Sugar Rush

The kids’ candy stash is full. They ran around collecting pieces and now they can enjoy their sweet success. Halloween brings a different kind of sweet success for me. It is the time when I prepare for a season of ski patrolling. I collect the pieces: study outdoor emergency skills that may have grown rusty over the summer, take the online quizzes from National Ski Patrol, renew my CPR certification, and take the in-person refresher tests with my fellow patrollers. It is a time when I come back together with a group of people who are all as excited as I am to feel the cold mornings and look for the first flakes of snow in the sky. The anticipation is palpable. This winter could be epic! Is it usually this cold at the end of October? I think I heard that we’re supposed to have a good snow year. These are the starts to the conversations this time of year. Only time will tell how much snow will pile up, but for now, I can almost feel the weightlessness of flying through feet of powder and it’s sweeter than a pillowcase full of candy.