Don’t Harsh on My Thrill-Seeking Buzz But Keep Me Safe on the Slopes – Part 1

A  life-changing skiing hit and run made me think – how could we change safety conditions on mountains without messing with what we advanced skiers treasure most? Here’s part 1 of 3 of my blog. Thanks for reading!

You’re a silly goose, no you’re a silly goose, you and the little girl singsong, she protected between your skis pointed downhill in pizza not french fry. She slumps in your arms, boneless. Where is the bottom, she says. Not far, you tell her. No more lessons, just a few more lefts and rights. It’s time to get off the slope you tell yourself. Too many people zipping past like cars doing ninety in a school zone. 

Faster, says the little girl. Okay you say. You straighten your skis just enough to feel the cold air rush in the sides of your googles, stinging your eyes. Swish swish go your skis. You can’t remember life before booking down a slope, before countless hours running gates on mountains, before that beep beep beep and push push push out the starting gate, hips and knees directing quivering thighs to explode with velocity. Skipping lines because of your racing bib. Spitting Raisinets at the freestylers from the chair lift high above the tree line with the safety bar up. Peeling bleeding lips from cold ski poles. Fearless. Swish swish go your skis. The sound soothes you in the blackness of the night on the bright, white snow, stars glittering behind cloud wisps. 

The scream comes from the woods and then edges scraping ice toward you, failing to catch, like a cat clawing its way up a chalkboard. Before you can turn your head, the snowboard hits you like a plow. Your knees thrust forward, boots locked in bindings, the rest of you and the little girl hurtle backward. 

First your right knee pops, really more of a twang, like a piano string snapping, loud and off key. Then the other knee. Twang. Dissonant chord. Where’s the pain, you wonder. But even without it, you know this is bad. Get her off me, you yell, as kindly as you can so as not to scare the little girl. Help her. Is she okay? I’m not okay, you call out to the sky above, from your back on the snow to whoever might be listening. Create a perimeter. Undo my bindings. Call ski patrol. No more twangs. You cover your face, as skis swish swish by your head. Can’t you see me lying here, you shout, at other near misses. And then you realize you’re something to look away from. Roadkill. 

The little girl lifts off you and someone frees you from your skis and your knees unnatural bend. You sit up, legs now splayed, poles and skis strewn like flotsam. The boarder crouches down-slope next to her friend, clutching him, staring at you like you’re the girl in the horror movie who’s about to get ax murdered and you don’t want to watch but you can’t stop yourself. Excuse me, you say, not sure what else to say, but something should be said. The boarder takes off down the slope leaving her friend to apologize. I’m so sorry, he says and he waits for your permission to go and you don’t want to grant it. You want to say, what is wrong with you, can’t you see I can’t get up, and that girl you’re with, you really picked a winner. But it’s not in you to punish him and you can’t think fast enough to be mean. So you nod and as he turns downslope you wonder what they’ll talk about when he catches up with her. Another run honey or how about a beer? The little girl whimpers beside you. She’s shivering, tears like tracts. Take my hand. You scoot with her to the side of the hill, one knee bending as it should, the other knee non-compliant when your brain tells it to move. It still doesn’t hurt but you feel pressure building from the inside. You know it’s like a bomb went off but you’re not sure if it’s bones or tissue that have come apart.  You try not to think about it but all you can think about is I can’t move my leg, I can’t move my leg. 

I’m hurt but it’s going to be okay, you say to the little girl, squeezing her hand, even though you’re pretty sure this isn’t going to be okay. Don’t panic. She’s too scared. Or maybe it’s easier to think of her fear than your own.