Memoir
The most recent interesting event in my life is when I almost froze to death. No I'm not talking about it being 50 degrees with wind chill, I'm talking about getting lost alone on a snowy mountain in the middle of winter in an unmarked area of the ski slopes.

  My family, well almost all of my family, loves to ski. This excludes my mother because of an experience like mine from the same cause. The last time we were in Crested Bute, another ski town in Colorado, she and my sister, Charlotte, got incredibly lost on the mountain. They went up the lift to the top of the mountain with blue/diamond runs (intermediate/advanced terrain, way over both of their ski levels), by accident, due to my father once again giving horrible directions. As they tried to find their way down, and got even more lost, and my mother hurt her knee halfway down, and my sister had to hail down one of the ski patrollers and he gave them a lift to the bottom of the mountain.

As you can see my father has a history of inadvertently leading people in life threatening situations. I suppose it's not entirely his fault most of the time.  He does need to be more considerate of the other people skiing with him. Especially since not all of the accompanying skiers are as experienced as he, and his bad directions can be deadly in mountain terrain. This leads into my story.

I had gone skiing with my father, a bad move in retrospect.  He brought me down exclusively treacherous blue runs (intermediate to advanced runs) the entirety of the day so I was exhausted, only having small breaks on the lifts. We went up Payday, and Bonanza lifts to the summit of the mountain. The plan was to ski down the big run, and go on the blue branch off, Hidden Splendor, and ski down to Silver Lode Lift. Naturally, whenever something is planned, it never actually goes accordingly.  
I ended up finding Hidden Splendor, and waited there for my father, but he never showed up. I ended up going down the trail myself because it looked like it connected to the main trail that I had come from. I was wrong. Instead of connecting back to the main trail, it interconnected to a few other trails, which I went on trying to find my way back.
I ended up at the bottom of this wooded dead end with lift that looked like it was one of the original ski lifts.  I sat down on on the bench, next to a snowboarder, who was a little older than me, who gave me her map. I ended up figuring out that if I went to the top of the lift which I was sitting by, I would be able to take a trail to the left down to the summit.

I went up this obscure ski lift and the view was spectacular. It felt as if, for a moment, I was in a painting. The lowering sun filtered through the snow covered pine trees, and bathed the small lift valley in golden shadows. It was so peaceful, I wish I could of stopped time in that moment and just bask in it until I was satisfied.
However, time goes on, and when I reached the top of the lift, I didn't see any signs for trails. I eventually just went off of ski tracks around me, and found some that went left. This was not an actual trail. It actually was some poor sap who was about as lost as I was, leaving a windy trail through the forest which I had the misfortune of stumbling upon. I couldn't go back and follow the tracks because it was getting dim, and it was too twisty to risk.

I trudged though the deep powder in an attempt to find a trail to the summit for about an hour. If you have never had to fight your way through untouched snow, let me tell you it is the most exhausting thing you will ever experience, especially if you are carrying 7 pounds worth of ski equipment. First of all the air is already thin so you are heaving twice as hard, and if you breathe too hard you will dehydrate yourself and pass out, if the exhaustion doesn't get to you first. Secondly imagine freezing cold mud up to your mid-thigh that every time you take a step you have to pull your leg completely out of that mud, take a step, sink again, and repeat that process for every step while in metal boots. It's exhausting, which was even worse for me because I was exhausted before I even started.

I really thought I was going to die. I was going to pass out and freeze to death before they find my body. My lungs hurt from heaving, and my heart was pounding so hard it hurt. The breaks I took from walking became longer, and harder to start walking again. I wondered how my long distance friends would find out, and how my possessions would be distributed, since I hadn't written any kind of will, or final testament yet.

After what felt like an eternity, I finally found a trail. As joyful as that was, I also found out I was in the restricted area of the mountain, which could get me kicked out. A ski patroller did pass by but, apparently, patrollers are a lot like dinosaurs. If you don't move, they can't see you. I made it to the trail, and sat to catch my breath for a good 10 minutes, which made another ski mounty stop but I don't think she realized what had happened, at least I didn't tell her.

I eventually skied down to the summit cafe, where I found my father. I found out he also got pretty lost as well, but not my magnitude of lost. He had wiped out a few times and got disoriented but eventually he found his way back at the bottom of the lift miraculously. We skied back down to the base, and skied for a few more hours before heading home.

It was a pretty educational experience. I learned that asking for directions is a better bet than guessing. Having your own map is very important. I needed to write a will incase something happens. Ski patrollers have dinosaur vision, and apparently know me by my earmuffs because I'm the only one on the mountain in fluffy earmuffs. So, reader, please learn from my mistakes, lest you make the same one day.