27 of
the 53 days I have spent on skis so far this season have been outside of resort
boundaries and off groomed nordic track.
On a good day, which there have been quite a few of lately I love skiing
the resort about as much as Flava Flav loves New York and big clock necklaces. But the backcountry offers me an escape that
the lifts sometimes cannot. When I’m out there it’s just my partner, the mountains,
and I, no social distractions, skittle thugs, or dean of students to talk too.
Just us, on our own unguided and untracked experience. But the potential cost of our solitude is
something that often comes into my mind.
I am an aggressive and young skier and so are the majority of my
partners. While I enjoy skinning through
the woods and surfing low angle powder snow nothing is more rewarding than
alpine views and big white canvases with s-shaped signatures. And so I seek to
find myself in these in these wild places every time the opportunity is
present.
The
prefrontal cortex of our brains is responsible for, memory, emotion, and
rational decision making. This area of our brain reaches morphological maturity
around the same time as puberty but its size is not relative to function until
later years of life. It has been confirmed
that the prefrontal lobes continue to both quantitatively and qualitatively develop
into our early twenties. The fact that the
part of my brain responsible for both decision and emotion is still developing
weighs heavy on my mind quite often. A
bad decision in the backcountry could produce an un-erasable result and have
effects that cascade far beyond my own selfish quest for fulfillment; to my
parents, my friends, and even the arm chair quarterbacks that seem to comprise
much of the online backcountry community.
Because
danger is inherent in wild snow skiing I make it a point to follow the snow and
weather with intent and passion. I have
fun on tours where my only goal is to look at the snow and a get a picture of
what might be in shape. I try to treat
every outing like a re-con mission and it has led to more and more amazing
summits and safely opened doors. But skiing powder snow is probably one of the
most emotional things I have ever done. I mean what experience is more
instantly gratifying than momentary weightlessness in a cloud of shimmering
crystals? It’s impossible for me to say with absolute assurance that the
undeveloped part of my brain responsible for both emotion and decision will always
make the correct call. Can I trust myself to overpower emotions with rational every
time? So far I think I have done a pretty good job, I've pulled the plug more
than I have flipped the switch and I've only regretted turning on the lights once.
Skiing
is probably the coolest thing I have ever done, but as for the coolest thing I
have ever had? My family takes the cake without a doubt and my frontal lobe
better be able to remember that on top of every line for the rest of my life.
 |
| Zach proving it never hurts to go home early, this photo is from my first big ski tour (Sheelite Canyon , Jan 2011).We didn't climb or ski the entire couloir because my gut wasn't right. Two day's later a solo skier triggered a 2 foot deep slab that ran over 1,000 feet in the upper part of the canyon. |
