As the weather has turned arctic the last couple days, I have finally made time to do some writing. Although the single digit highs make it hard to venture out, I am happy to have an excuse to put some energy into a blog post. As I reflect on the last two months of skiing and work, I am reminded of how ephemeral winter is and how lucky I am to be spending this winter here.
After riding our tandem bike through a never winter, Mark and I jumped into this winter happy to be back on the snow. Day one, we were excited to be out, but perhaps less than prepared. We arrived in Aspen on a Monday to fresh snow falling and were excited to ski powder first thing Tuesday morning before we went into work at 9am. We hiked up Highlands first thing in the morning, then again after getting off of work at 3pm that day. By the time we crawled back to our new apartment we were both frozen and tired from the days outings. Having spent the prior month in Albuquerque with my family, we were neither acclimatized to the cold nor the physicality of skiing. Still our excitement kept us at it, and little by little we got more comfortable in our boots and on our skis. The re-learning process was surprisingly slow after a full year and a half off. On top of that, both Mark and I have been wrestling a variety of ski, boot, and binding challenges, that have meant devoting a large portion of our time not skiing or working to researching and modifying our equipment. Now, we have settled into a rhythm that consists of skiing nearly everyday, work, and a few hours of free time a week: aka the dream.
This is the first winter Mark and I have spent together in Aspen. We decided to take full advantage by taking a job where we could work together every day so that we could ski together everyday as well. We are lucky to have employee housing right across the street from Highlands ski area, and enjoy only a short commute to work at Snowmass. We work a swing shift job (3pm to about 10am), so we are able to spend most of our daylight hours skiing and still generally sleep enough to avoid burning out. The pay cut from our summer jobs is mostly offset by the reduced rent and incredible location of our current place. For years, Mark and I talked about the possibility of living this reality; skiing everyday, working together, milking every powder turn through the course of the season. Now that we are here, we have to pinch ourselves occasionally to be sure we are not dreaming.
The (almost) ski bum dream winter (we do still have a job after all) of course has its costs. Our work varies greatly night to night, so sometimes we do not clock out until after midnight, or once 3 am. And because we do not live in town, we do no socialize much outside of skiing. We work with a small team, and for most of the night only one another, so most of mine and Mark’s socializing happens on the ski hill, or more precisely at the top of Highland Bowl. Thankfully, our friends enjoy life on the snow as much as we do, so we get to ski with many of them regularly, and several of our out of town friends have made the trek to Aspen to ski with us and crash in our guest room (a paco pad on the floor in between our kayaks and bikes at the foot of our bed).
Even as the weather turns more favorable, I am looking forward to making more time for writing, and hope to post another update soon!
Thanks for reading!