The
Death Trap was looming! It was the perfect invitation
for a serious ski injury. The end of the
third and final day of skiing was inviting and perfect. The day beamed bright sunny skies, clear
visibility, little to no wind, finely groomed long runs, and few skiers on the
slopes to contend with.
Deer
Valley was beautiful! The heavens dumped almost 12
inches of new snow the week prior to our arrival, transforming Deer Valley into a freshly
carpeted panorama of pure white. The
trees strewn on the perimeter of the ski runs bared evidence of the fresh
deposits of snow, weighing down their branches with a velvety thick white cover. The snow contrasted sharply with the dark
branch undersides, leading to their imposing tree trunk origins, coursing
through the snow blanket, rooted firmly into the ground.
Still,
there was reason to be cautious. Even with
the newly painted terrain, the loose surface snow was surprisingly thin and would
be skied off by mid afternoon. This left
a hardened cover of snow that resembled a concrete corridor painted white,
solid, impenetrable, and unforgiving. With
little snow for the ski to grip, there was little left to buffer the gravitational
forces pulling you faster down the slope.
Thus, the skill set necessary to negotiate any intermediate run
increased substantially. Not quite as imposing
as skidding over a swath of pure ice during descent, the conditions were
nevertheless deceptively challenging.
It
was REALLY cold adding to the danger. Indeed, the
paralyzing bitter cold temperatures insured that the snow would remain frozen
hard. The frozen floor resisted the neutralizing
laser-like-effects of the warm afternoon sun, which patiently melts exposed surface
snow into soft cotton, or if abused by too many skiers, into murky slush. During our time at Deer Valley, there was no visible moist snow or slush anywhere to allow one’s skis
to grab hold and temper the pace of forward movement.
It’s
no fun to ski with your face frozen and your fingers and toes numb. Indeed, while our minds were focused on how
much snow needed to fall for Deer Valley to provide us optimal conditions for
skiing, we failed to consider the stifling consequence of single digit
temperatures, with some that dropped below zero. The human body’s ability to withstand the
perilously mounting effects of freezing temperatures over time is limited. On the first day, it instantly turned my
beard and mustache into a frozen block of ice, while insidiously attacking
my fingers and toes, shocking them into painfully frozen pulps before robbing
them of feeling.
But
WE were still happy to SKI! Notwithstanding the bitter
cold, the neutralizing effect of the sun - which burned my face despite a hefty
lathering of sunscreen, and the lack of any real wind chill factor played a large
part in making our three days of skiing much more than tolerable. How funny changing set points can be. In the past, temperatures in the 20’s gave us
pause when considering whether to ski on that day. At least in this instance, we were relieved
when the Fahrenheit thermometer crept into the mid teens – it almost felt like
summer!!
Do
what I say, not as I do. Everyone with a pea brain
knows that you need to be extra careful skiing at the end of the day! Legs are
tired and filled with lactic acid. Eyes
are blurred with an overdose of blinding white.
And there is the fogging of reality inspired by the mounting mental
fatigue of monotonous unremitting surveillance of oncoming traffic. Everyone and everything in your path must be considered
to determine avoidance patterns to save off collisions.
My
mind was nowhere to be found! But for me, that last afternoon, rather than being
extra careful, I found myself skiing in body with my mind nowhere
to be found. Indeed, I was skiing as if someone
else was navigating me. I was on cruise control. I was barely cognizant of my
surrounding while carelessly gliding down the mountain, as though I was under
the influence of some potent elixir. I was skiing as if I was watching a movie
of someone else skiing, half dozing into oblivion while waiting for something
exciting to happen to catch my attention.
Something
exciting did happen! What should have been a routine run down a moderately slopped blue
turned into near disaster! Expecting the steepest part of the run to be on top
of the mountain, as my experience skiing in Deer Valley dictated, the semi cautious
navigation up top yielded to more casual skiing below. I wanted to test my ability to shift my hips
to and fro to more fluidly navigate the run with precision and speed. As I past my friend Gary, I mentally fast
forwarded to the end of the run, which would have me positioned at the lift waiting
for a few moments for Gary to catch up, and then to catch the next ride up the
mountain to repeat the process on yet another run.
With my mind having already completed the run, I was left blind-sighted
as the slope of the terrain unexpectedly increased with my speed continuing to
increase as well. Unprepared, I was abruptly
brought out of my mega-stupor to find myself out of control skiing down the
run. I was on thinly covered hard packed
snow that was unwilling to allow me to regain or readjust the
speed of descent. A momentary lapse of
uncertain navigation was enough to put me off balance, my forward momentum was
too committed to suppress by my feeble attempts at cutting the snow, and I was instantaneously
upended.
I
hit the snow with the force of a bowling ball thrown down the bowling alley. My helmet hit the ground
with a loud thump, my left ski disengaged, my ski poles flew wildly through the
air, and an explosion of snow shattered the sky above. In the end, my body shot forward at least 20
yards, rolling and contorting down the hill still connected to my right ski, totally
and completely out of control for what seemed to be an eternity.
What
was real was that I was so out of control that I didn't even consider initiating any resistance
to slow the tide after the fall. Or
perhaps I had no opportunity to do so, since I was moving so quickly. I instinctively understood that only time and
the dissipation of kinetic energy would end my uncontrolled
fall down the hill. Indeed, it was in
many ways a surreal experience. I submitted totally to the forward momentum of
the fall, retracting slightly to remain compact while relaxing as my body was
contorting and twisting on the bumpy rigid terrain. I was blindly and peacefully accepting my
fate with little fear or remorse, naively expecting for it to end finding myself in
one piece. When it ended, I remember
thinking, gosh, that was kind of fun! I
had no idea how far I had been thrown down the hill, how my body turned and
twisted, how many joints were stretched to their limit, and how many body parts
were greeted rudely by the hardened show covered mountain. And when it ended, I
heard Gary’s words of concern and countered with a jubilant thumbs up. He was horrified by what he had seen and was
sure my mangled looking body on final impact reflected some major serious
injury. Miraculously, nothing was broken, nothing was twisted, nothing hurt,
but that is not the end of the story!
Gary
was indeed amazed that I was still in one piece, alive, unbroken and
smiling after the incident. Checking my
body parts one final time, and finding no reason for concern, I hobbled through
the last few runs of the day a lot more tentative as the reality of fall sunk
into to my brain through my thick skull and life-saving helmet. We called it a day with a few minutes to
spare before the resort closed its doors, thanking our lucky stars that we were
both walking on two feet, conscious and alert, and that we had ended our ski vacation healthy
and happy.
NO
trees, no skiers to collide into. Of course,
I was very lucky that there were no trees in the path of my decent to collide
into and crush my bones, bruise or batter my body or hammer my helmet and
head. And fortunately, there was no
unlucky skier ahead to add to the number of victims. I never would forgive myself for causing harm
to another human, at least unintentionally, from my reckless error in judgment.
My
helmet was not so lucky. As we sitting on the lift
chair on our way to the next to the last ski run, Gary noticed that my helmet
was scratched and bruised in several locations.
On one spot corresponding to my left frontal lobe, there was a visible dent
almost a centimeter in depth, as if a large bore nail had been driven part way
into the helmet. On further inspection,
there were numerous major dents and bruises, too numerous to count! The more I looked, the more mangled the helmet looked. It was indeed the victim of the fall. I could only imagine if my head was used as the battering ram during my fall instead of the helmet.
Thank
you dear Helmet! In retrospect, my head and helmet
must have landed on several sharp pointed object or objects, perhaps a shard of
ice or a spike of rock that produced the damage, clearly saving me from at
least a serious concussion, maybe permanent brain injury, or maybe even
death. It also saved me from being involuntarily
added to the head injury annual statistics report registry; 16,000 were reported in 1998
– have no more recent stats at the moment to offer.
Are
there lessons to be learned? Indeed, the incident speaks
for itself. The stage was set, the
conditions perfect, and the human in question – ME - took the bait, hook, line
and sinker. This was no true accident;
it was my destiny! A little fatigue, a
little oblivion, a little recklessness, all mixed with a yearning for
excitement. One moment in time could
have sealed my fate for the rest of my life.
This is not the first time I have come close to serious injury and
death. Did I learn from this incident to the benefit of my future? There are others
whose story ends badly, heeding not the warnings of the first pass from a dangerous
encounter; they return another day to find their fate sealed by their delusion
of infallibility.
To
tell another story. For now, I am writing this blog
on my way home to Hawaii. I want to
remember to kiss the helmet that saved me from myself, perhaps for another day
to do something foolish and risky but for now, I am just happy to have all of
my body parts working, and my head no more deranged than it was before the
fall, still immersed in adolescent fantasy, ready to face another day to hopefully tell another
story.
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