30pictureschallenge: Day 3

this is winter time in whistler. it looks like it's christmas, but the magic of whistler is that it looks like this all through winter.

things freeze, things stop, things slow. at the same time, there is frenetic energy. the village is filled with visitors; it's a visitor's town.

when fresh snow falls, right down to the village, there's a nice time during the night before it's cleared away and salt laid to make safe paths for those unaccustomed to the white winter underfoot. before it's cleared away, it gives beneath your feet. it makes a sort of muffled crunch, a murmur released as you leave a footprint behind.

it's ankle deep. sometimes it's knee deep. these are the nights you quietly head for home; these nights promise nextmornings filled with pow turns and faces full of snow. your heart fills with the anticipation of it. you smile at strangers as you trudge by them, wading through the fresh snow to the bus stop, and home. you pull your hood up; you wrangle your toque into place under your hood. you check your pockets and pull on the mittens you have stowed there.

the more the snow falls, the wider and fuller your heart becomes. the flakes are big, floaty things; they drift slowly to the ground or they fall thick and fast. you're covered in them as you walk, you brush them out of your face and off your eyelashes. they're wet and cold, but you don't mind; on still snowy nights such things can easily be forgiven.

off the bus, you're making your careful way up a hill that is foiling any cars without winter tyres. you pick a path and patiently put one foot in front of the other, avoiding the slipperiness that comes with packed down snow.

once home, you shake yourself off and shed a wet outer layer; hang up a coat, stash your boots. you rub your hands together and blow into them as you stomp your way up the stairs, buoyant with the magic of the winter world you just traveled through to make it back. upstairs there are housemates, equally happy in their anticipation of what tomorrow will bring on the mountain.

a cup of tea, a brief chat, a plan made for the morning, then bed.

treasure: oh, Canada!

so listen: I'm just going to come right out and say it.

there are days when it rains a lot and you have a headache and generally, it turns out, you're failing a little bit at life. 90% of the time, I love my life. the other 10% i think, damn I wish I'd stayed in Canada.

today is Canada Day, and I'm too far away to be able to get my hands on some Clamato juice for Caesars, or $10 worth of wings at Crystal, or wedges with the infamous Butt-Rub mayo from Dusty's. No Eggs Benny from Wildwood for me (no side of Banana Bread french toast either).

there's no green grass by picturesque lakes to sit on today, either; no snow-capped peaks to surround me; no fresh pow to shred; no bears to thrill/scare the bejeezhus out of me.

oh Canada, I miss your face. the shitty bits of Canada have fallen away to the sands of time, and all I really remember now are the friends, the good times, the all-consuming sense of possibility and non-sensical lack of responsibility and need for decisive behaviours. floating through 3 years of living out amongst the seasons, knucking down for the freezing cold or the hard-to-come-by sunburn, adapting to the weeks on end of rain, the overnight 30cm messing up the bus route but answering your prayers when you awoke to the sound of avi bombs exploding.

I miss the downtimes in the village between seasons, where you get to spend time getting to know the long-termers who have made their lives in Whistler and are not just passing through. I miss the peak season for the parties and the nightclub dancefloor (but no, not the lift lines or the queue out the door of lift coffee co. for a hot beverage).

I miss my friends; my Whistler family. I miss you all so much, and am lucky to have a few of you who followed me back to Armidale (because I got here first). I miss all the food we ate and the ski days we smashed and the apres we soaked up. happiness, plain and simple.

next year I'm going to visit Whistler, Canada, and I'm going to love it all over.

until then - Happy Canada Day.

treasure: whistler

these are two sights i miss... of course there were whole other seasons in whistler, after all i was there 3 years, but it's the snowy times i think of tonight with most wistfulness.

it's actually been a year since i left canada, almost to the day. i read back posts from that time, like this one with all the nervousness and hope, and i'm flung back into it. the feeling of uncertainty in leaving somewhere that you love, where you know the people and the bus route and the best place to drink. i was ready to leave on a lot of different levels, but i can't honestly say that the last few months haven't made me wonder if i should have just quit while i was ahead and stayed put. that's just a wish really, but the truth will set you free, or some such.

it actually hurts me to think about the ease with which my life became snowboard-focused; i have that physical memory but awake from those daydreams to find myself in a place dry of snow. if i think it over now, with the wisdom gained with time, it really was the empowerment of being able to actually do a sport and enjoy it. Until that point in my life, my body was not a physical thing on its own, it was dragged down by all the thinking i've been in the habit of doing my entire waking life. it wasn't much good at anything except for hands to turn pages or wobbly bits to curse in despair or a mouth to make a bit of noise now and then. i used to be all brain, is what i'm saying. for me, snowboarding opened up this world where it actually didn't matter so much how you looked (well, as long as your pants were the right colour and your board had a little street cred) as what you could do. i've waxed lyrical about a lot of the days of revelation i had on the mountain, powder days being the big favourite obviously (read my blog anywhere between mid november 2010 and may 2011 for the full understanding of just how great this all was for me). it did actually change my life, and just the snowboarding would have been enough.

the icing on the whister cake though, or perhaps the eggs that held everything together (not much of a baker; this metaphor has sunken in the middle like a faulty sponge cake) was the everything else. the everything else was mainly the people, partly the view, partly the beer. ah, the beer (i'm still trying to wear off the effects of drinking beer for 3 years solid. i don't drink beer anymore). and the everything else was just right. honestly, there are a few stand-out days for me, but the whole experience passed in a wonderful blur of knowing confidently that there would always be someone to ride with and someone to drink with afterwards.

there were the shitty bits, like being poor or fucking my ankle up or bitchy housemates or that time i left my beer outside too long and it froze, but mostly those things fade into the scope and the colour of the memory i hold dear. honestly, mostly i loved it, and i even knew how lucky i was. that's the thing that gets me about whistler- there were a few complainers but they weren't my friends, and really everyone spent plenty of time and energy acknowledging just how lucky we all were. 'living the dream' is a large category, and you can fit most whistler experiences in there.

a year on, all i have is this lousy tshirt. and i tend to complain, and talk about the good old days,and blog about things i've been thinking about instead of things that happened to me. today, a year later, is i guess a good wake up call to remember why whistler was my favourite place- it's the attitude you take with you.

i'd like to write more about whistler, and i'm certain i will. i started a series of blogs last year called 'things i'll miss about whistler: a series in many parts', but i only managed to get 3 parts finished. there are some unfinished posts in my drafts folder that i hope to breathe new life onto, and with the gift of time perhaps overstate their awesomeness slightly. i'd like to get to that, in fact it's on my writing list now, so stay tuned.

for now, i send love out to whistler and to the people i met there who i miss a bloody lot. to the pow days, to the apres, to the lot of us squished into lounge rooms for pot luck dinners and squished into gondolas heading up the mountain. lots of love going out to you from the comfort of my bed in humble armidale, NSW.

and more to come.

secret: love and other parts of the pickle

at this time of the year it is easier to go down than up. the weather is rubbish. all you want to do is drink.

because it snowed today, like SNOWED EVERYWHERE, and i bought my season pass, and there are all these people that i'm meeeting, who are great and interesting and not full of shit (although there really are a lot of those too), i am in love.

during the day, when there is snow and lattes, this love is all uplifting and whatnot.

at nighttime you end up on facebook chat listening to random people with webcams who have posted videos on youtube, terrible covers of songs you like.

being in love is exhilirating but somehow melancholy when reality sets in and you are, for all intents and purposes, alone.

maybe if i focused my love upon one person instead of loving everybody.

but then how would i save the planet?

day 21. a picture of something that makes you happy

christmas eve 2009.
on my way down to dusty's, my favourite pub in whistler, to drink rum and egg nog with bridget and sam who had just arrived in town.

love.

day 05. a picture of somewhere you've been to.

the top of flute, with mitchy and shani, 2 crazy kiwi gals. we hiked up and we rode down in the powdery goodness.

i chose this one because i've been thinking a lot about upcoming winter season and all the things i want to do...

treasure: bad decisions

1. not eating dinner
2. wearing shoes without socks
3. ignoring the fact i work tomorrow
4. being all sneaky, whistler style
5. not dressing warm... where the fuck did summer go?!
6. much more

i don't really know what i wanted to happen this evening, but i had no plan, and it all sort of failed me. so i got to the bar at 9.30 and then just wanted to be home. so i'm all cozy at home now, with my wine which i stole from mitch (but he did say i could) and beyonce, among other things, playing on the stereo.
sometimes i don't even recognize myself, oh the terrible decisions i make. this week is going to be another corker i can just tell. i need to sort myself out, and just maybe Be Organized.
i have started work on my story, but at the moment it's just the story of failed love. embellished to make it funnier than it is. because in reality it's not funny, it's more than a little sad. but there is comedy in pathetic stalker behaviour, correct? i think so.
i'm working on my karma at the moment. ANY DAY NOW, something wonderful will happen to me. i'm actually hoping it all will save up and i'll have an amazing powder season with a small amount of random romance. a sprinkling. just a sprinkling will do.
failing that i'd be happy with a fuckload of snow.

treasure: mountains, mountains, oh mountains!

i have fallen in lust and in love with the rockies. they are all i have been looking at and thinking about for the last 5 days, i have fallen damned hard.

i think i need to be near mountains always. ones with snow on. how can i ever go home now i know how much i love the mountains?

and riding in winter. mmm. is it bad to wish it was winter again, when summer has really only just kicked in? i feel like everything is just one big wait for winter. i am such a winter person. riding and apres and warm headwear (give me another winter in canada and i'll be calling a beanie a toque). powder powder powder.

i send a prayer to the snow gods: give me another good powder season.

then i think i might do a year of double winters. it's getting serious.

basically, this has the makings of a long-term relationship.