It was snowing yesterday and I noticed on Instagram post by my friend from long ago (Hi Neige!). She was out skiing. The snow here wasn’t blinding snow.

No blurred vision.

But enough snow to enjoy and … bring back more memories. Of skiing. You get triggered like this, right? You see a photo of an activity and you’re back doing that: this time skiing. It can be so vivid.

Only this time it’s in Colorado. I spent my freshman year there. I had expected that I was at school for the classsroom education, but most of my learning took place elsewhere.

And one of those places was the ski trips. Skiing was the excuse. But we were 18: socializing was the point.

Someone would suggest a trip to the mountains. In Boulder, there was rarely snow, so weather there was not a determinant. If a mountain was open, it was good.

The group would form, and then pile into whatever cars were available. There were no seat belts required. Three in the front? Jam more people in the back? And there was no car inspections: who knows if the wind shield wipers worked. If not, you stopped at the side of the road and threw snow at the windshield at regular intervals.

The ski areas were on the other side of the mountain pass. Up, up and up into switch backs. Oh no! It’s snowing. Does anyone have snow tires? Will we be able to keep going? Best to get behind a big truck to suck us along. But now: we are at the top and headed down. Yikes, let’s not skid over the edge as we turn and twist on the down side.

Once we reached the ski mountain, maybe there was snow. Maybe we had to ride the lift up because it was so early in the season and we were given lift tickets for cheap to “find the snow” higher up. Who ever heard of that? We did.

Once on the slopes – the next question was who could ski? My goodness. People came because their friends were there. NOT because they knew how to ski. It was just for fun. We would take the lift up and then find out who could actually get down.

As it turned out, everyone could get down in way or another. Some needed a lot of holding. Others were able to do that for them. Some were super confidant and then others… blustered: One friend was a skater. A large guy and definitely self-assured. He would take off and move is skis left-right, left-right which meant faster-faster, faster faster. But he had no idea how to stop. So he’d topple over in a pile of snow. Over and over again. He loved it.

No snow? Too little snow? Blinding snow… Why were you at the University of Colorado anyway? Let’s go!

(One photo and I’m back there. Hi, Jennifer! DIdn’t we love our time skiing?)

Forget the ABCs:

(blurry photo of my ABC scarf coming soon)

Just play!

“I love snow, too. Got my scarf on. Ready to go out.” – Peaches