Irish Violet

Rumor has it (love that Adele) that my birthday was recently. And what better reason to go skiing, especially after a week's worth of snow had cascaded (*groan*) down in the lovely Pacific Northwest all week. And while it was snowing just about all day while I was at Stevens Pass, the fresh snow was great.

I did publicly call out the mountain for utter lack of organization at the base -- everything from the parking lot attendants, to the two, competing lift ticket sales queues, to the lift line management.




It was a weekend, the region had gobs of new snow, and it seemed the fine folks running the slopes were surprised at the crowds. But that's really neither here nor there. On the other hand, I've also never skied in between electrical towers.

At one point, relatively soon after I took this picture on the right I believe, I fell. Hey, it happens. Even for a kid who grew up in Colorado. And I'm not talking about an "agony of defeat"-type fall cartwheeling down the mountain. Just a fall. Maybe I crossed my tips. Maybe I was momentarily distracted. Anyway, down I went and blew out of both bindings. Oh, and my knee hurt. But I clipped back in, finished the run and then skied down off the mountain for the two-hour drive home. And, oh yeah, my knee still hurt.

Fast-forward a few days: my knee was swollen like a basketball, I'm hobbling around like an 83-year old man (no offense, Dad) and was given an early, educated guess by an orthopedist that it was a likely meniscus tear and possible MCL damage. Going on IR seemed likely. Good thing the Broncos had already been eliminated from the playoffs. But as far as lucky breaks go, I cashed in. The MRI showed no tear in either the meniscus or the MCL. Only the fibers that connect one to the other. The upshot? No surgery. For you curious sorts, here's the medical illustration view.

...the song remains the same. 11 September 2001  --  2011.

It's been more than a week since I've returned from my reunion and I think I've been able to put it all into something resembling perspective. Certainly glad that I went and had the chance to see the campus and catch up with some folks I hadn't seen in too many years.

Funny what the mind can have you believe before the tangible refutes it. I remember the campus being much bigger, but that turned out to be a version of the old line about how much harder we had it walking uphill both ways to school in the snow. I had this recollection of the "trek" from my senior year dormitory to the Classroom Building taking forever. But it was probably less than 5 minutes. Physically, much remained the same (such as the Main Building in photo). There's no additional land to expand onto so the new construction since I was last in western Massachusetts had to be situated within the same space. Interestingly, two of the larger construction projects wound up going down into the contour of the split level campus since out and up really aren't options. The other change that registered was the updated, gender inclusive lyrics to the school songs. Deerfield went co-ed in the fall of 1989, but this since song lyrics crowd up much of anything else useful in my brain, this old boy sang the old lyrics.

But that's the physical. The bigger issues I was wrestling with were most of the feelings/emotions I had about being back and seeing folks (and not seeing the masses who chose not to attend). Coincidentally we had 25% attendance for the 25th reunion, a little over 40 people from a graduating class of 160. And that was part of the bittersweet and sad that I took away the tempered the late nights, catch-up-on-the-biography convos, and perspectives on the school today. Not sure why the attendance was so low from my perspective, but then again this was the first reunion I found a way to return for. Various life events and excuses preceded me and I have to assume the same for my fellow '86ers.

As ever, in the end the bittersweet and sad was self-inflicted. Spent a fair amount of time disappointed that I didn't attend prior reunions, instead of looking forward to the next ones and not waiting until the 50th! Realized I missed out on the lives of folks I was close to, but is good to know that several live in the New York City metro area and I do get back there just about every year so can re-kindle those connections. And somewhere along the way, I neglected to get married.