Transitioning from the Mountain Into My Writer’s Life

My Fortune

I came across the above fortune a few weeks ago in our local Chinese restaurant here in Telluride, Colorado. That was when I was in the throes of spring break craziness and the end of ski season was drawing near. It seemed most à propos since I was already contemplating my flip side, or how I would soon transition from a predominantly physical existence–that of a ski instructor–to the more cerebral ponderings required of a writer.

Indeed, at that point I was craving a good read and near desperate to sit still for a while and give my body a rest. As hard as I may try, reading and writing during ski season is always a challenge, especially from February on when I go full tilt. I’m just too tired at the end of the day to do much more than swill a glass of wine from my couch, and so the stack of books on my nightstand piles up as high as the writing assignments awaiting me at my desk.

Ski season is too short to carve out much time for my other passions:  reading and writing. But as soon as the fair weather hits, I begin to sink into the mode of spending endless hours at my desk, on my couch and in my bed wrapped up in words and stories and all kinds of projects, all integral parts of the writer’s life. It is then that I become almost painfully inactive, something that’s required in order to log the time necessary to keep my freelancing life afloat. Sure I take hikes, ride bikes, do yoga and swim from time to time but it makes up a small part of my week, especially by Telluride standards.

Perhaps that’s why I embrace the physicality of ski season with such love and enthusiasm-even though it always half kills me. For the first time in eleven years of teaching skiing, I woke up with a nasty cold the day after the mountain closed. It turned into a sinus infection and for over a week now I feel like I’m being tossed and turned about on turbulent seas. My vertigo is so great that I can barely steady myself to do my post ski season stretches, I feel like I have half a brain and an incessant white noise has become the soundtrack in my head. Funnily enough, about the only thing I feel comfortable doing is lying still on my couch and bed while enjoying some light reading.

I suppose this is what I need most right now. The universe has fast-forwarded me into my other world, one that’s far less physically demanding, albeit super topsy turvy for the moment. With time and more doses of garlic, antibiotics and Vitamin C, I’m sure I’ll get my Zip-a-dee-doo-dah back and report on all that I want to share with everyone. Shifting gears can be tough particularly when there are hiccups along the way such as sickness.

So my transition is more slow this year although I know my life will even out soon enough. We all seek balance and I think I’ve found it by juggling my writer’s life with being a ski instructor in the winter. I’m trying to surrender to this flow–no matter how clogged the rivers of my brain feel right now.

Allez, it’s time to exercise my mind more than my body. This year’s ski season will soon be a distant memory and next winter will be here before you know it!

What’s your flip side?