The day is Saturday, the Saturday before Christmas and we are both worked from our work. 97% of the time, I have few complaints about being in the service industry, and about my job in particular, but the weeks leading up to the holidays is particularly challenging for a variety of reasons, and one of them is the sheer urgency our Guests have in regards to their Christmas and New Year's ski vacation. This time of year, it just plain sucks that so much of my time and energy are devoted to making other people's holidays memorable.
My office is down one person and to top it off we have 2 half-day trainings this week - trainings that I actually love. Essentially: how to communicate better with everyone. But the time away from our office has placed us even farther behind where we should be, heading into 2 of the busiest weeks of the year.
That being said, I am just plain tired on Saturday morning as we are planning our adventure. Fortunately, so is JC. He is working towards a deadline of getting some people into their remodeled house by Christmas, which is creating a massive amount of work and stress on his side as well. We take our time in the morning, drinking coffee, reading, eating, talking out our plan for the day.
My only real goals for the day are to get outside, get some exercise, get away from most other humans, and ski some different terrain. All of that was accomplished, plus so much more.
We talked about driving to Red Mountain but neither of us was up for the drive. We talked about a few options in the Ophir direction, and gambled on the sunny side still being good, even after a day of warmish weather. JC had skied it with a friend in an early morning venture and raved about it, and we both thought that the lowers may be sun-crusted and tricky but that once we got up a little higher, the snow would be holding up nicely for a couple of laps above treeline. Well, as many of you know, it is very easy to underestimate the power of the San Juan sun.
A couple of local families are skiing up to the Opus Hut with their young adult kids, incredible athletes all of them, swimmers, runners, skiers, you name it and they can probably do it as good as, if not better than, the next family of Telluride athletes. Their kids are home from college for a short time and they corralled them into a mountain hut overnight foray. We also chat with Fiona and Chris, two hut keepers skiing up to start their few days up there, making food and keeping the families happy and warm.
We veer off onto the sunny side and it isn't long before I realize three things:
1. I am tired.
2. I have overdressed.
3. The snow is bad.
The first is one is not surprising. I decide to slow down a bit and just keep going, one foot in front of the other until we reach our de-skinning spot. There are some cool animal tracks on the snow, chipmunks, squirrels, ermines, and ravens, even the spots where those crazy birds have swept their wings onto the snow before lifting off to roam around looking for trouble.
The second one is easily fixed. I announce "Disrobing!" and the caravan halts for me to take a layer off and marvel at how great it feels to stop and rest.
The third one is slightly troublesome, simply because the snow is not getting better as we ascend but worse. Yes, you heard me. The San Juan sun has baked the surface of the snow, condensing and crusting the top 2 inches into a layer that makes it slightly challenging to pull the baskets of my poles out of as I skin. I entertain my brain with a new technique I call the "stab and flick", where I poke my pole tip in, then lightly flick it behind me before stabbing it into the snow again, in an attempt to free it from the entrapping crust on the uphill side.
Oh and then I had a couple of wipeouts, falling and sliding downhill on a couple of sloppy kick turns.
I then entertained myself with capturing the beauty of natural icicles on trees:
but that doesn't last very long and I think JC is beginning to suspect I am faking reasons to take breaks. It is not much farther that we assess our options, as we are nearing the area where he was assuming the snow would be good skiing quality. And then… we get there… dun dun dunnnnnn. It is the same.
At this point in time we decide, it's going to be treach (Dad: this is the first part of the word "treacherous" and pronounced just like the first part of the word, I put that there for your benefit) descending anyway, let's turn back and cut our losses.
JC turns to me and says in all seriousness, "I'm going to say this one time: I'm sorry." There is good snow everywhere today, but sadly, not where we are.
We stop for a tea break, and scope the families like scattered ants nearing the top of Ophir Pass with the new Nikon Monarch binoculars I got him/us for a combo birthday/Christmas present, then both agree that we just want to get it over with, take our skins off, put our skis back on, and make a plan for getting the hell out of there.
The previous week we did some training at work that was basically how to connect with Guests and serve them better, as we are in the service industry. In the training a TED Talk was referenced, which you can watch here if you have an extra 20 minutes, but in a nutshell, it basically shows that you can change your hormones to higher levels of testosterone (confidence) and lower levels of cortisol (stress) by holding arranging your body in certain powerful poses (like Wonder Woman). I have started employing it when I start my day at work or prior to a challenging physical pursuit (like skiing sketchy sun crust) so I stand like Wonder Woman before venturing forth.
On another day I may have opted to actually make turns and ski down the crusty slopes but given the fact that there is an old mining road criss-crossing the slope, with just enough of an angle away from the evil sun to keep the snow soft and skiable, I choose the road. JC practiced skiing in such conditions but I just don't have it in me and embrace Plan B, following lynx tracks here and there, until we reconvene at a stream crossing, with rusty toxic mining residue that leaves our skis orange and grungy even into the next day.
And then the aspen grove! All I will say about the aspen grove is that there came another fall (for me of course) that leaves me wallowing, floundering, thrashing about, breathing hard, and completely unable to hoist myself out of the snow until JC says, "Stop moving!" which stills me enough that he can turn my skis around for me and heave me back to my feet. For some reason I find it hysterically funny and have to pull it together to keep maneuvering through the shrubbery and branches in the aspen grove.
We both burst forth onto the Ophir Pass road, with a comical turn full of flourish and pizzazz, as though we were skiing that way the whole time, then it is the shush back to the car. I ask, "Is that what skiing in Vermont is like?" to which he replies, "Yes! Only better." ;)
At the car as I am taking my boots off I say, "Well, it could be worse."
"How?"
"We could be fighting."
And we fire up the little Forester and zip back to the ski chalet, where we make a spontaneous decision to drive to Montrose and load up on groceries.
But wait - why didn't I ski the sketchy crust after my Power Pose? Well, I didn't want to. But I think the moral of the story is that whatever choice I made, I made from a place of confidence, and with zero stress. I guess it could have been really worse: we could be skiing in Vermont and fighting.
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