The Ars man and the ski

There was a boy and he loved to ski. He loved it because his father taught him and he loved his father. The boy loved the mountain too, because without the mountain he could not ski.

The boy grew up and learned about computers and jet planes and other worlds, but he did not forget the mountain. Once a year with his father he would ski on it, even though he had become a man now and was no longer a child. But the mountain remained a mountain, and its heart was stone.

The boy who had become a man then became a writer. His stories were sometimes too long, but the writer wrote them anyway. “I will write until I am done writing and then what I have written will be as long as it needs to be,” he said. His editors fought with him, and the writer fought them back, and his editors were strong. In his heart, he cursed at them. But the writer had learned perseverance from the mountain.

“I write because it is what I do,” said the writer, “but I ski, too. Am I a writer or a skier? A bird flies but also nests; is it a bird because it flies or something else because it nests? I will do what I must do.”

So he left his writing for a week and returned to the mountain. The mountain had not forgotten the writer, but the mountain did not love the writer like the writer loved the mountain.

The writer awoke early one morning and went out to ski. His skis were new. They were made with skill by craftsmen. The writer had faith in them. His jacket was warm but the air was cold, because skiing must be done in winter.

The writer rode the chairlift up, up, up the mountain. When the writer had been a boy, he had fallen, but boys can fall and get back up again. To a boy a fall is nothing. But to a man a fall is more. “Mountain,” thought the writer, “I have come to ski on you. And I will not fall because I have brought new skis and my skis are strong. I will go fast because I love skiing and I will ski with skill, and my jacket will keep me warm against your cold.”

The writer was strong, but in the writer’s pride, he forgot that the mountain was strong, too.

And so the writer reached the top of the mountain and skied down, but the snow was treacherous. The writer turned as one does, for to ski is to turn from one way to the other, using the edges of the strong skis to hold to the mountain. The writer turned too quickly and he fell. Time stretched. The writer felt his foot twist in his new boots, felt his strong skis separate from the boots. The mountain came up, up, up. The writer knew that he was falling into the mountain and that it was implacable.

“A boy,” thought the writer as he fell, “is light and small. When a boy falls, it is nothing. The boy might cry but he will not be hurt. He will get up and then he will play, because children can bend and twist, bend and twist, like a willow tree. But to fall as a man—that is a different thing. A man is not a willow tree. A man can be hurt when he falls. And I am going very fast. I am falling and I am a man and I am going very fast.

“But maybe I will not hurt myself too badly,” thought the writer as he hit the ground.

He slid upon the mountain for a long time. His father and his father’s brother watched him slide. They skied behind and helped gather his fine skis and poles and his hat, because his hat also had come off, as hats do.

When the writer stopped, he knew that he had hurt himself because he felt pain like the mountain, strong and great. “I have hurt myself,” said the writer.

“I am a man. I have done this.”

A ski patrol woman came along. She knew the mountain better than the writer. The writer looked at the woman and the woman looked at the writer.