Vacation Views
I've spent 30-something Christmases in the Colorado alpine. My parents live on a towering ridgeline ringed with peaks, and I find it meditative to go back there once a year. To wander. To wheeze. To snowboard. To curl up in my bed at the top of the house and lay there in the dark watching the moonlight on the snow and the lights of faraway snowcats, 10 miles up the valley at the ski resort, going up and down restoring order to the slopes, until I fall asleep and then the dawn breaks all cold and blue.
This year:
This year I was especially in awe of the the winter scenery. It'd rained in Portland for 17 days straight before my trip, and so the dazzling sun on the Colorado snow was so freaking bright I could barely open my dim little eyes.
This year I rode my fill of powder, through trees and open snowfields, till my legs ached and my back spasmed. On Christmas Eve Day, we lapped the lifts for hours and then went in the lodge at the top of the mountain to warm up, where we drank hot coffees stiff with Jim Beam and ate snacks my mom had packed for us whilst contemplating the expanse of rugged peaks out the window.
This year, in cosmic observance of the Christmas Eve full moon, I made my entire family go for a late night hike through the dark. Some were more game than others, but I thought it was lovely and remain a firm believer in the magic of a winter night.
Snow-caked trees and 14,000-foot peaks, et cetera.
Dusk dog walks on the ridge line.
Vacation views to remember.
Sun + fresh snow. The air was super sparkly!
Real-deal parking prices at Vail Mountain. (I did not park here.)
Aaaaanyway, lovely to visit, lovely to come home. Lovely to spoon with dog in bed and carry on with real life in a regular, non-holiday fashion.
Get Out
We're having a "real winter." The kind that sends the faint of heart back to wherever they came from (California). Perpetually dark skies. Flood warnings every weekend. Rainstorms worthy of horror films, with the wind lashing a torrential spray against your windows.
It's nice. It's what makes it a little rugged up here. More weather today? I don't even care. I'll slosh my way to work again, keeping a towel ever close to dry off the dog. Sunshine is a fantasy. The littlest blue, a fleeting pinhole on the horizon—that shit can last me a whole month. I live in the North Country.
Key to winter survival is the ability to get out of the city.
As mentioned elsewhere, I have adult-onset phobia of driving in the snow, but I happen to know a handy fellow with a 4-wheel-drive car. We've escape toward the mountains whenever possible. You can breathe a little deeper up there, take in some natural light. You can walk. You can hike. Stumble on the ice. Maybe snowboard? Hell, even telemark if the mood so strikes you. Any outing involving physical exercise in the cold is what I suggest. Bring drinks, bring snacks. Bundle up. If yer like me, wear two sweaters at once but forget your gloves. It's all about getting the blood moving and tapping into the wilderness vibrations.
See, rain is very dark (especially today—the darkest day of the year), but snow—snow is bright! It holds the light. It makes the evergreens sparkle in the dead of winter. If the spirit of the solstice is rebirth, then I would argue that there's nothing more solstice-y than retreating into the cold, embracing a polar adventure, and then driving back toward the warmth of the city through that strange late-afternoon dusk.
Ghosts Of Christmas Past
I come to you today from memory lane: Oregon. Colorado. Nights that got cold. Christmas parties in my old kitchen. Winter quiet. Snow in the city. Snuggling in my pop's chair with nephew Pat.
Late-December dusk at 13,000 feet—white knuckled in the passenger seat on that crazy road between Denver and mom and dad's house.
The Slammer—a scummy bar with a heart of gold. This place decks it out for Christmas, but I don't think you can go there anymore on account of it being clogged with Chads and tourists. Fuck it, though.
Dog walks on Christmas Day when everyone was happy and the snow danced with sunlight.
Baby-face Justin, back when the boys lived in the Belmont house and threw the wildest New Year's Eves.
A mistletoe last year, for kissing season. As I recall, I'd been feeling blue, and although December did bring with it a spicy kiss or two, they weren't partaken of in any real proximity to my kitchen or this talisman of Druidic fertility. Nevertheless!
A powder day. A powder day with my dad. How many of these I’ve had in my life, I can’t be sure, but they’re very valuable.
Me hanging twinkly lights at Commonwealth in 2011, the year I decided against all odds to open an indoor skatepark in the middle of a recession.
This picture reminds me of the unkempt Chrismas parties I used to have and how one in particular, maybe even this one, ended with a can of caramel popcorn getting tossed all over the hardwoods and then, like with alchemy, transformed into a kind of tar thanks to the addition of spilt beer and dancing. Ah those were the days!
Nephew Pat in his Kermit slippers, working his way through a dire case of post present-opening blues.
Do y'all remember how for a little while there after Department Of Skateboarding got torn down, we still skated the empty warehouse—just cuz it was winter outside and there was NO WHERE ELSE TO GO?
The coldest Christmas camping in Arches National Park. We were the only ones. It was beautiful and austere. I turned into an icicle.
Peace on earth.
Fire & Ice
Despite a lot of harsh, wild, and sad events happening in the world right now, December carries on, here in the Northwestern territories of the United States. It seems like every act of turning on the news is an exercise in bravery, and I haven't been very brave lately.
Really, the bravest thing I did this weekend was attempting to skateboard after eating a monster burrito that was so heavy, it almost ripped all Hulk-like through the paper bag it was carried home in.
There was a birthday party, too, featuring an arm wrestling tournament that crowned our pal Xeno the #strongestmanonearth. And the day after that, there was a slippery hike up an icy gulch (much cat-like balance came into play). The reward at trail's end was simple and austere: a veil of rushing water and a cauldron of blue ice.
There were many, many minutes tucked away in the corner of the couch. Book open. TV or radio on. Rain rushing down the windows. And so on. Plenty of quiet hours appreciating such things as the sense of peace a sleeping animal can bring into a room.
In contrast to the rest of the world, our lives are magical, lucky, impossibly charmed. Continuing to live them in the face of impermanence and death isn't exactly brave or noble, but it's something.
The Thanksgiving Report
I like a good eating event. A gathering focused on food. Potluck, I think it's called? A table full of steaming dishes magnetically draws a party close, gives it purpose, fills the stomachs of imbibers so that they don’t get wrecked when/if they take it a few sips too far. This is the magic of Thanksgiving.
I hosted at my house on Thursday, but I did not belabor the feast. I just made a simple herb salad and cooked a frozen rhubarb pie. Mark roasted a ball of reconstituted soy product, also known as a Tofurky (the best turkeys being the alive ones, of course). Toby created a platter of scalloped potatoes that billowed clouds of steam, Danielle crafted supernaturally good cornbread, and Jesse, bless his soul, showed up carrying a pink-cheeked baby and a giant fake turkey made of vital wheat gluten. (We cuddled the former and ate the latter.) Also, there was green bean casserole, candied yams, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie—every whateverthefuck you'd expect from a classic holiday spread—and I barely lifted a finger.
Many ovens make light work, you see.
We skated before we ate, despite the kind of cold that had the trees tinkling with ice.
My pets are thankful that I continue to feed and house them even after enduring years of their joblessness and failure to contribute to the household in any other way .