Life Skills and Lego

I am not an engineer or a mechanic, I have never claimed to have been an engineer or a mechanic, and I have never played either on TV. I did, however, spend an inordinate amount of time playing with Lego building blocks as a kid. More scientifically minded educators may be able to provide interesting analyses of what that sort of play does for the fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, spatial awareness, creativity, and ability to speak foreign languages in children, and I'll leave that discussion to the experts. Having said that, I do believe that my childhood fixation with Lego did provide me with one essential skill and one odd character trait: I can do stuff with my hands and I don't like to read directions.

How on earth, you may ask, is this relevant to the life of a ski professional? What benefit can these Lego-borne characteristics provide to someone in the snowsports business? After a month of writer's block, how can this possibly be the subject that prompted me to write? It's simple, really. I don't have a lot of money, my car is a rapidly aging Subaru, and this afternoon I needed to fix it on my own with only the contents of my closets and my home-owner style toolbox. Now that was a fun challenge!

The short version of the situation with my vehicle is that the collar that connects the exhaust pipe to the muffler was completely rusted and falling apart. I found this out this morning when I started my car, put it in drive and when, after rolling a few feet, I heard the telltale clang and rumble of a big chunk of metal hitting the ground and dragging underneath me along the driveway. I got a ride to and from work from a friend – I wouldn't even think about passing up a full day of work this late in the season when they are so few and far between – and arrived back home this evening with plenty of Spring daylight hours left for me to jerry rig a quick fix so I can get my car to the shop in the morning.


The All-Purpose Wire Hanger



The Sistine Chapel of Fixes

After a little contemplation and strategy (insert analysis of the benefits of a liberal arts education here), I fixed my car with an old wire hanger and some needle-nosed pliers. That's it. The exhaust pipe is now fully connected to the muffler. I even checked my work by driving up and down the driveway! I'm not a skinny little guy so wedging myself under the car on a mud and gravel driveway was a bit of a project, and doing so in a way that allowed me to use my hands took it to a whole other level. Yes, I am very proud of myself. No, I didn't draw any blood (which would have improved my street cred). Yes, I got very dirty. No, it's not clear whether the fix will hold up for the entire mile-and-a-half drive to the auto shop tomorrow morning, much of which is over very badly pot-holed roads. Yes, I do have an extra piece of wire hanger just in case. Yes, I shamelessly took pictures of my handiwork to post on my blog, and I will brag to my parents about it.

My car isn't really in that rough a shape, but with another good winter season or two I should be able to get a new one. Or I'll just pay a professional to properly fix it for me before these sorts of things happen. I'll maintain a ready supply of wire hangers, duct tape, tongue depressors, and super glue around the house just in case.

P.S. I am very please to be able to report that on the afternoon following The Big Fix, I successfully drove my car without incident, sparks on the road, or clanging parts all the way from Ludlow, VT to Claremont, NH. The drive included my very severely pot-holed road here at home, smooth Vermont state roads roads, and several typically ice-heaved New Hampshire roads with rough pavement.

Enough Already

I can't help myself. I'm still in Crested Butte, Colorado, enjoying a few days free skiing with friends after a busy holiday week of work. What this means is that I'm not in uniform, not on the clock, not on a schedule, not concerned about technical precision (OK, maybe a little but concerned about it), and not constantly looking over my shoulder while skiing. It's terrific, it's a welcome change, and it's a great way to recharge my batteries. Why, you may ask, is this relevant to anyone who happens upon my blog? What insight can this possibly offer with respect to skiing, my work as a ski professional, or my life in the mountains? None. It's not relevant at all. What is relevant, however, is that my time skiing for myself alone allows me to really appreciate what I do and the places where I do it, and where I am at the moment is spectacularly beautiful. So, unable to resist, here are some more photos from the Colorado Rockies.

Paradise

The "backside" of the mountain here in Crested Butte is called the Paradise Bowl. The name "Paradise" belies a confidence, even an arrogance about the place despite there being quite a number of other, proper bowls which are further afield than Paradise and which have more demanding terrain. The fact is, however, that when conditions are just so and the snow falls deep and impossibly light, this very uncrowded place really reaches into that realm of otherworldly fantastic. Paradise. Today was such a day. It snowed all last night and all day today, and it's still dumping snow on us now. Tomorrow, the skiing likely will be even better, which frankly is hard to imagine. Paradise it is for these few days, and in our collective memory it always will be.

Taking the Show on the Road

It's currently Presidents Week, typically the busiest week of the season for the snow sports business. Most schools in the nation are on holiday for the week celebrating the birthdays of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, and a lot of people take that time to ski and ride with their families. Okemo is a busy place under normal circumstances and during Presidents Week it can be a bit nutty. Those of us who work there gear up for this week as though it were the Super Bowl, the World Series, the Olympics, and the World Cup all rolled into one. It may be nuts, but when we are prepared for it, we do our jobs well and our guests are in a great state of mind, it's a whole lot of fun.

Okemo and Vermont generally have had some very difficult weather conditions to contend with this week, so it's definitely been a test of everyone's mettle. Thankfully, our snowmaking and grooming continue to amaze everyone, guests and staff alike, and the resort has fared pretty well considering. At least that's what people have been telling me. I'm not there.

I'm in Colorado, working for a spell at Okemo's "little sister" resort, Crested Butte. Together with a couple of colleagues, I'm working with some guests that I normally ski with this week at Okemo. It was time for an adventure, and we're very glad to have had the opportunity to provide one for them here in the Rockies.

Crested Butte is quite a different place from Okemo in many, many ways. The mountain is big, steep, snowy, far from any metropolitan area, a true destination resort, and definitely culturally a part of the American West. But one thing has become crystal clear: after several years of ownership by the family that also owns Okemo and operates Sunapee, the guest service here has taken on a remarkably familiar tone and a thoroughness that we refer to as "the Okemo Difference". Our resorts do not hire guest service consultants, we do not subscribe to some pre-engineered method of training our people, we do not hard-sell our guests, we do not have a script that we follow, and we do not have a scientific prescription. What we do have is an ability to create an environment where guests and staff alike enjoy being in our resorts, where we genuinely are happy to share our places with those that travel to experience them, and where we are comfortable enough in our roles and our places that we can greet people and take care of them with informality, sincerity and attention to detail. It helps that we hire carefully and staff our resorts with some wonderful, hard-working and dedicated folks, and that's certainly been our impression here at Crested Butte.

It's wonderful to experience these similarities while on the road. Given my role here, I really am an "internal guest", as the expression goes. Everyone here on the 'normal' staff at Crested Butte has gone out of their way to make my colleagues and me feel at home and welcome. It's awesome to see and experience this consistency of tone from one place to another, and it certainly is making our stay here, and our guests experience here, a great one. It helps that we've had lots of fresh, dry, powder snow followed by deep, blue, cloudless skies and that the terrain here is absolutely fantastic. I'll be here for another week, and I intend to savor every last bit of it before heading back to the familiar confines in Vermont. It's just great to take our show on the road and see that it really is the best in the business.

Soul Survival

Every so often, skiers, ski writers and all manner of self-appointed nay-sayers complain about the loss of the soul of skiing. Here at Okemo they point to the snowmaking, the groomed trails, the slopeside condos, the wide runs and the many amenities as somehow an indication that skiing as a sport has lost its way. Obviously, they're wrong. We see a million examples every day that skiing's soul is alive and well. Particularly perturbed by this phenomenon last year, I wrote a piece for this blog about it called, aptly enough, "Shouting at the Wind".  (http://russendlesswinter.blogspot.com/2010/02/shouting-at-wind.html). More importantly and on a positive note, in today's New York Times sports section, there is an article about my favorite little slice of skiing's soul alive and in action.

My hometown in the very Northwestern corner of Connecticut is the tiny village of Salisbury, and it hosts the Eastern Ski Jumping Championships every year. Salisbury has hosted ski jumps since the 1930's, and the organization that runs the jumps (the Salisbury Winter Sports Association, "SWASA") also organizes a number of other great activities for the local folk. It's as grass roots and as unpretentious a group as you'll find in any sport, and it's pure distilled skiing soul. This year, after a remarkable fundraising effort to rebuild and modernize the Salisbury Ski Jumps at Satre Hill that had the support of the entire community, Salisbury is hosting the 2011 Ski Jumping and Nordic Combined Junior Olympics. It a tremendous complement for the dedicated volunteers at SWASA, a wonderful addition to the annual Jump Fest festivities, and it'll rekindle faith in the soul of skiing for even the most grizzled winter sports misanthropes.

It's an easy prescription: go to Salisbury, Connecticut for the weekend of February 11-13th; enjoy time outside in a convivial atmosphere watching elite athletes compete in an environment free of crass commercialism; warm yourself near the fire with a glass of something at one of the local inns or restaurants; attend the Snow Ball and let your hair down a bit; and the result will be joy, optimism, ruddy cheeks, and the satisfaction of time well spent in the company of good people. Isn't that the point?!

The New York Times article about the Salisbury ski jumps can be found here –
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/09/sports/skiing/09skijump.html?src=me&ref=sports

The SWASA website is the go-to source for information about the 2011 JO's, the rebuilding of the Satre Hill jumps, and ski jumping generally -http://www.jumpfest.org/

All Work and No Play

Today, February 2nd, was a powder day. Plain and simple. A sick, rad, sweet, rippin', epic, choking on it, take a sick day, play hooky, grin until your face hurts kind of powder day. Thankfully, just in case we didn't make the most of it because we were working too hard in the Okemo Ski + Ride School (note the radio harness on my chest in the photo), it's still snowing as I write and we'll have another powder day tomorrow. I try to stay away from shameless self-promotion here on my blog and to focus instead on interesting thoughts and experiences relating to my life and work in skiing. But, there are times in my life and work when the skiing and riding is so great that it reaches metaphysical status and we just need to rip some turns in the pow. And then we gloat by sharing photographic evidence.

Thanks go to my friend and colleague Chris Saylor for taking the time to take some photos. Believe me, when the skiing is this good, stopping to take photos is a big sacrifice!

Your faithful blogger inspecting the product on Ledges at Okemo.

A Teacher’s Pantry

I love to cook. I'm more of an enthusiastic cook than a good one, but I do love it. Ok, truth be told, I do really enjoy cooking but what I love to do is eat! Come to think of it, I'm pretty hungry right now. Hmm. Oh, sorry, I digress. I do have something to say about cooking and ski teaching here, so bear with me.

A good friend of mine who is a ski instructor here at Okemo is also a very gifted chef. He and his wife run a restaurant not far from Ludlow, Vermont that is an oasis of great food in an area that isn't exactly known for being the center of alpine gastronomy. Every Wednesday, my friends close their restaurant and hold cooking classes in its kitchen. The mis en place is moved out of the way, eight or so stools are set up on one side of the large prep area, and place settings and cutting boards are set in front of each place. After telling me last week how excited he was for Bistro Night and that there was still a seat available, I took up my friend's invitation and attended for the first time.

Before the cooking began, my friend passed to each of the guests a handout. On its pages were lists of ingredients for each dish to be prepared and one long list of items everyone should have in their pantry if they intend to prepare restaurant quality meals. The guests, myself included, all perused the pages and were surprised to find no instructions for the dishes, no recipes per se. Rather, the document contained only ingredients listed with approximate measurements and the pantry list. To the disappointment of a couple of the guests, the chef explained that he didn't like to follow recipes to the letter and that if we wanted to be able to prepare great meals, truly gourmet meals, we'd have to free ourselves from slavish recipe following as well. With the right ingredients found in a well-stocked pantry, an understanding of how each affected the 'flavor profile' of a dish, and some knowledge of how each is best cooked, great dishes are crafted with a little trial and error, constantly testing and modifying, and sometimes simply making it up as you go. My friend took great pains to tell us that cooking is not science and that if he had wanted to prepare dishes scientifically, he'd have been a baker.

It was a pleasure to watch him work. The chef walked us through the creation of some traditional bistro dishes and some less traditional ones, explaining as he went, providing some helpful tips about the cooking process, the ingredients he likes to use, and other details. All the while he tasted, adjusted, seasoned, told stories, fed us a little at a time to keep us from getting hungry or impatient, and in the end convinced us that great food is achievable by ordinary chefs. It dawned on me, in my duck breast and onion soup induced reverie, that what we were experiencing had all the same ingredients of a great ski lesson. Seriously.

The day that followed the bistro cooking class, after awakening to find that I was still in Vermont and not in the Haute Savoie, I conducted some training clinics for children's instructors at Stratton, something I do from time to time. The clinics were intended to help these mostly young instructors become better at creating activities in their lessons that would be technically valid, that would help develop the skiing skills of the children in their lessons, and that would be fun and engaging (that fun thing is pretty big). The title I created for the clinic was "Skills Focused Kids Activities". Informally, some people refer to these sorts of clinics as "bag of tricks" training. I really dislike the idea of "bag of tricks", and much prefer my own subtitle for this clinic. I refer to this clinic informally as "how to make stuff up", only I don't always use the word "stuff".

My point here is simple, if not verbose. In many ways, becoming a gifted children's instructor is far more difficult, far more nuanced, and requires far more attention than becoming a good adult instructor. With kids one has to understand the movements of skiing and be able to explain them in laymen's terms, one has to be able to identify and focus on one aspect of skiing in particular that will assist all of the students in a group. One must keep the class moving, keep it interesting, engaging, and fun. Yes, all this is true of adult lessons as well, but in the case of kids, instructors have to do all of this in a language and with an energy appropriate for their charges. It's a lot of work and it's a challenge, but it's a ton of fun.

So, like the class in my friend's kitchen, having a properly stocked pantry with fresh ingredients and a few interesting tricks up one's sleeve (Yuzu juice? Really?) is the start of a great lesson, but it's only the start. The process of creating a ski or snowboard lesson is far more craft than science, and the instructor's interaction with the students and awareness of their needs, their feelings, their movements, and their comprehension is the most important guide to how to put the final dish together.

For dessert, we're all going to learn how to ski in deep powder. It'll be the icing on the cake.

My friends John and Leslie own and operate Leslie's Tavern in Rockingham, Vermont. Their website is http://www.lesliestavern.com/, and information about their cooking classes, retail shop and other tidbits is available there. John cooks and Leslie bakes and runs the front of the house. If you go, make sure you arrive hungry.