I pretty much gave up on snowboarding a few years back. Most friends were of the “weekend skiers and riders” variety who said things like, “I really prefer ‘blue squares’,” and, “Oh you do those ‘black diamonds’?” …and not that that is bad or anything—we should have a general idea of our limits—but also a big part is setting new bars.
For years I had a place in VT, and a lot of people would come up. Some great stories were made. But I was burning out: too many midday breaks where we would have to wait for ______. Should we go in and get a “hot toddy”? Stuff like that had just torn the fun of snowboarding out of me. Long gone were the skate park runs off of Cirque at the Bird, or lapping Milicent chairs at Brighton. There weren’t even great eastern feature runs at Killington anymore.
I was about to hang it up: I stopped with the house in VT and shoved my board into the closet. I couldn’t care either way if I stepped on it again. And then something magical happened: DP got the bug. He started going up with us. We went and bought him a board and full setup. He ended up buying a car specifically to go snowboarding.
When I stepped back on my board, it was like I was seventeen again, bombing things, figuring out how to launch off this and that. Now look, I’m not seventeen, and the past years of “pleasure-riding” had really taken a toll on my ability. But within a season, DP and I were tuned up, and he actually could ride faster and go bigger. We both had areas that we “owned” and could push one another at. I hadn’t had this much drive to push the limit since Windells in 2000, or Utah in ’94.
I prefer back-country type stuff. I like it steep, I like it deep, and I want to float. DP had a little park in him, although when he gave up skating, he missed a large portion of the style and foundation from where the tricks are based. But he had a huge sack and would attack everything and anything in the park. A great moment was when I started working with him on rotations and grabs, and he nailed his first frontside-360. It was really something else. I would tape him, and we would look later that day and talk about balance points and ollies. He would push me to do more shit in the park, and I would bring him over the edge of a cornice into the deep white.
These last few days have sucked from a riding perspective. Not having David with me last season basically made me lose all the gains we had made. I was back to leisure-riding. Nobody was there to push the limits. We had some great days last year—don’t get me wrong. Every time I stepped on the snow and every time I did, it was with David, and we both knew that we were going to push one another.
I stood in the tram, and the whole way up, it’s like, “I am sooo not interested in being here.” I’m on the chairlift, and I look left… it’s just empty. Pretty much like how my riding has been. I have these little bips of enjoyment, but for the most part, it’s just going through the motions. Yesterday was just a mess. I could get down the tracked-out chutes and navigate my way through the trees, but it was joyless. When I got to the connection trails, it was as if I started riding two days ago. I was speed-checking all over the place. I’m sliding out on kiddie runs. I wouldn’t even take a line through the kiddie park. I was ready to throw in the hat. When I woke up this morning, I decided to rent a car and try a different resort. I drove over the pass through Idaho to Targhee. It was a really nice ride, but the whole time, I found myself just talking to the passenger seat at motherfucking David for not being with me.
I took a few runs and cranked up the headphones with some “get it going” music. But the only thing worth riding were groomers. And they were good—great, in fact—but I had to literally tell myself to ride the whole run through, to not stop, to stop speed-checking, to quit being a pussy and put the gas on it. I took a total of like six chairs before I was completely bored.
Snowboarding, skating, surfing… all these sports are a challenge. It’s not a team thing—it’s you pushing yourself to a point and then driving beyond that. But the thing I’ve always loved most about them all is the personal style and how and why you progress. You wanted to go off the jump or the cliff or the cat track, and you added that style because it represented you. But it only mattered if somebody else saw it. For one, there’s just the safety thing: If I get crushed in the trees, it’s just me out there, and I will have to hope that somebody else is going to take that same line and find me.
But there is also the purpose and that is seeing somebody else doing something and their style. And vice versa, pushing yourself to be seen.
That is what it was all about. You learned tricks; you pushed yourself because you’re being pushed and pushing others. David reignited that flame in me after all those years of leisure runs and lazy lunches, and now… that is gone. It has been gone going on two seasons now. And it sucks because even though David was smaller, our builds were similar, so it was like being able to talk to yourself in the mirror. Maybe shift this way or that… “Hey, did you see that sketchy tree on the way down? Let’s hit that!”
I don’t have a solve for this yet. It just blows because sure, I have some friends who are great riders, but they aren’t going to be there every time I strap in. So it’s like you have to wake up each day and hope you find a crew of people who you can follow and slowly inject yourself into their little group once you’ve determined their level. Trust me, especially in a place like Jackson, you hop off the tram and just go following a group of people you might just find yourself looking over the edge of a 25’ cliff with, with no way out. So I’ve been just dicking about the mountain, riding like a three-day-old rider, getting ticked at the conditions, and just generally being bummed that my greatest riding buddy isn’t exploring two entirely new mountains with me.
Again, I don’t know how to fix this one. It’s like the passion I had for this sport was a place I could go when I needed to get out of my head. When David showed up, the experience quadrupled, and now that he is gone, it’s as if the entire joy of the sport—a sport that I was originally into in the first place—has also been taken from me.
I say it a lot in the posts: Surviving suicide is like losing the ability to walk or talk. You just have to believe you are going to be able to walk again, or to speak again. But getting back on your feet will require you to endure the most excruciating pain before you can even take three steps, let alone run. That’s what this feels like. I have to find the enjoyment in this again. The sucky part is in this circumstance… I’m not sure I want to.
