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Skiing in the Alps

January 16, 2012 | 1 Comment

Sir:

I spent last summer writing and painting with my lover in Normandy. Now she wants to go to the Alps to ski. I don't ski. Our relationship is at the point where I don't want to embarrass myself or disappoint her. How can I get out of this one? I have suggested a pilgrimage to Spain.

Paul

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I am in pain in your behalf, Paul. I hate to say this, but there is no alternative. The pilgrimage isn't happening. You are going to go skiing in the Alps. You will do this with great bravado and you are going to break your leg. I hope you break it in a good place, a simple break that doesn't require an orthopedic surgeon and a four-hour operation and the insertion of steel rods that mean you'll set off metal detectors for the next forty years and have to be patted down at airports. She will feel enormous guilt at what she made you do and she'll admire your fortitude and the way you lay patiently on the slope, your leg bent at that horrible angle, and the way you endured the emergency-room doctor setting the bone (kkkkkkkkkkrackkkkk) and how you've done everything your physical therapist asked. Your p.t. will be a willowy blonde named Amber who holds you in her arms as you do the crunches and leg lifts and your lover is a little jealous. She marries you in the spring. In the summer you learn that you will be a father. Life hurtles forward and hazards fly past us and down we go, just like on a ski slope. I wish you well.

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