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We all have that one friend. The one who can’t come to your July barbeque because he’s bushwacking across time zones to a near melted-out glacier. The one who’s looking for a patch of snow so small it wouldn’t pass as a bunny hill. The one who completes these expeditions wearing a pink bro tank, ratty jorts, and yellow Pit Vipers. The one who, after making three low-speed turns on sun-baked crud, snaps a selfie—and, ugh, why is his tongue out again?—to let the world know it’s #stillskiseason.
Skiing, my friends, is a seasonal pursuit. Many of us will argue it’s the most wonderful time of year, but we also must acknowledge its parameters. Ski season arrives, if we’re lucky, in the late fall—a long-awaited gift from the troposphere, one that assures us that although the days are growing shorter, we can fill them with sweet, sweet turns. Depending on where we live, those turns may last until the late spring. Then the days get longer, the sun shines brighter, and, at all but the highest elevations, snow melts. It happens every year, and it’s okay.
The warmer months offer opportunities to enjoy the outdoors in other gratifying ways. We ride the bike. We cast the line. We paddle the river. We swim, we float, we hike. Sometimes we just recline in the sun, beverage in hand, and scroll mindlessly until—oh, c’mon! There he is again! Bragging on Instagram about his 37-month skiing streak!
There are much, much more things to celebrate in the outdoors than someone who skis all year for the sake of saying they skied all year. We’re not here to blow out anyone’s adventure candle or, in vernacular all-year-round ski guy would understand, extinguish his stoke. But find some grace in the in between. To that guy we all know, here’s some wisdom from Pete Seager, The Byrds, and King Solomon: “To everything, there is a season.”
That includes skiing, my dude.
