Almost Paradise -Part I

Restless and Discontent

Post Introduction:

When I complete a Substack post, I go to my newsfeeds to search for the next topic of interest. As my readers and subscribers have come to expect, my topics vary widely from business and politics to religion and philosophy. If the topic captures my imagination enough to warrant 1500 words, I develop it into a future post. Recently, I stumbled upon an article talking about the "suicide belt" of the American Rocky Mountains. Specifically, the article described how suicide rates had quadrupled in America's mountain towns. My research on this topic led me to a recent documentary titled The Paradise Paradox produced by Podium Pictures and Hall of Fame skier Bode Miller. It is available on Amazon Prime for a nominal fee.

As a lifelong skier, visitor to many of those resort towns in the "suicide belt" and a recovering alcoholic, I relate to the mental health struggles that many in America's resort towns experience. I feel compelled to share my recovery journey, not because it is ever pleasant recounting the low dark crevices of my past, but in the hopes that my story may help someone who is struggling with depression, anxiety or addiction find hope and recovery. My work on this topic will span multiple posts. If you connect with any part of my story, please sign up for a free or paid subscription. Moreover, if my story compels you into further action, consider donating to one of the mountain town organizations working to expand mental health services and stem the tide of suicides.

 

I.  Restless and Discontent

Dealing with restless discontent has been one of the greatest challenges of my life. From as early as I can remember, I was never satisfied with what was directly in front of me, I ever sought worlds beyond my reach. When I was young, I thought my longing was simply adventure. Man, after all, is a being endowed with an innate desire for adventure and I was merely following that nature. Visits to the local library found me in the periodical section, reading National Geographic or Science magazines and my book check out list included such authors as Jack London, Earnest Hemmingway, J.R.R. Tolkien, and C.S. Lewis. I admired explorers, innovators and travelers and wanted to become one. When I was five years old, my family gathered around a black and white television to witness Apollo 11 first touchdown on the moon. Before that time, no human from Earth had ever touched any other celestial body. If man could touch the moon, a little boy could certainly explore the lands in the next subdivision.

Restless discontent was my nature growing up in a northern Minnesota resort town. Never content with the yards, fields, and lakes before me, I dragged my neighborhood buddies to new locations, ever exploring what it was like somewhere else. My mind never focused on my present location, no, I was always dreaming of what it would be like to be anywhere new. I can assure you, having that kind of daydreaming of adventure was not appreciated by my elementary school teachers. Apparently, they believed pupils sitting in neat rows with hands folded patiently upon their desks and living in the present moment was a thing all humans desired. My utter lack of being able to "cherish" the immediate educational moment before me got me sent to principal Lee's office on many occasions. He was even less sympathetic to my yearning to break the education chains that bound me to the here and now of teaching.

When I was about twelve years old, restless discontent met the sport of downhill skiing. I fashioned my father's lace-up ski boots to a used pair of wooden-cored Blizzard skis and immersed myself in my newfound sporting adventure. Every weekend I could, I was skiing the tiny bump known as Detroit Mountain just outside my hometown. I subscribed to Skiing magazine and plastered my bedroom walls with posters of people skiing untouched powder. To this day, the pure joy captured on the face of a skier in chest-deep powder is unmatched in any other sport. I studied the ski locales of the upper Peninsula of Michigan and of the Rocky Mountains. I longed for the chance to adventure to one of those classic ski resorts. Back in the 70s, the big names in skiing were Aspen, Vail, Steamboat Springs, Heavenly Valley, and Snowbird. The monthly periodicals I received were loaded with articles, photos and advertisements for those iconic ski resorts.

By the time my obsession to absorb everything about skiing was in full swing, the legendary Warren Miller had been filming the world's best skier for 30 years. His movies put the posters on my bedroom wall into motion and allowed me to observe, not just what the skiers were doing, but how they tackled the gnarly mountain terrains before them. Here is Miller's Tribute to the Pioneers of Skiing short. No one had a bigger impact on the sport of skiing than Miller. He began filming skiers in 1950 and has over 750 published sports works in his name.

In addition to my Skiing magazines, I was mesmerized by the skiers Miller captured on film descending pristine mountain tracks, chest deep in fresh champagne powder. The beauty, grace, and style with which the skiers floated through the snow was like nothing I could ever experience at my tiny little hill in northern Minnesota. In Minnesota, we do not ski high altitude vertical drops, we ski into low altitude holes in the ground. In the Midwest, we don’t ski runs, we ski laps. Whereas at a typical Rocky Mountain ski resort, one would be lucky to get three complete runs in under an hour. In Minnesota, if the lift lines are not too long, one could easily ski ten or more laps per hour. Also, our cold low altitude atmosphere, though it can produce a fair amount of snow, never produces the quality of powdery snow that one finds above 8000 feet.

Once I got hooked on skiing, especially in the winter, my daydreaming distractions from mundane educational pursuits focused on skiing. Instead of paying attention to my teachers, I was doodling in the margins of my notebook. Mountains, stick figures skiing, various logos of equipment I longed to buy. Olan skis, Look bindings, Scott polls and Nordica ski boots. I visualize them and scheme desperately on how I may acquire them. Skiing, after all, is not a sport for the faint at heart, as it requires enduring harsh conditions, cold weather and difficult terrain. Skiing is also not a sport for the financially meager. Back in the 70's when I took up skiing, as it is now, the cost for equipment, clothing and lift tickets was expensive. My parents did not share my same enthusiasm for the sport and were unwilling to provide me with the new equipment that I desired. To fund my skiing wishes, I worked hard mowing yards in the summer and washing dishes at our family restaurant until I earned enough money to acquire the equipment that I obsessed over in the margins of my schoolwork.

By the time I was fifteen, was getting pretty good at skiing the local hills of Minnesota, I had the right equipment according to my pre-on-line research in the ski magazines and I watched hours of the world's best skiers in the Warren Miller films and televise world ski cup events. All I was missing was a western mountain to test my skills. In my next installment, boy meets mountain and the adventure continues…