545 miles from St. John's and back in Utah it's 9:00 pm. Just finished watching "Into the Wild" from my business class recliner. I've just experienced a world class "how'd I get here" moment. I'm a long way from Wilmot, Wisconsin, and reflecting over that thought. I may be a long distance from my small midwestern home, but I've had feelings of nostalgia since the credits rolled on the movie. There was a scene that reminded me of my father's father. It has been a long time now since he's passed, but I still feel his presence from time to time. Maybe it's because I am at 30,000 feet, but he was here tonight without a boarding pass. I can still see him as vivid as life struggling to cross a dry riverbed to show us the way to our goal one day in the north country woods of my father's youth. My ski adventures have roots that run deep into the midwestern soil beneath an old chair lift still wrapped in upholstery that grandpa installed chair by chair back when boots where leather and edges had screws. I often have moments on journeys like these that make me question how I ended up here doing these things. I think that is when he puts his wisdom on my shoulder and reassures me that he brought me here, turn by turn.
I've loaded up a shorty that I made a while back also that tends to run along similar lines of feel and flow. I made this back near the end of last season when I was starting to feel the pains of a long season. Now it seems almost like reassurance propaganda to myself to keep pushing forward to the end of the season.