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The Lost Season (or My Life in the Bargain Bin)

(From the archives...)

I remember the moment with heart-breaking clarity. I sat in a small examination room and listened to the words that would shape my season: ACL reconstruction. That same old, worn out, familiar story. But there was a difference this time. This time it was me.

I tried to take the news in a calm and composed fashion - the truth is I was too stunned to do otherwise. But when the doctor turned to leave as if this was no big deal, I found myself struggling to hold my emotions in check as I called him back for more information.

"I realize this is old hat to you," I said through slightly clenched teeth, "but it's new to me, so if I could just have a few more minutes of your time…" He turned out to be quite understanding and was able to do a lot to clear up my fears.

Which is not to say that I was completely set at ease. On the way home I suddenly reached out and punched a metal traffic pole. The hollow echo reverberated long enough for plenty of people to turn and stare my way. I found myself wanting to throw things. Wanting to scream. When I got home I played the heavy tracks off of the Smashing Pumpkins' Melon Collie and the Infinite Sadness at a near deafening volume. I fumed in the privacy of my own home.

I used to think I was healthy, in good shape. Not anymore. I have a bum knee. I am damaged goods. Bargain bin stuff. Crammed in there among the mismatched gloves and hats with large pom-poms.

The initial damage occurred back in December of 1997. A 360 landed slightly askew twisted my knee in a most unnatural way. The pain was large but not what I thought ACL tearing pain was. I had heard so many horror stories that the fact that I hadn't passed out had me convinced it was only a sprain. I even managed to eke out a laugh as my friend came over the same jump, stalled halfway through his rotation, and flew ass-first into the trees and patroller's rope on the side of the run.

I thank him for that - for giving me something to laugh about as I held my battered knee.

I was diagnosed with a sprain and was on crutches for about a week. The doc then gave me the go ahead to get back to my life (read: skiing). So I did. Despite the fact that I still felt occasional flares of pain and despite the fact that deep down I knew things were not quite right. I thought time would heal things. I hoped.

But then, in August of 1998, with the first real yearnings for winter beginning, my friends and I found ourselves in the sand dunes with skis on our feet. And the inevitable happened. A simple jump with a compression landing and my knee let go on me again. This time there was no fooling myself into thinking things would heal on their own. I slid down the dune and could not pick myself up.

After many doctors and many physiotherapy appointments the inevitable became clear. ACL reconstruction would be needed. The soonest they could fit me in was fall. A ski season would be sacrificed for many more to come.

Two months after this diagnosis I hopped onto an operation table and felt strangely calm. I joked with the anaesthesiologist and faked concern when I heard him call the resident a "spastic bastard." He set up the IV, stuck a needle in my hand and told me to say goodnight. Out I went.

The first memory I have after that is hearing a nurse telling me to wake up. I slowly opened my eyes and tried to get my bearings. I was obviously in the recovery room. I saw a nurse looking down at me. I felt a strange throbbing in my left knee. I tried to form some words but I was feeling so groggy. "Did they operate on my left knee?" I managed to ask. "Yes," she replied still looking down on me. "But they were supposed to do the right one," I said in my slow, drug induced speech. She stared at me. I could not read her expression but I was glad I was able to get out a "just kidding" before falling back asleep.

I am one week post-op now. I have to say that the drugs they gave me have been rather ineffectual. Fortunately the pain has been bearable. Again, the stories I had heard had me prepared for much worse. I could deal with this.

The crutches are a bitch though. I've truly come to despise them. They make me feel like a prisoner. My one goal in life at this moment is to get off of them as quickly as possible. I have already been given the green light to try to put a little weight on my bum knee and so far things feel all right. I'm hoping to be hobbling on my own in another week or so.

The knee itself looks ugly. A six-inch slice runs over my kneecap and the flesh is currently being held together by staples. Those will be coming out soon, but until then I actually enjoy lifting up my bandages and sneaking a peak at my Frankenstein features. I don't, however, take any joy out of seeing the monstrous swelling. My knee has been replaced by a softball.

The hardest thing for now is feeling so weak and so helpless. My quad feels like Jell-O and the simplest tasks are rendered humiliating by the crutches. But again I keep my sight on my goal. Once these crutches are gone I will be free. Once the physiotherapy starts, the strength will return. Once I am active in just the slightest bit, I will feel better. I do not want to spend too many more days with my ass glued to the couch, watching daytime television.

Unfortunately, the start of my recover will coincide with the start of the ski season. My roommate and brother have already bagged a day on the boards and will be heading out again this weekend. The winter has begun even if significant snow has yet to fall.

Every now and then it hits me with its original force. I see my skis propped up in the corner of my room and I realise that I will not be using them this year. I flip through pictures of seasons gone by and know that this year I will not be in any of the shots. I hear my skier friends talk about the upcoming powder days and, although I do not begrudge them, I cannot ignore the fact that I will not be there. It will not be the same for me; it will not be the same for them. It will be the first time in about six years that my ski partner will spend a season without me. He is going to have to find someone else to share his runs with. Someone else to share the epic powder days and the bored goof-off days.

He will ski with my brother. My brother, whom I may not get another chance to share a season with. Last season he was in Switzerland, the seasons before he was busy being a ski instructor. This would have been the first time in many years that we could get some significant ski time together. Next year? Who knows what it will bring?

But I am coping. As I said, I will survive. People have gone through much worse that this, right? Right.

Yeah, but that isn't going to help me when I see the snow raging outside of my window. Perspective will be lost when I hear my roommate leave at 6:00 am to bag some first tracks through the glades of Jay. I will lie in my bed and curse my knee and wish I was going with him, and, then, when I get up many hours later, I will go outside and sit in a snowdrift - not so much to mope, but more to feel some contact with the snow, to help me be there in my mind.

I think I will be doing that a lot this year.


One Day

New Year's Day. Some unknown hours into 1998. The two parties in a friend's apartment building had morphed into one. Momentum was building. Three units held an open-doors policy and people streamed in and out like shooting stars. Hallways and stairwells held the overflow. The front stoop became the breathing space - a spot for a bit of fresh air and drunken contemplation. The January air cooled our sweating skin and we watched our breath drift into the night before disappearing.

The night was beautiful. I wanted it to last forever.

In those drunken states, when laughter is prevalent and there's never a dearth of people to talk to, I get overwhelmed with melancholic euphoria. Every joke is the funniest ever told, every truth the most profound. I have a hard time letting go. I want to soak it up, because even through the alcohol haze, I can see the fleetingness of the carefree moment.

And so it was that when most people had stumbled home, passed out, or otherwise vacated the party, I found myself in a much quieter hallway discussing the finer points of god-knows-what with my fellow closer. And so it was that we were there when the door at the end opened and a girl with blonde pigtails smiled her way towards us.

She joined our conversation easily and soon enough we were talking about skiing. After spending seasons in Whistler, her scholastic pursuits had brought her to Montreal for the year. Her skis sat in her apartment, but lack of transportation to the slopes had left them gathering dust. I rolled up my pant leg and showed her the reason that I too had been relegated to the sidelines.

However, not being able to ignore a skier in need, I offered my roommate's services to right her horrible wrong and get her to the hills (safe in the knowledge that he was (and remains) solidly spoken for).

"He goes every weekend, I'm sure it won't be a problem," I convinced her. Numbers were exchanged and everyone left happy (except for my fellow closer who claimed to have felt like a third wheel: "As soon as the talk turned to skiing, she ignored me and only had eyes for you," he complained. "If that was the case, why the hell didn't you leave us alone?" I countered.)

In any case, the winter continued and my pain was tempered by this fortunate fling. Life conspired to keep me busy and I can almost convince myself that I didn't notice the skiing I was missing. I hit the physio hard and spent many afternoons riding a stationary bike in a basement room that felt like a dungeon. Staring at a cracked concrete wall, it was easy to believe that the lights would go off if I had stopped pedaling.

Come March I was almost at peace with T. coming home from Saturday skiing with tales of powder. He was excited and meant no ill when he talked of glades in prime shape. So I smiled and tried to share his enthusiasm, all the while hoping he would soon shut up.

Then Tuckerman Ravine crept into the picture. For years we had talked about it, but had yet to sack up and make the trip. Now things seemed to be getting serious. My brother and a friend of his were making loud noises about going, so of course, T. would as well.

Again, I don't fault anyone. Things come together at certain times and people should take advantage when they can. I certainly did not want to hold anyone back. Of course not.

Any yet…a part of me was pissed. Pissed that after years of hesitating, they were finally taking the plunge while I was out of commission. I don't remember what I did the weekend they were away, but I do know that I acted very disinterested when they returned. "It was good? Yeah? Great," was the extent of my questioning. When the pictures came in I rifled through them quickly and went back to watching the hockey game. In short: I sulked. Can you really blame me?

But I would feel redemption before the snow left the ground. I did not let the season go by without putting skis to slope. Good Friday came along and Jay Peak was hosting one last weekend of skiing. I was just over the 5 month mark of my rehab and determined to cash in. Armed with a knee brace, I joined T., my bro, and pig tails in what promised to be a quintessential spring day.

"I'll just stick to the blues," I said. "Just gonna take it easy." Easier said than done. Under blue skies and over soft snow I was feeling prime. The simple motion of gliding down the hill brought back so much of me. Testing the knee like a fawn, I gradually grew more sure of my rebuilt self. Turns came easy. Instinct returned. I was home.

We ate our lunch on top of the ridge. Sitting on rocks amid stumpy conifers, throwing snowballs and soaking up sun. I was almost okay with my first day being my last. It felt like closure. Closure on my rehab, closure on my injury.

I followed the crew down Radio Chute, a steep narrow shot down the lookers left of the ridge. From the blue cruisers to here I felt the rush of rapid improvement. The satisfaction was equaled only by the beers we quaffed on the deck at the end of the day.

I was home.


Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8


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