We do things because they feel good.

Think about it, that’s why we have sex.  Oh, it expresses our love for the other person, but it’s the SENSATION that keeps us coming back for more.  Life is about sensations.

How can I explain skiing to you?  You know when you bite into that dark chocolate, and your eyes form slits and you involuntarily smile?  That’s what the skiing’s been like the last two days.  Like a gourmet meal, made up of unexpected delights, with a hot shower and then a bit of sex thereafter.

Yesterday dawned just a little bit too cold.  It started out at 23 degrees.  It LOOKED warm, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, but the snow…it was rock hard on the north side, on the main face, the one that leads down into town.  But in the Back Bowls??  It was like being at the BEACH!

Do you know that scene in "The Heartbreak Kid", wherein Charles Grodin is lying on the beach, looking into the hot Florida sun, blinded by the light, just before Cybil Shepherd shows up to block the rays and say he’s lying in her spot?  THAT’S what the rays were like in Vail’s Back Bowls Thursday.

After a run on the rock hard Swingsville, we dropped into the Slot in Sun Up Bowl and it was like dropping into a hot fudge sundae.  Each turn scooping up a bit of vanilla, the hot fudge being the sensation of HAPPINESS inside.  Like we’d waited our whole lives for this.  It was SO good, we had to do it AGAIN!

And then over to the Poppyfields in Siberia Bowl.  It was groomed as smooth as Scarlett Johansson’s skin.  And there wasn’t another soul ON IT!  Imagine going to a Yankee game and being the only person in the stadium.  Or the lone attendee at Disneyland.  It was something unique, never experienced, normally the Poppyfields are a MINEFIELD!  But on Thursday, we danced down through the corn alone.

But the piece de resistance was Emperor’s Choice in Tea Cup Bowl.

Maybe someday you’ll go skiing in Europe.  Or maybe you have.  It’s the VASTNESS that blows your mind.  The ENDLESS slopes.  Open for navigation.  The choice OVERWHELMING!  Emperor’s Choice is wider than a football field is long.  And it had been sitting in the sun just long enough.  To be PERFECT!  When Felice arrived at the catwalk at the bottom, she wore a shiteating grin on her face.

Then there was the end of the day.  Endless runs on Avanti.  The namesake run.  Pickeroon.  Pickeroon is like skiing a roller coaster.  You’re zipping along and all of a sudden, there’s a WAVE!  Bigger than the ones in Malibu.  And after cresting the first, there’s another, and one further down, at a different angle.  The texture appeals to you like a chocolate brownie.  You just swirl it around in your mind, loving it, willing it NOT TO END!

Now Thursday was one of those days from the postcards.  Cobalt blue sky without a cloud in evidence.  One could see Mt. Holy Cross.  Standing on top of the mountain, better yet, sliding down from the Mountain Top Express to Avanti, looking at the scenery, one felt that one wanted to bring EVERYBODY he knew there.  To experience the exquisite beauty, the feeling of being ALIVE!

It wasn’t quite as sunny today.  In the morning there were a few clouds in the sky.  And then those white jet trail-formations in the afternoon.  But it was WARMER!  No jacket was necessary.  It was as if you were skiing in JULY!

Today everything melted, everything slushed up.  We started in the Back Bowls.  The Headwall was groomed to perfection.  The Poppyfields were great again.  But the stuff in Tea Cup…we were too late.  It was too soft, too many people had been there.  So we went to Blue Sky Basin.

Those were the runs of the day.  In the back country.  On top of the world.  Skiing amongst the trees on Grand Review and the Star was like being locked up in a marshmallow factory.  Surrounded by fluff.  With the trees representing chocolate swizzle sticks, stirring the goodness.

But these runs were finally exceeded by a zip down Blue Ox.

Blue Ox is a double black.  Groomed once a week.  And yesterday, they groomed it, even though the chair servicing it is CLOSED!  Oh, we started at Two Elk Lodge, cut over on an almost flat cat track, and found ourselves at a beach with a lifeguard station, the Chair 11 off-ramp, but no guards and no bathers.  It was like a private beach in the Hamptons.  A slope JUST FOR US!

It was good yesterday.  But the top was a bit firm.  But today Blue Ox was SPECTACULAR!

Oh, it starts off gently rolling.  But halfway down, Blue Ox FALLS OFF!  Oh, there’s steeper terrain, like Climax at Mammoth, where they had the avalanche on Monday, but other than a couple of slopes at Stowe, nothing on the east coast can touch Blue Ox.  And today it was a carpet of corn snow.  Time to test the limits.  Like opening up the Ferrari, the BMW, the TOYOTA on a desert freeway, we let her RIP!  Nobody was watching.  It was just us.  It was the kind of sensation you live for.  On the edge.  Pushing it.  Knowing that maybe you should slow down, but you can’t, because it feels SO GOOD!

The last two days we closed the lifts.  Made it down to the bottom close to 4:30.  And believe me, that last thousand vertical feet was like water skiing.  But when we walked into the Lodge Thursday, Felice said "We’re in heaven."  And today, as we slogged through the sixty degree heat of Vail Village in our ski boots, she started singing "Summer Breeze".

Summer breeze, makes me feel fine
Blowing through the jasmine in my mind

That’s how we felt.  Not only yesterday and today, but Wednesday too, skiing the pow amongst the trees on Over Yonder.  That feeling that everything is all right in the world.  That what’s going on in D.C. doesn’t matter.  That life is too short, you should just let go, and follow your heart, do what feels right, spend your days in the mountains.

Oh, it sounds stupid.  Strapping two planks to your feet.  And sliding down mountains again and again.  But that’s not what it’s about.  It’s about those moments, those feelings of elation, just like that stinging electric guitar in "Summer Breeze".