Theres a common superstition among skiers to never call Last Run.
If you do, chances are youll do something stupid or get hurt in a freak accident.
Instead, weve developed our workarounds: Two more, but skip the last?
Want to make this run our second-to-the-last?
Call it in two?
We dance around any kind of assertive statement that these will be the last turns we make today.
For me, it feels a little like saying see you later instead of goodby.
Theres just such a numbing finality to calling it your last run.
It makes it feel so over, so done.
They might not have called their last spin up the last time they skied, but it was.
And for once its not weather or insurance dependent.
And now, for most of us, thats over.
Chances are that I skied my last inbounds run of the season last Sunday.
It wasnt anything to write home about.
I spent the next week getting medical work done and didn’t ski.
Now its dumping snow and the resort is closed.
I want to savor that last run.
And maybe that could still happen.
Maybe this thing will just blow over and well get back to the business of making turns.
I made those last turns blissfully unaware of their import.
They weren’t great, but at least they were pure.
There will be a final ski run before I never ski again.
The chapter of Cy Whitling: Skier will be finished.
But the events of the last few months have added a little perspective to that.
In my imagined scenarios, I always see that last run coming.
Ive always had the privilege of time to plan it, to anticipate it.
And nothing guarantees us another day in the mountains.
So wash your hands, check on your people, and stop hoarding hand sanitizer.
But I am going to double-check to milk every last drop out of whatever turns I do get.
