When it snows, I get excited. When I get excited, I always try to do too much. The way I look, my body overloaded with ski and snowshoe gear, all precariously balanced over a mountain bike, I could be a mannequin on display for a used sporting goods store... and still, through it all, I'm thinking that I might still look cool.
Just before 8:00 A.M., not particularly early for a backcountry ski adventure, I mount up. Locating bike petals under my feet becomes a difficult task while I wear ski boots. I pull the waistband buckle of my backpack around my thick girth of layers: long underwear, Nordic wool sweater, down vest, windbreaker, then, click the buckle. I push of, rolling my bike down the snow. Down the mud mottled side street. It's all downhill from my house to Andrea's.
While sharing the road, I give Saturday morning drivers a big grin. With all this gear on my body, goggles down, it must be obvious to people in cars that I am biking towards extreme outdoor adventure (an activity with caché in this small mountain town). As I whir down Bridge street, my ski poles create wind resistance, sticking up from inside my pack. From either side of my pack, beside my shoulders, dangles a snowshoe, attached by a carabiner to the little loop where my skis should be attached, but are not, despite the circus sideshow freakishness skis would add to my already overloaded display of snow recreation equipment. My gear is not just for show. It will be used.
This illustrates a common theme in my life, I am trying to do too much, all at once. Luckily, on this bike ride, it seems to be working out. Hooked by my index finger is a coffee cup full of cold oatmeal, stabbed in the center by a spoon. On my bike, I am careful to keep perfect balance and brake smoothly with my one free finger. Spraying slush, I zip through the center of this snow-crazy town. When I go fast, my snowshoes begin to flap at my sides like angel wings.
I arrive precisely at our rendezvous time. Andrea and and Robert are fuddling around for the next half hour, getting their gear together. While they get ready, I will sweat in my layers and daydream about our purpose. We are going to drive up to a local, favorite backcountry ski-spot. It is a popular enough place, so that I may divulge its location without feeling guilty. I am guessing it is probably the spot to which everybody in this town visits for their first backcountry ski slope. Still, it is local enough that I won't tell you where it is. Still a newbie backcountry skier, I am selfish and don't want to share my spot with a bunch of folks driving up from Boulder. Moreover, I am not ready to pimp myself as that kind of ski journalist, you know, the ones that wreck local spots by publishing articles about the secret stashes to which they have been made privy.
Anyway, we are not skiing Caribou today. We are going to dig pits. For those of you who know nothing about backcountry skiing, "digging pits" is just that, digging big holes into the snow in order to expose layers of the snow pack.
Like the sedimentary layers you might have seen trapped in the rock cliffs above your car as you zoomed along some highway in Utah, the snow also has layers. Every storm deposits a new layer. By looking at the different layers of snow, whether icy or fluffy crystals, etc., an experienced snow Scientologist predicts the likelihood of an avalanche. No one knows for sure when an avalanche will run its course, but there are calculable risks. We ski in avalanche country, Colorado being the #1 avalanche fatality state in the lower 48. It is hard to compete with Alaska, the other #1. But the snow outside my backdoor is still way too shallow for avalanches. It is early November. There are large rocks poking up though the snow. There will be no skiing today. We are going up the mountain with a singular purpose: to dig pits.
I have never seen the snowpack develop over an entire season. Usually, I just go into the backcountry with other people who know, presumably, what they are doing and will tell me where and when it is safe to ski. But, I am asserting myself this winter, shedding my newbie status. To give myself a proper snow science education, I will watch the snowpack develop like a story, each snowfall leaving clues to the slope stability. Of course, I am excited about the snow, and so, go to extremes. For example, I aim to take the AMGA backcountry ski guide test in the next four to six years. I will need at least that long to gain the experience necessary to safely guide weekend warriors and wealthy ski bums (!!!!#$%k?) into sick backcountry terrain. Then, I will move to Alaska. Um, I mean, the real reason I want to go dig pits is so when we warm up to the bar afterwards, I can tell people we were "digging pits," which means we are cool backcountry kids. Another bonus to digging pits with Robert: his friends, who will meet us at the trailhead, are all in my age-range for dating.
Robert, who finally has his boots on, has been skiing the local backcountry for the last ten years. I have asked him to come out with me today so he may impart his wisdom. Andrea, who has not yet purchased her avalanche beacon (a piece of equipment that signifies entry-level membership in the backcountry ski community) has come along out of curiosity.
When we arrive at the trail head, Robert's single friends are not there. We are half an hour late. They have headed up the snowy trail without us. Andrea, Robert and I begin our uphill snowshoe. We stop to wait for Andrea. Recently moved to Colorado from sea level, she has not yet acclimated. I am happy not to be the last one up the mountain. Matter of fact, this is the first time I am not the last one up the mountain.
Once, I apologize for stopping trail-side. I am sweating and need to peel off a layer, self-identify as a gear-monger, even explain to Robert the etymology of the term monger, using the term fishmonger, a.k.a. fish seller, to illustrate my meaning, adding that monger did not have a negative connotation until after the influence of British colonialism. I have no idea if this is true. I only know that I probably have the heaviest pack and always bring excess gear. Thusly, I am a gear-monger in the contemporary sense, a chronic over-packer. Once again, with words, as with life, I am trying to do too much. We continue up-hill.
We meet up with Robert's friends: two handsome men and four large dogs. As the trail opens up below Baldy, a mountain named after a man's head, I pull all my tools out of my bag. One of the men is either surprised that a petite woman like myself has such an extensive snow science kit, or notices my prideful display of equipment as his opportunity to cater to my enlarged ego. He seems to be flirting, excited by my saw, which is actually Andrea's saw. (She bought it, as per my instructions the previous day.)
I do not correct the handsome man when he assumes I own the saw. I smile, and with exaggerated demure, shrug, and say, "I like gear and I Iike books." I show him my paperback copy of Staying Alive in Avalanche Terrain. One member of our team, whose identity will not be revealed, breaks out a tiny, zippered bag, a different kind of snow science kit, a glass piece, one for experiencing the crystalline nature and flow of snow.
While the men dig, I boot pack up the slippery, steep slope. The sun is rising, giving this Eastern facing slope a glossy sheen. I practice self-arrest with my shovel as I slip. This looks allot like goofing off, sliding down a hill on my butt, dragging my shovel behind me and screeching like a girl, but it is actually an important self-rescue technique that I am practicing. Eventually, when the snow-hole is big enough, I pretend to know what it is that I am doing. Andrea and I get down into the pit to trace our fingers up and down the layers. We look at snowflakes through my magnifying glass. The crystals are pretty, round and melting off a prism of colors at their edges.
*
I juxtapose the digging of pits with my upcoming knee surgery. Here is where I leave out the snow science: slope aspect, temperature, gradient. It would be too much. You can read snow science in Staying Alive. Since morning on the trail, I have known this story will eventually end with me in a café, my leg propped up on a chair.
*
While snowshoeing back down the trail, I fall behind Robert and Andrea. Stepping downhill reminds me of my knee's uncanny ability to hyper-extend and get caught in a painful lock-up. I move gingerly, the last one in the group. How will I do all I that have set up for myself… A backcountry ski guide? Am I lost in an aging ski bum's marijuana induced fantasies? But weaknesses are sometimes strengths. I can make this trick-knee of mine into something valuable. Ski magazines print first-person accounts of A.C.L. reconstructions every year! A very standard topic. I could sell this.
As I snowshoe down through the shadows of pines, the sky begins to grey. My mind quiets with the rhythm of my own slow, steady pace. I imagine being conscious during my surgery, gripping the operating table when the surgeon inserts and turns his screwdriver. He is removing a titanium screw from my tibia. It has been wiggling its way out for over a year, since I skied with a loaded patrol toboggan, too soon after my first surgery. The pages of my calendar are penciled with marks like the footstepped pattern of a dance. Schedule surgery, but do not miss any days like this, days digging pits, days skiing after the Halloween storm, three feet of fresh powder, days out moving my legs and sweating. A last minute cancellation opens up an appointment for me, tomorrow.
Doctor's orders: off skis for three weeks. Ski school instructor training begins in two weeks. Again, I am trying to do too much, but somehow, I believe it will work out, just as long as I can maintain my balance. My Grand-Aunt could stand up on the seat of a motorcycle and drive the handlebars with her feet while she juggled. Despite my hope for an easy story to tell, I have no gory record of my knee surgery. I was sedated and anesthetized.
*
I don't remember anything about yesterday's surgery. I am heavily drugged, sitting in the café across the street from where I live. The steamy café is busy with skiers come back down the hill, this being the opening weekend of Eldora Ski Resort. Our small mountain town is revived. Bound by the friction of high performance synthetics, their thighs whoosh past my table. Having lived my whole life in tourist destinations, I safely assume the skiers have driven up the canyon from Boulder.
My leg is elevated, propped upon a chair. On my table, beside my soy maté latté, I lay a slightly tattered edition of Ski Journal. On the cover, the tiny shadow of a skier hovers over blue waves, speeding away from his shadow-tracks in the meringue fluff… probably in Alaska. Over the magazine's cover photo, I lay a small cellophane pouch, sterile and labelled…
NAME : DUNGAN, MARGARET A
ACT# : 10409
DOB : 08/07/76 AGE : 33
DR : MCCARTY, ERIC C MD
DOS : 11/20/09
The 4"x8" blue cellophane window displays a large screw. Here, at the café, I have balanced all the props to create the perfect scene: elevated leg, screw, ski mag, even random skiers co-operate like extras on a movie-set as they bustle in the café. The scene speaks, a dialectic of ski culture: conversations about knee surgeries and how much fresh snow, where and when, and gear mongering and how much we love to eat after a day of skiing; I want everyone who walks by my table to see, I am writing about "digging pits." I take a sip from my mug and the steam hits my face, reminding me of how I sniffled yesterday in the snow, breathing hard in the cold air. Now, sedated and eyeing my screw, finally, I am not trying to do too much.
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