denver. The grocery store was ransacked last night with the threat of another storm bearing down on the area. Reports suggested the weather would worsen throughout the day. As we start our drive into the mountains I imagine a snowstorm nipping at our heels, but just into the foothills I stop having to conjure up an image as snow begins dotting the windshield. It’s the first of our trip. By the time we pass Idaho Springs, about halfway between Denver and Dillon, we’re slowed to half the speed limit. Trucks start to stall on the stop-and-go climb.
After coming to a halt on an incline, we stare at the back of a semi like it’s the cart in front of us on a roller coaster. I wonder what’s inside as its tires spin vainly. It inches backwards towards the nose of my car and Ashley squirms when I whip just past the back corner. Not long after, a car coming in the opposite direction fishtails once before plowing into the median packed with snow. We ponder how the young woman inside is going to escape her car with drifts piled up against the edges of her windows. Heavier traffic in our direction might have been a blessing, forcing people into a little more caution on the tightly packed two-lane road.
There are still cars lodged in the shoulder, like bricks lain by a mortar of snow, from the past storm with orange ties around their antennas. The Eisenhower Tunnel is a welcome beacon of hope because the weather isn’t improving. It’s a sign that at least we’re not far from Summit County, home to several of the countries most vaunted ski resorts. The mouth of the tunnel splits Loveland Ski Area in half. As we burrow through our last physical barrier, I’m less worried about my white knuckles wrapped around the steering wheel than whether we can get on the slopes today.
We arrive at Copper Mountain too late. Most people are off the slopes by three in the afternoon, ignoring the temptation offered by another hour of turns. Everyone makes an effort to beat traffic but no one really succeeds. Ashley and I have a different, but equally frustrating issue. We’re stuck in the homeowner’s office of Mountain Plaza, the site of Natrisha’s condo at Copper’s base, trying to get the attention of distracted employees who are ruing their desks and wistfully peering out the window at the falling snow.
We’re slowly explaining to them that we’d like to move into Natrisha’s condo, although she won’t arrive until tomorrow. After a brief attempt at accommodation, they apologize for being full and send us away before returning to their cubicles where skis are propped against the wall instead of playfully sliding across nature’s playground. I don’t feel bad for them because we’re homeless again.
Summit County, Colorado, is not a good place to be without a reserved bed during the holidays. There’s simply nothing available. Flakes fall heavily as we bounce around from Frisco to Dillon and then to Silverthorne, from one no-vacancy sign to the next.
Teddy, a former soccer teammate at Ithaca, says he can give us a place in Winter Park, but that option just went from unappealing because of the weather, to impossible. Just an hour or so after we emerged from the tunnel, a rash of accidents forced police to close I-70 Eastbound. Even if we wanted to get to Winter Park, it would be hours before traffic moved.
A little more desperate, we continue our quest for a bed. We’ve resorted to asking places that claim unavailability and it finally it pays off. Ashley exits the lobby of the Luxury Inn with a look of unfortunate satisfaction. The room’s going to cost us $140, but at least we won’t have to sleep in the car, which is what a real ski bum might do. I hesitantly shell out the money.
The room isn’t luxurious, like the establishment’s name might suggest, and it reeks of smoke. We get our first encounter with the diversity of the area – the staff barely speaks English. We want to open the window to clear the rank smell, but it’s entirely too cold. Choking down the air, we dump our belongings into the room and quickly break for some food. We haven’t eaten at all today. My car lights still won’t turn off and we’re waiting for it to sputter instead of start.
A stagnant millipede of cars snakes down the hill from the direction of Copper and Vail and spills over into the streets of Dillon. People are asleep behind the wheel in parking lots. We see one man make a dead sprint for the liquor store, abandoning his Jeep in the standstill on the interstate about a mile away.
Famished, we choose a Chinese buffet more for the quantity than the quality. We watch a young girl argue as only a child can, convincing her embarrassed mother to scratch the child from the bill because she doesn’t like anything they offer. I feel bad for the waitress, a good-looking woman with an accent that I can’t particularly pinpoint, but drips Eastern European.
Most of the people eating are stranded by the closed road. The pair across from us kills time by piling so much food on their plate it looks like an eating competition. They’re locals, a character type I’ll confront often and will be conflicted by in the coming weeks when I’m mistaken for one. They’re such a distinct persona I could pick them almost perfectly out of a lineup by the end of my stay.
I know where to go now if I’m stranded without a room again. Ashley and I speak to another couple during happy hour at the Dillon Dam Brewery who, like us, are in limbo. Their flight for the next day has already been canceled. After our parting, they return a few minutes later.
Misunderstanding that we had actually found a room down the road, they offer: Here’s my cell phone number, and Matt’s too. If you can’t find someplace to stay, we’re staying at my parent’s house up the road near Keystone. There’s plenty of room, so give us a call later if you want, we really wouldn’t mind if you stayed with us.
I’m more than surprised with their hospitality and extension of friendship. It isn’t an empty offer – maybe even hopeful for a phone call. One traveler offering their place to another didn’t seem uncommon, but it was unexpected from strangers we had just met. Matt is a freelance writer and recently moved to Portland, Oregon where he is trying to break into several publications after abandoning scholarship halfway through his Ph.D. in history. We share dissatisfaction with the opportunities for writers, and an interest in taking up public relations to put some money in the bank.
Maybe it’s the small connection of writing that led them to invite us back to their home. Maybe they are serial killers. But more and more I think it’s just a unique understanding, and an interest in delving into unknown experience, into knowing people and uncovering beauty through the unseen. They moved to Oregon without direction, without jobs; they knew the place was where they wanted to be. Ashley and I came to Colorado because this is where we wanted to spend the New Year together. Place brought us all together at this moment in time.
Inexplicably, I couldn’t see this same gesture being extended in many places on the East Coast. In fact, I probably wouldn’t feel comfortable accepting the invitation there. But there was a sense of security in the mutual unknown. The two were warm to us, and if we could have gone to the hotel and taken back our money back, we would have.
The next morning we head back to Copper, making the fifteen minute drive west on I-70 that takes us around a bend and spits us out the last exit before the road winds up through Vail Pass. I already had my season pass, so I picked up a discounted day ticket for Ashley. Natrisha and company, who have entry to the condo, aren’t in yet and won’t arrive until later this afternoon. We suit up in the free parking lot for our first day of skiing, a pleasantly active reward after three days of driving and restlessly searching for a bed.
In our moment of triumph after parking the car, with the mountain in full view, I have a moment of dread. I realize that overnight I broke a rule in the code of skiing. I left my boots in the car. So here we are, excited to make our first turns and I’m having a battle of epic proportions in the parking lot trying to put on my right boot. After several minutes of noisy struggle, and only after I think I’m going to sever my foot off at the ankle with icy plastic, I hurl my boot against the ground with tears in my eyes. Disappointed, I pathetically resign that I won’t ski today. Only then do I think about turning the car back on and blasting the heat.
By the time my boots thaw enough for me to force my cringing feet into them, most of the parking lot is only abandoned cars. Most people have taken the shuttle over to the main lodge and started their day. I never want to listen to Oasis again. Between the arduous drive through the mountains that had us too focused to reach back and grab a new CD to the monumental struggle with the ski boot supplemented by whiny British voices, it was enough to consider snapping the CD in half.
Nobody ever, mentions the weather can make or break your day,
nobody ever, seems to remember, life is a game we play.
It’s the first day of skiing this year for both of us, so we take the morning pretty easy, cruising comfortably around familiar parts of the mountain. It’s like visiting a city you’ve been through so many times, but you still stop by some of the same sites, if not to show someone around, then just to get your bearings right before you explore the unknown. Ashley likes Oh No and I ski nearby and watch her yellow jacket steering confidently through the run’s winding turns and regular tilt without any moguls.
Not too long into the day we’re starving. After a few hours of skiing, our continental breakfast seems distant. Skiing only looks effortless. The famished feeling at four o'clock after a full day on the slopes is unmatched but staying hydrated is the biggest challenge. In the cold you hardly notice the pouring sweat and the loss of water underneath the layers keeping you warm. The effects set in at the après-ski, when two beers deep you decide it’s best to retire for a nap and stagger lightheaded back to bed.
The price of a lift ticket is disturbing until you wander into any of the mountain’s cafeterias. First, you’re blown into stunned gaping, and then you’re appalled. After picking my jaw up off the ground I weigh the consequences of eating hot dogs and Taco Bell for the rest of my trip in fear of not being able to pay my credit card bill at the end of the month. A slice of pizza for $4.50. A cheeseburger for almost $8. It makes an honest man want to steal as much as possible.
But out of options and sucked into the tourist trap, we close our eyes and hold out a ten dollar bill at the cashier, hoping for good news. All we get in return is a couple of coins. Solemnly we head out to the deck to slowly savor our fries and single slice of pizza under the warm gaze of the Colorado sun as it ebbs behind the ridge where the American Eagle lift disappears from sight.
We glance up at the screened in porch of Natrisha’s condo, visible from near the lifts and see some ski boots set outside. Friends have arrived and we decide to join them. While we’re cutting the day a little bit short, we’re satisfied with our efforts. Our legs are feeling a little shaky after not working them for weeks and then shocking them for a few intense hours. The lack of oxygen available at nine thousand feet is getting to us a little. Panting under the warmth of our winter clothes we tromp into the elevator. We both stare at the glowing number four in silent exhaustion.
I make wordless noise walking as fast as my stiff boots will allow. I get a return shout from inside the room. Pushing open the door that was already ajar, I find exactly what I expected. Two shirtless dudes lounging on separate couches, hat hair still shooting in all directions and long underwear exposed from the top of their unbuttoned ski pants. They’re the first of a party of six – some of us have been meeting annually at Copper in the same condo for five years.
I’ve known Brad since childhood but haven’t seen him since the summer. We’ve been in and out of each other’s lives since playing on our first soccer team at five years old. While he traveled the world with his family, who accepted foreign assignments for Exxon Mobil, I was jealously stuck in Fairfax, Virginia. He loves to travel more than anyone I know, falling prey to its seduction at a young age. He’s been to six continents now with his girlfriend who he’s dated for less than a year.
Last year, his curiosity got the best of him and he asked to meet us in Colorado despite limited skiing experience – just two days of my teaching at a little hill in Southern Pennsylvania. I geared him up at the ski shop where I worked and he hasn’t turned back since, or turned on the slope for that matter, preferring an approach reminiscent of a missile.
Mark, who’s situated on the other couch, was an acquaintance through high school and became a closer friend when the trips to Copper Mountain began. He’s not the first person brought into my life by skiing. He’s a member of the race team at the University of Virginia – yes, a ski race team south of the Mason-Dixon Line. Of our whole crew, he’s the one most likely to get drunk and do something stupid.
We get a surprise when a guy named Casey pushes through the open door. He introduces himself as a friend of Natrisha’s, but we don’t know who he is, or quite what to say. We don’t bar the door, but I’m sure our first impression wasn’t the best. It’s probably difficult to walk into a room of established friends by yourself and go for it cold, but if there’s ever a door you’d want to walk through, it’s probably the one that leads to our room. He promptly receives the title of “new guy” after disappearing to unpack. Within minutes, Ashley casually asks if she could borrow his shoes. After complying without much hesitation, he was in.
We recover all our belongings from the car, liberating it from the cold and making ourselves a temporary home base. We’ve slept in five different beds over the course of a week and I’m happy to familiarize with this one for a couple days. Ashley collapses her short frame onto the bed while the rest of the crew trickles into the condo, each greeted with the same round of smiles and hugs, like a separated family reuniting in their old home.
When Natrisha arrives, her first concern is that her missing purse that’s disappeared sometime between checking in down the street and getting to the room.
We scour the room and take turns assuring her it’s around; there was nothing that could have happened to it. No one would steal your purse here, everyone is already rich.
We agree there’s not much incentive for those that are wealthy enough to ski here; they’re in a position to return a purse to you. We soon find it hanging off the nose of a snowboard on our own porch.
We crack open the owner’s closet and extricate some bottles of liquor. The catch up is on but blurred by everybody’s travel weariness. Most of the house crashes early after talking up a big night of partying. About half the house is stuck without luggage, lost in movement from airport to airport because Denver is still in disarray from the effect of two monster storms. Sarah would wear borrowed clothes for the next couple days. There still weren’t eggs or bread in the grocery store, so our rations include mostly hot dogs, peanut butter and jelly and the little loaf of bread we have left.
In the morning, after a skimpy breakfast and a couple warm up runs, we discover some higher power has spited our naiveté from the day before. Both Brad and Mark’s skis were stolen overnight. We all feel a twinge of sympathy and share the misfortune that it had to happen to them and not someone else. I can’t even voice my thoughts: they were idiotic for leaving their skis outside and unlocked all night.
There are certain levels of trust that probably can’t be reached in a small area with a mostly transient population. As many honest people as there are, there are at least a few looking to abuse that honesty. It would take about three minutes for someone to get in and out of the base area where there are hundreds of skis. That’s how long it probably took for theirs to disappear. The silver lining for Mark was that they were his older pair, beat up and on their last legs – he had brought another set with him.
Brad didn’t have the same fortune. He was a newcomer to the sport and had just been outfitted last year. It was a fairly hefty investment that just vanished. He was disenchanted, his face twisted in a mixture of disbelief and anger. Skiing on rentals the rest of the week wasn’t as fun and it took a while before a smile would reappear on his scruffy, unshaved face. The adrenaline rush and the purity of skiing had lost its innocence. The free spirited nature of the mountain vanished in a flash.
DC United @ LA Galaxy
I just wanted to make a few notes on the game last night. To me, the team in all its incarnations keeps fulfilling its definitive nature this year - frustrating. For those of you who maybe missed the first couple minutes, the game should have been well in the Galaxy's hand with a near miss by Donovan from outside the box and a sitter the Nate Jaqua put over from about six yards.
The formation Tommy Soehn put out there lasted about five minutes. Surviving their, mostly Brian Namoff's, initial woes, it turned to the offense for some slow moments. Moreno looked slower and slower every step and never really troubled the slapped together Galaxy defense. Emilio just hasn't been the Brazilian wonder we saw in his first couple matches. Fred looks sharp on the ball but unwilling to take on that last guy or pull the trigger near the box. Oh, and he missed a header from inside the six with no defenders to be seen.
That said I guess there are some positives that come out of the game
- A point away isn't bad because every one is looking more valuable given the congested standings right now.
- At least United doesn't wear a jersey with a bumper sticker on the front.
- Kpene needs to be on the field more often against teams that are slow in the back. He is fast.
A win against New York next week would be huge.
The formation Tommy Soehn put out there lasted about five minutes. Surviving their, mostly Brian Namoff's, initial woes, it turned to the offense for some slow moments. Moreno looked slower and slower every step and never really troubled the slapped together Galaxy defense. Emilio just hasn't been the Brazilian wonder we saw in his first couple matches. Fred looks sharp on the ball but unwilling to take on that last guy or pull the trigger near the box. Oh, and he missed a header from inside the six with no defenders to be seen.
That said I guess there are some positives that come out of the game
- A point away isn't bad because every one is looking more valuable given the congested standings right now.
- At least United doesn't wear a jersey with a bumper sticker on the front.
- Kpene needs to be on the field more often against teams that are slow in the back. He is fast.
A win against New York next week would be huge.
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