Ski town, USA

Toothy Mctootherson heading up for the day.

This is our Thanksgiving tradition (circa 2010): we haul the family up to Winter Park and in exchange for copious time at the condo pool we train them in the arts of rushing downhill really fast, in the hopes that someday they will be in it for the skiing and not the excessively chlorinated pool. This is what M. hopes, anyway. I mostly hope that nobody ends the day in the ski patrol clinic.

I look rather severe. Perhaps I am instructing Helen in a matter of lift-riding etiquette.

Luckily (for my anxiety level), the kids have inherited my cautious DNA. Every so often I'll see some lavender- or olive-drab-wearing mite zip down the slopes with aplomb and style; after a brief moment of proud disbelief I'll realize that it's not actually my own offspring and that my child, in fact, is the one oozing downhill in a sensible snowplow formation. Nevertheless, M. has high hopes that someday we'll all be ski crazy.

(That will be great, I think. I'll watch you all lovingly from the lodge, where I'll be reading a good book.)

(I kid. I like skiing fine. All except for the impact-and-injury part.)

(You know what I like? The run I took this morning, alone, along the snowcovered bike trail, past the black ice-lined water, under the spruce and almost out of earshot of the highway.)

Welcome to my mountain.

Silas is actually getting rather skillful, in a slow and sensible way. I think technically we share the same ski ability, he and I, much as we share the same boot size, snowpant and helmet.

Actually, I think his boots are too big for me now.

"That's a pretty good view," said Silas. "Better take a picture for Sue."

When we're packing to leave the house, I'm always in a mood--do we have to go? For all those days? And then we get here; the house and all its chores seems pleasantly distant and so long as I have my books and a decent amount of time in which to enjoy the condo in solitude, I am content.

And here we are. The cares of the world feel very far away, and for a little while I am content.