When skiing is your true valentine

Not to overdramatize, but I recently woke up in a hospital bed after surviving a life-threatening illness and emergency surgery. Immediately, my mind and heart went directly to what I love most: My husband and children. My granddaughters. And skiing.

That’s no joke. Skiing was right up there in what I was so very thankful for in both the life I had lived to date and — thankfully — the life I will continue to live.

That’s probably not a huge surprise to those who know me. But what did surprise me was what I focused on in that love.

Let me explain:

I’m a lucky ski gal. I’ve heli-skied amazing ranges out west. I’ve gathered all my guts and turned my way down some super challenging trails. I’ve skied at hundreds of resorts across North America and, yes, in the Alps. I’ve ripped with world champions. I’ve had some over-the-top moments most skiers only read about.

Yet the moments that came to me in this realization of love were so much simpler than those “once in a lifetime” experiences. Rather, it was those basic and pure slices of ski life that make it what it is. And I realized, in that moment, that I love skiing for the entirety of what it is; not for the glitz and bragging rights stuff. Those simple moments are why skiing can always be my valentine.

Like a sunny chairlift ride on a low-wind day. The temperature doesn’t matter. There’s just something about gliding uphill through the trees and over the snow with the winter sun warming your face. You can almost feel the vitamin D soaking into your body, and more than a few times in my life I’ve thought, “This moment is perfection.” Skiers carve below you, foreshadowing your next move. But up there in the sky, you feel free, warm and just plain right.

Or late day in the mountain lodge (because we ski at noon when everyone else is inside eating, folks) with my husband or a gang of friends. There’s always ’70s music on (it’s like mountain law). I usually choose a cheeseburger or chicken noodle soup and an Orangina — tradition! We’re all a little sweaty but in need of warming up; faces are ruddy and everyone, every single one of us, is just plain marinating in happiness.

Or the quiet moments on a run by myself. I always have a song in my head when skiing (and I’m totally anti-earbuds when skiing, preferring to listen to nature and let it suggest a song in your head), and I like to turn to the beat of that tune. One year, it was “Brand New Day” by Sting. Again and again and again. I turn a corner on a trail to that beat and suddenly find myself in a beautiful grove of Aspen trees with the sun filtering through. Or looking out over a vista I’ve seen a million times before that somehow looks new each time. The days a bluebird sky offsets the crisp, white snow are as love as the gray days that look like nature clicked the Sepia filter. I breathe it all in. And feel the love.

Or when I was a little girl and, unwilling to wait for my parents and siblings to eat a leisurely weekend breakfast and then head to the mountain, I’d throw my skis over my shoulder and take the short walk to our home ski area myself, knowing that even though I could basically ski every day I ever wanted to, first tracks were always called for. I’d meet up with my gang of ski buddies (who are still my gang today) and take run after run after run, singing “Build Me a Buttercup” as loud as we could on the double chair and loving our childhood ski lives.

Those are the kind of moments that filled my heart with love for the sport that is as much a part of me as anything could possibly be. And it made me realize: My love for skiing translates to a perfect ski day anywhere, and at any level. I know I’m going to recover fully and get back to being a “chick who rips” again. But what if I had to take it a smidge slower? What if back-country cat skiing and taking on double black chutes were ever to be a thing of my past? What I learned reflecting that hospital morning is this: I’d remember all that fondly, but I’d not mourn it. Because as long as I can get out into the fabric that is skiing — the snow and the sun (and the stormy days), the bustle of the base lodge and the peace of the lift and the quieter trails, the happy faces and the absolute separation from the rest of life (no talking on the phone on the chair for this gal) — I’m always going to have my true love.

That’s what makes skiing such a worthy sport: the pure joy of it is immediately accessible at every area and at every level.

Happy Valentine’s Day, skiing: You truly are a great love of my life.