Dear Reader: This week’s Revelation is culled from the pages of Snowbird Secrets. It’s a meditation on trees and the part they play in our lives as skiers. In the turbulent times we live in, trees form temples of timeless tranquility where peace has a sound all its own.
On Trees
The trees were here first, and so perhaps it’s fitting they should provide the last shelter, the forested fortress to which we resort when all other venues have been trampled into submission. In the trees we can still find, tucked around the next corner, a pillow of essence preserved just for us. The trees are the guardians of the last stash.
They are also the cure for vertigo. When storms settle into this canyon, the most open expanses on the upper mountain are exercises in minimalist art, alabaster on ecru, with every normally discernable detail eradicated. This has a disabling effect on the inner ear, which sends an urgent message to the optic nerve to give it a reference, anything that will shed light on which way is down. The trees know, and are happy to oblige. Their magnificent immobility provides an axis around which our vastly diminished universe can orbit.
Vanessa Aadland running through the woods. [Photo by Jay Dash]
When we’re in the trees, they become the center of our turns, the radial point around which we rotate. They live in the center because we cannot permit them to intersect the perimeter. When we are in motion in the woods, the trees become dark matter, substance seen yet not encountered, light’s dark twin. For the way to ski the trees is to seek the edge of light, the blush of photons on an evergreen limb that promises an opening, an invitation to stay in the flow where rhythm and faith guide our descent.
Visualization and anticipation have their limitations in the trees, as it’s ipso facto difficult to see very far ahead. Proceeding apace is a matter of belief, a safe, forward projection of the self in time and space. We continue because we know the coast is clear; whatever obstacle appears around the next corner, we will have all the time we need to avoid. Trees somehow induce the concentration it requires to ski them; we focus so intently on a path we cannot see that the veil of self-consciousness is stripped away. We become our movements, beings of pure sensation.
The trick to skiing the trees is to not be in a hurry. There’s enough room, there’s enough time, as long as you move in the path the trees have allowed, which is usually not the fast lane. When you find the rhythm of the forest, your line keeps opening up before you, as if the trees were guiding you. If you also sense that they are protecting you, it’s because they are. The woods are a sanctuary from wind and an oasis of visibility when the rest of the world is plunged in whiteness.
The trees want us to succeed. They understand our role in the energy flow, how we nourish the mountain who is their matriarch. Why else would they exchange the vile gas we exhale for sweet, fresh oxygen, if not to sustain us? We are not the only beings with a purpose to their presence here.
The trees shape the notes; our paths through them share the silences where they resonate. We move in the hallways the trees left for themselves, their public space, territory they own even if they don’t presently occupy it. As we trespass their property, we ski the trees by ignoring them, by setting our energy radar for the next glimmer of light and willing ourselves through it. To stare at a tree while in flight is to grant it the power of attraction, the amazing facility an animated but immobilized entity has to pull us into its thrall. Treat each tree as if it were Medusa and look anywhere but at it.
Skiing the trees is about being fluid and elastic, about feeling, about heart telling head to go take a shower. If your monkey mind is chattering away, you won’t feel small changes in the slope underneath, your best information source in a world that may not extend more than a few feet ahead. When your mind gets quiet you can see the softer shade of green, reflected light off evergreen boughs, indicating the slit-wide opening to the path ahead. Each flicker of light is a promise, each arc an expectation, catalyzed by the endorphin rush of sinking into satin snow.
On an overcast, blustery day when the light is flat, it’s time to head for the Bananas Trees off the top of the Gad 2 chair. The snow the wind has removed from the exposed slopes will have loaded into the woods, so it should be safe to pick any entry point skier’s left off Gadzooks, but exercise some caution as the line is steep, rolling and slightly off camber. The tree spacing is gracious but irregular and gets tight here and there. Keep your shoulders square to the hill and your feet ready to dance. The slope angle will naturally feed you towards Bananas, but if you veer off skier’s right and cross Gadzooks, you’ll discover the oft-overlooked Bananas Bowl. A line of trees blocks a clear view of the entry, so look for a substantial piece of artillery as your gateway indicator. The top of the bowl drops off steeply, but it’s a clean, open shot with plenty of room to run until you re-connect either with Gadzooks or the northwest- facing tree lines skier’s right of Lift Line. As the relentless steeps finally start to flatten out, bleed some speed or you may hit a cat- track by surprise, providing an unforgettable moment. To scope out the various tree lines between Lift Line and S.T.H., give the area a close inspection from the Gad 2 chair, which we recommend you board again, for the trees always reserve a powder pocket for those with the will to find it.
Many generations ago, men believed trees held the memory of all the events to which they have been witness. Whether you still believe that or not, surely the tree stores some record within each band that marks its annual growth. Trees are children of the circle, upright echoes of the giant vortex generators they anchor. When we move through their space with focused minds and open hearts, the awe we feel is like being in a cathedral or other holy monument, sensing the presence of spirits that we feel as a heightened acuity, a sharper attention to detail, and suddenly yet unhurriedly the line ahead is clear. We slide among the sentinels to our history, writing our own transient footnote below their vaulted, vibrating canopy.
The forest provides a refuge from more than just weather. It’s an arena for sounds we can’t hear, for a silence that seems alive. We live in a very noisy world, bombarding some of our senses into dysfunction. The trees absorb all the sound in our spectrum and in their encompassing silence create a retreat where we can rediscover reverence. In return, the trees grant us some of their grounding, trying to teach us to understand where we stand.
Let the light be your guide through the trees.
If you enjoyed this Revelation, please make a vow to do three things: buy a copy of Snowbird Secrets, regularly visit Guru Dave’s Snow Report and visit Snowbird itself, a majestic mountain with many such lessons to share.