Snow Fever
By Joshua Reid


“Go faster, go faster” I said.

“I’m trying, it’s too fast.”

“It’s getting closer.”

“I know.”

I’m Oscar, and this is my story. It all started on one cold winter day, it had been snowing all night and there was about three feet of new snow that covered the ground. The sun had just come out from behind the dark gray clouds and the snow was sparkling in its light. It was the most beautiful thing I had every seen in my entire life. Well, I guess my entire life hadn’t been that long since I was only thirteen at the time. Anyway I ran as fast as I could to my parent’s room to show my dad the glorious sight outside the window in high hopes that he would take me skiing that day. I had only been skiing for two years or so, but I loved to go, and my dad loved to take me. I loved the feeling of the fresh snow sliding beneath my skis as I speed down the mountain with the wind blowing by my face. I loved the smell of everything up in the mountains, the pine trees, the snow, and the fresh non polluted air.

I slowly crept over to his side of the bed trying not to wake up my mom. I gently shook him, trying not to startle him and put him in a bad mood.

“Dad… Dad… come look outside” I told him.

“Alright” he said.

He slowly got out of bed and still half asleep, he walked with me outside.

I excitedly showed him all of the new snow. I stood there waiting for him to say something. Each second felt like an hour. I couldn’t stand it anymore and I finally had to ask him if we could go skiing.

“He looked over at me with half a smile on his face. “ Well I guess we’ll have to on a day like this with so much new snow.”

I couldn’t believe it, I was so exited that I ran straight up stairs to get ready. First I made a list of all the things I would need. I would need gloves, goggles, my helmet, coat, boots, socks, snow pants, poles, my pass, and my skis.

When I was all ready I went back down stairs and watched cartoons until my dad was ready to go.

He walked out into the family room all decked out in his ski gear and said “Well where should we go to ski?”

I told him we should go to Snow Basin. He smiled; it was his favorite place as well as mine.

Snow Basin was the very first place I had ever skied and I had started skiing when I was about eleven years old, so as far as I was concerned Snow Basin was the best ski resort in the world.

We went outside and packed or skis, poles, and all of our other things into our truck. I was so exited. It was going to be the first ski trip of the season. There was one thing I was not exited for though, the ride.
The ride up to Snow Basin was horribly long. You had to drive on the freeway for twenty-five minutes until you come to the canyon, and then it took about forty minutes of winding and turning and climbing up the canyon which always made me sick, seeming like we were moving in slow motion because the road was so slick and full of snow. In the summer the canyon would dip down about eight or ten feet, but in the winter it was filled up to the top of the road with snow. There were animal tracks in the snow here and there where rabbits, foxes, deer, and moose had been walking around. Once and a while you would see a rabbit hopping around or a deer trying to find something to eat, and sometimes even a moose or a fox.

I had always love Snow Basin. It was such a beautiful place. There was the smell of pine trees and fresh snow in the air. The snow glistened as the morning sun bounced off billions of pure white crystals of the Utah snow. You could see green pine trees running all up the mountain. Some you could only see half of and some you could only see the tip of. The sun was just barley coming out from over the mountains and I could feel its rays warming my skin up in the cold air.

You could always smell bacon, eggs, and other breakfast foods at Snow Basin because Snow Basin had a breakfast restraint in open in the mornings. It was the perfect day to be there, or so I thought.

We went to the gondola and waited in lined for about seven four minutes until we were able to get on and the time we spent in that line was agony to me.

My dad and I got ton the gondola, which we shared with another family. There was the dad, who badly needed to shave, the mom, whom I’d say was about forty-nine, was wearing a bright neon green jacket with black ski pants and a helmet. They had a son about my age who was listening to his ipod. He had a gray beanie with a white coat and pants; he was the only snowboarder in their family. They had a tiny little girl who was about four hooked on to a ski leash. She had long blond hair flowing out from under her helmet. She was very shy and just sat there with her hands folded.

“So do you folks come her often?”

“Yes we’ve been coming here for a while now. Have you ever been here before?” asked my dad.

“No we’re on vacation and this is our first time coming here. Do you like it here?”

“You can take it from me this is the best ski resort in Utah.”

The gondola doors slid open simultaneously. We stood up and grabbed our things and walked out the door.
“You guys have a good run.” Said my dad.
“Thanks, you too.”

I was so exited for the first run of the day and the year. The sun had now risen and was up and over the mountains and the snow was shinning, inviting us to come down the slopes. I set down my skies, slapped on my bindings, grabbed my poles and started heading down the hill through the fresh snow.

It was the best feeling in the world. The harsh cold wind was blowing past me as I turned from lift to right, left to right. I went through a pile of snow and watched as the snow shot up into my face. The snow was so cold when it melted and the rapidly passing wind slowly froze it to my face, but I didn’t stop I went down full speed until I reached the bottom of the ski run.

We repeated this process about three more times until we decided to head down and get lunch.

Lunch was one of my favorite parts of coming to Snow Basin, next to the skiing part, and I had been looking forward to it all day. We walked into the lounge and I could smell all of the different foods cooking. There were tons of people and there wasn’t an empty seat in the place. We walked around until a nice couple were done eating and gave us their seats. I took of all of my clothes except for my snow pants and t-shirt; we went to order so I left all of my things on the table.

I got the same thing I always did. Roast beef with mashed potato’s and gravy. It was the best dish I had ever had. The roast beef was hot and easy to chew, but still tough. I would cut of a piece of the roast beef and get some potatoes and gravy to go with it. The potatoes were as smooth as butter and the gravy was warm and was smothered over everything else on the plate. Once we finished the meal we got all of our clothes back on and went to get or skies.

“Hey, why don’t we go on a little bit of a harder run”? Said my dad.

“Like what.”

“Well I was thinking we could do the front side of John Paul.”

“Alright I love that run.”

We got our skies on and skied over to the John Paul lift. The John Paul lift line was really short so we got on in about two minutes. I never really liked the John Paul lift because it was always really cold and windy, which made it even colder, on that side of the mountain.

On the way up it was so cold that I buttoned my coat up all of the way, put on my facemask and put glove warmers down my shirt. It was so cold that it felt like at any moment my ears were going to freeze solid and fall of, it was so cold that if you stuck your tongue out on to the metal bar, your tongue would freeze to it.

When we finally reached the top I was frozen and I felt like I was going to die from hypothermia. We sat down and warmed up for a moment and then started heading down the hill.

We started heading down a hill called Hollywood Hills and it was completely untouched. There was not one set of ski or snowboard tracks. The snow came up to my knees it was so deep.

We took off down the hill and about half way down I heard a loud sound that shook mountain. I stopped and looked over my shoulder, and to my terror a wall of snow was coming down. I was in an avalanche. I looked over at my dad and I saw the same terror in his eyes, which really made me scared. I started down the mountain and so did my dad.
“Go faster, go faster.” I said.

“It’s too fast.”

“It’s getting closer.”

“I know.”

It had hit me like a slab of concrete. I had just enough time to make a ball of air around me, just enough so I could breath. I opened y eyes and all I could see was darkness. I started to scream, but I knew no one could hear me. And then I thought of my dad and wondered what had happened to him, I started to cry. I was so scared. I felt more scared than I had ever been in my life. I kept crying until I couldn’t cry anymore.

I heard barking and wondered what on earth could be barking right now. And then it hit me. It was the ski patrol. They had found me. I started screaming at the top of my lungs. And finally they had dug me out of the mountain of snow. I got the first glimpse of sunlight I had seen in a long time. I was free.

I asked the ski patrol were my dad was and if they had gotten him out. They told me that they had dung him out about an hour ago and he was doing fine but they would have to take me to the hospital but I didn’t care, I was free.