Anyway, since you asked what I’ve been up to here in the Green Mountains . . . the ski season is starting to wind down. It’s mostly spring skiing now. Since we work at the shop until 10:30 every morning and have to be back by 2:30 or 3, we ski midday, sometimes in shorts and even T-shirts. With the sun’s rays reflecting off the snow, you can actually get a pretty serious sunburn if you’re not careful.

Most of the guys in the shop don’t give a crap about the business and just put in their time so they can ski every day, but I’ve been learning stuff. I don’t dig the sales part. It’s typical capitalist bullshit. Dave, the owner, wants us to sell whatever gear gives him the biggest profit margin. But the technical side of the business is pretty interesting. There’s a ton of stuff you need to know about how the different brands of skis, bindings, and boots work together. Binding placement. Adjustments and blah blah. Dave took me aside the other day and said if I was serious about it, he’d send me to some tech clinics next fall.

That’s a possibility, but the other thing is, from his days in ad sales at Time magazine, my father knows some people at Ziff Davis, the company that owns Ski magazine. They have some trade journals about the ski business, and he’s going to find out if maybe they’d give me a job. I’ve been doing a lot of writing. Short stories and things like that. Might try sending a few to literary magazines. In the meantime, how amazing would it be if I could get a job writing about skiing?

Guess I’ll have to see where things are with Robin next year. Most of her friends at Middlebury think it’s pretty groovy that she’s got a ski bum boyfriend. But a couple of weeks ago she asked me if I planned to work in a ski shop for the rest of my life. So of course I said yes just to give her grief. But between you and me, I doubt it. Working in a shop and having to deal with deranged customers is a drag. I can’t imagine making a career of it. And like I said, writing about skiing would be a dream.