The Night I Nearly Died

I almost died this week…

Mikella and I made the bold decision to chaperone a night-skiing trip that Riggs’s school puts on weekly during the season. Had I a dollar for every time a boy uttered “bro” or “literally,” I could buy a bookstore.

Once the kids were off on the lifts, we suited up. I did a bit of snowboarding as a wee lad, but I have zero skiing chops. We live in Maine, though, and one learns to lean into winter here. This is me leaning.

First, I hit what they call the magic carpet, which is basically a moving walkway that takes you up fifty yards to a gentle grade for absolute newbies. After a practice run, I was ready to take the chairlift to the beginner slopes. I’d done them once last year without a problem. This year was no different: big smiles, tons of fun, carving left and right in the snow. All was so good.

Mikella is a snowboarder because she is arguably a millennial, depending on different Google results, and as you probably know, millennials like to “shred.” Though she’s not that much more experienced, she is usually far better than me at everything we do. (Except squash, our new pastime. I think I’ve got the edge… don’t tell her I said so.)

Thirty minutes after we’d hit the snow, she had the brilliant idea of taking a chairlift to the near top of the mountain. She’s snowboarded with our son a couple of times already this year and said, “It’s just higher up, not any more difficult.”

“Yeah, okay. I’m getting the hang of it.” We take a much faster chairlift that already feels like big business. Even disembarking from the thing proves to be more challenging. I survive, though, and then we are faced with a choice: left or right. Both seem pretty similar, but most people are going right. I tell Mikella, “Let’s ask which one is easier.”

“Nah, don’t worry. Let’s go left. Riggs and I did last week. Piece of cake.”

We go left and reach the top of this new run. As Mikella straps in, I take a moment to look around. We are super high up; I can almost touch the moon. Lights twinkle on the surrounding mountains, which are all diminutive in comparison. And then I look down. It’s a straight drop. Not to my surprise, it’s also empty. Because who in their right mind would go down this cliff voluntarily?

And then Mikella is already dashing down the mountain like Olympian Shaun White, so I take a deep breath and follow. In hindsight, I should have realized even then that she was going after insurance money.

The good news is that I made it about a quarter of the way down without falling, but then I ate it with… what is the opposite of grace? Inelegance is not strong enough of a word to describe the scene, me trying to stop while going forty miles an hour (give or take) in rather icy conditions, my legs quivering, my heart rattling in its cage. And then… wham…. I’m down.

The thing is, I’ve never fallen before with skis on, so I don’t even know how to get up, especially while I’m on a slope better suited for rock climbing. Expert skiers are flying by me, nearly jumping over me. To make matters worse, I hear someone calling my name, and it’s my son on the lift above me, cheering me on. “You’ve got this, Dad! Pizza! French fries!” Supposedly you’re taught in ski lessons that beginners should move their skis from pizza to french fry shapes as they navigate a run.

Riggs gave me enough courage to keep going, but let me tell you, the next twenty minutes were terrifying. I not only considered sliding down on my derrière but nearly flagged down the guy in the snow machine to beg for a ride.

We’re at the lodge a bit later. Mikella feels bad, but in that way a spouse feels bad for you because it’s your turn to change a diaper. She’s surprised to learn I didn’t ski at all growing up; I guess we need to talk more. For the first time, I pull up a map of the mountain. And it all makes sense. Had we gone right, we would have had a long fun run made for beginners. Left was “intermediate,” which doesn’t sound so bad, but there’s only one run more difficult on the whole mountain: a black diamond accessed by a lift for lunatics. Mind you, this was the second time I’ve skied in my life.

I tell her that if she’s going after insurance money, she should wait until I finish the dev edits for the mystery I’m working on. As you may know, the mystery is an unfinished story that I took over. Had my wife succeeded with her diabolical plan, this lovely novel would require yet another author to get involved. Dare I entitle it An Unfinished, Unfinished Mystery?

I hope I’ve delighted those of you who thrive on schadenfreude, which means enjoyment derived by someone else’s misfortune. Shame on you!