Feels like the last time

Nothing like pop music of the 70s or 80s to get me through a crisis. Between Foreigner and Melissa Manchester, I've made the transition from winter to spring.

Thanks to some late-season snow and the persistent grooming of Ely's great Nordic club, I enjoyed one more day on the Hidden Valley ski trails last week. It was classic spring skiing...mashed potato snow in the sun and crispy icy tracks in the shade.

The best part was one more blessing by wolf tracks:



Looking back, I have to wonder why I thrashed around so with the end of this ski season. It ended way too quickly, for one thing. To go from the heart of the ski season, with deep snows and weeks of potential skiing ahead right into mush and crust, was brutal. I didn't know the peak had passed.

If you ever only knew that this time was the last time, it might help put it all to rest. Knowing it's the last time out, would I experience it more fully? Would I be melancholy?

Would I lose focus and crash?

Ski patrollers know that one of the most dangerous runs skiers take is when they know it's the last run of the day. The Duluth paper today had a story about a local high schooler on his last run of the ski season at Spirit Mountain last year; he fell badly and is paralyzed from the chest down.

Music has really had a hard time with this one last time feeling. Why did Foreigner sing "Feels like the first time" so rapturously, and not "Feels like the last time"?

Instead, we a need moody singer-songwriter. Leave it to Melissa Manchester, "One more time for all the old times."

One last time.

Melissa? "And I think we can make it."

Just keep your eye on the ski trail until your skis are off.