T A B L E_T A L K What do you read when you travel? Talk tomes in the Wanderlust area of Table Talk R E C E N T L Y "How do you celebrate Christmas?" By Joshua Cohen A Jew in China: The travails of life in a land where Westerner equals Christian (12/09/97) Road Warrior By Dawn MacKeen Are airlines delivering sexist service in first class? (12/08/97) Mondo Weirdo By Lori Makabe When bed bugs attack! (12/05/97) Surreal Gourmet By Bob Blumer Herbed olive oil holiday gifts (12/05/97) Maya Color Photographs by Jeffrey Becom Jeffrey Becom's passionate pix (12/04/97) - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Browse the Wanderlust archives - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Your virtual travel agency - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -		_________________________________________> SNOWBOARDING IS A LOT LIKE LIFE -- FULL OF SCARY SLOPES, BIG SPILLS AND TINY TRIUMPHS. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - BY MARIA DOLAN | I stand in a long line of people in parkas and thick gloves, all of us facing the ski lift and a white Dry-Erase board scrawled over with words in a black, emphatic hand: "CAUTION: This is an EXTREMELY difficult run. There is NO EASY WAY down this mountain." I ride to the top of the hill with one of my two companions for this trip, a man in wire-rimmed glasses, his mouth stiff with what looks like dissatisfaction. From my right foot dangles a snowboard, a glorified tongue depressor. Though I have never been up a black diamond before, and am usually a fan of plodding endurance sports such as running and cross-country skiing, I am not scared. The moody guy spends our minutes of sky-bound suspension worked up about Japan and car co-ops, and I smile and breathe in the cold, tranquil air. I dismount casually, and pull up alongside the edge of this notorious slope, which plummets, over giant mounds of sponge cake dotting an incline as gentle as Lombard Street, to nothing, and still I am fine, fine. Only the mildest fibrillations strum my chest, the heart murmurs of a guppy. We go over the edge and for a moment, before I can fight the momentum, I am excited and not quite sure I will make it, moving fast over fat powder I've always known was there, way up on top. Soon enough, though, on our steep slope, I am able to make things fine again. I move slowly. Everything glistens in this high altitude light. I can see far, across to other mountains and wisps of hovering cloud. It smells like the inside of an ice machine. Where the hillside is especially steep, terraced grooves have been cut by other skiers and boarders, and as I ride I can drag my bulbous mitten across the snow above me, which blows out from beneath my hand like flour. There are faraway sounds of people calling to each other, and then up close the Styrofoam creak of flakes packing down under a skier's weight; the rasp of their humid, gusty breath. My companions, with my blessing, move far ahead of me, and eventually I am on my own. Occasionally I try to point straight down, but each time an achy panic grips my chest and I pull back. I am horrified at the sight of the mountain falling away beneath me, at the dark woods on each side, and especially at the young girl halfway down the slope, yelping weakly while Ski Patrol aides fit her limbs to a rescue stretcher. After what seems like a long time the way opens out onto a wide hill, with the lodge at its base. As I get closer there are small ridges in the icy snow, and my board slips out from underneath me. My head cracks against the ground, my arms fling out involuntarily from my sides, crucifix-style, and I picture myself in traction for a sport I'm only just starting to like. I find my friends, and we break for lunch. I am dizzy from my fall, and a little dismayed, but I perk up in the company of these goofy men and a riot of food. Their friend, a former ski instructor, opens a big container of cold pasta, the eco-Japanophile has brought recycled yogurt containers full of cut-up vegetables. I bury myself in a giant sandwich, gnaw my way through a plate of spiced curly fries. When they ask me if I'm having fun, I agree that yes, I'm loving the day, the sun, the nest of fries and those great dunes of snow at the top of the mountain. The ski instructor, broad-shouldered and handsome, goes so far as to point out what good he saw: "You were cruisin' down that one hill!" he says. "Did you feel how fast you were going?" I want to agree with him, but I know I've been a coward. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - N E X T+P A G E+| Turn, turn, turn