We have been having greens from our garden for the last few weeks. The soft, meaty taste of arugula that hasn’t been on a refrigerated truck from California to Montana is bliss. Every year, I forget what that taste is like so it is always a wonderful surprise. Piled on pizza, wedged in fish tacos or just by the handful straight from the garden. yum.
We are having a second round of the asshole cold snap. Memorial Day weekend in Montana is always a crap shoot. Every year, on this weekend, we head to Red Lodge for the opening of the Beartooth pass–to ski and hang with friends and family. I am in Red Lodge now. I am not skiing this year as I didn’t alpine ski all last season because of a bug and well, I am a bit of a scaredy cat about my first time out in a while being on the steep burliness of Rock Creek headwall. I feel a tiny bit lame because of it but am having a great time with my ma and ma-in-law. They live two blocks apart. Right now my mom is dying Joan’s hair while bug naps. Good stuff.
This morning, Andy could hardly drink his coffee he was so anxious to get his gear on and go search for *snow.* This, among many other skiing-driven obsessions is one of his traditions, as he refers to anything he likes to do. He meets up with his posse every year and they get all suited and geared up and drive up the pass (it is closed all winter and opens on this weekend every year) to check it out. They ski together like they have since they were like eight. The group is a modest bunch. Some are professional skiiers and nearly all could be. Andy is sponsored and a total badass and is so sexy on the snow. He hates it when I talk about it but, come on. I am just a proud wifey.
I love his not-all-about -the-scene, real love for skiing. He could care less about the post-ski bar party, bro and often negotiates for the last chair while many are in the beer-consumption mode. Well, to be honest, I love it most of the time–it sort of depends when you ask me about it because sometimes he gets so tunnel vision about snow that it is really annoying and not sexy at all. For six months of the year, my man sets his alarm early (and he usually gets up at six anyway) to check ski reports. I feel all desperate like a mom madly waving her arms at her child as he heads off to prom to look at me! Part of his wedding vows: I promise to always meet up with you for lunch on a powder day. This sentence got cheers from the group of aforementioned friends. So, oy, I love it and it makes me insane.
I was planning to write about the amazing arugula salad we have been eating. Funny how that happens when blogging.
And, so, as long as he makes smart decisions when dropping that 20 or 30-foot cliff, like maybe not doing it now that we have a little kiddo, I am supportive. Skiing is Andy’s religion. And I don’t mean that in the cheese dick (another andyism) sense, but in the way that I need gardening sense.
I feel about the season’s first harvest as Andy does about the season’s first big winter storm. We are both driven by weather and ecology. We both get focused and obsessed with the minutia of our habit. I am thankful this occurs in different solstices or we could be in trouble. On Memorial Day weekend, his religion ends and mine begins.
