Heroin

Just the other evening I met my son for dinner in downtown Chicago. The dank, gray, gloomy, winter weather was making itself felt in many unpleasant ways as we walked towards the restaurant.  Out of nowhere, a cri de coeur burst from my soul.

“I miss Colorado, Nick.”

Instantly he whirled on me.  “And you think I don’t, Dude?” he asked accusingly.

“But you go to Cali (fornia) every other week,” I countered.  (Nick’s wife, Melissa, works in Los Angeles and he commutes.  Very post-modern marriage.)  “I know you like it out there.  You’re always saying how the weather is great and you love the ocean and skateboarding and stuff… I didn’t think you thought about Colorado much any more.”

“Yeah, that’s true,” Nick admitted.  “Southern California is pretty nice- the weather and all- but compared to Colorado it’s just… it’s just…methadone.  If you know what I mean.”

I knew EXACTLY what he meant.  He had chosen the perfect word to describe SoCal and how it’s a poor, synthetic substitute for Rocky Mountain junkies like us.  As lovely as it is, Southern California is just an artificial crutch to wean off your dependency when you can’t score your drug of choice.  In my case, Snowmass, Colorado.

(I’ll throw in Aspen and Denver, too.  Nick would add Silverton, Boulder and Jackson Hole- even though that’s Wyoming.  But he loves it because it reminds him of what Aspen used to be like.)

We’re hooked.  We’ve got it bad and that ain’t good.

I first got my first “taste” of the Rocky Mountain high in July of 1976.  The bi-centennial summer.  Bill and I drove out there on a belated honeymoon- along with his three adorable daughters- Julie, then fifteen, (she would turn sixteen on the sixteenth as we were driving back to Chicago.  The first time I had ever heard the expression “magic birthday.”) Patti, then eleven, and Amy, nine.  And Dorothy, friend of Julie and also fifteen.

We stayed at Lift One.  Aspen Central.  We did all the regulation summertime Aspen things: white water raft trips, barbecues, (I have a great picture of Bill trying to goose up the fire with a hair dryer) fishing at Maroon Bells, hiking, and horseback riding at the T Lazy Seven ranch.  Bill tried kayaking.  The girls and I opted for the more dangerous sport of high-end Aspen shopping.

It was fun, of course.  But the addiction did not set in then.  If anything, I was a little unsettled by the “rich hippie” vibe of stores like Therapy, and the outlandish-even back then- prices at Donnie’s Hot Dog Stand.  And I found the people we met pretentious, arty and generally weird.  They were like poser flower children self-consciously playing Cowboys- and no Indians.

But the second time we went back it was winter.  Casimir Pulaski Day, March 1990.  Nick had used his veto power to hijack the family plans for another unremarkable sojourn in Longboat Key and he had turned it into a Colorado ski vacation instead.

By that time we had many good friends who were fortunate enough to have second homes there.  And they were all going to be in them over that peculiarly-Illinoisian holiday long weekend.

The snow gods blessed the venture from the start.  The Ross family headed to Snowmass.  (A bedroom community of Aspen.  Equipped back then with a teeny mall, a tiny post office, a so so food market, and one very big kick-ass mountain.)

Natasha and Nick already knew how to ski.  (Nick, if you happen to read this, sorry I let your secret out of the bag.  I know that you would prefer- in the time-honored tradition of boarders everywhere- that I never mention the fact the you were ever a two-planker.  But I am sworn to uphold the truth here.)

And I think Bill was a never-ever.  But he was going to giving it a try.  When in Rome after all…

I had tried it once in high school at Wilmot- a small ski area in Wisconsin.  I cluelessly had gone in jeans and I can still remember how frozen they (and I ) were after several skirmishes with the bunny hill.  Once was quite enough, thank you.  Or so I thought.

But I have never flinched from a shopping opportunity, and when I saw my flat, unremarkable behind encased in tight-fitting Bogner ski pants bought especially for the upcoming Aspen excursion, little unathletic me thought “I’ve found my sport!”  I was determined to give skiing another go.

And Bill dared me.  The night before we were scheduled to hit the slopes he said, “I will if you will. I dare you!”

Well.

Fate led me to Hays, a godsend of a ski instructor.  Sandy-haired, blue-eyed Robert Mitchum lookalike, he was infinitely patient, truly funny and an all-around great guy.  And from my first timid run down Fanny Hill, I knew that I was in good hands and more importantly, I had found my sport.

Terror or not, I loved the feeling that skiing gave me.  A heady mix of adrenalin and free fall.  And after one half-day lesson when Hays asked doubtfully “Will I see you again tomorrow, Tiger?” I found myself- to both my astonishment and his- answering “Yes.”

Meanwhile, as I was negotiating the rigors of the t-bar lift and the complexities of the ski boot fastenings, Bill had been busy too.  He had spotted a small condo development right on the way to the mountain and had studied the units from the outside.  Long story short, when we returned home four days later, the Ross family had been forever transformed.

We had gone out casual visitors.  We came home: one new, mad snowboarder (Nick), one graceful, sunshine-only skier (Natasha), one “I’d rather be playing golf type (Bill), and one “I love it all!  I want more!  When do we come back?!  OMG!” (Me.)

And now we were Snowmass condo-owners to boot.  They were going to build us one in phase two of the twelve unit-only site and it would be camera-ready for Christmas.

Nick echoed all my sentiments.  And when we did return the following Christmas to our very own mini-chalet, he looked around it in awe and rapture.  “I’ve waited all my life for a ski house in Colorado,” he murmured reverently.  (He was all of ten at the time, but still, I got what he meant.)

It was for him- and me- a pipe dream come to life.  We both were hopelessly hooked from that day to this.

And, as we continued our cold, dreary walk up that windy Chicago street the other night, Nick concluded his “methadone” comment with the universal wish of addicts everywhere.

“You know, Dude?” he said dreamily. “If I ever win the lottery I am buying a place in Woody Creek.”

“Not Snowmass, Nick?” I queried.  “You loved it there.”

“Nope,” he was adamant.  “Woody Creek. I want space.”

But I barely heard him.  I was already gone, nodding out in a haze of longing, memory, desire…

“Okay, Woody Creek it is,” I vaguely agreed.  But one look at my son told me that he, too, was off somewhere else now, chasing the dragon. He was lost in a world of epic, back country uncharted powder, azure blue skies, first tracks.  I didn’t want to break the spell.

And, as I nodded out in my own private reverie, I had one last, sweet, semi-coherent drug-induced thought.

That ranch better have an awesome mother-in-law apartment.

Us junkies need to get high together.