Getting away with it

Picture this: it’s snowing big, fat flakes; the kind that stack up quickly and fill in your tracks almost instantly. I’m skiing with some friends and we’ve been enjoying excellent new snow as a big storm sets in over the Wasatch Mountains. Now I’m perched at the precipice of new terrain, just outside the ski area boundary at the top of Catherine’s Pass. It’s clear from the faint curving lines through the slope that other people have skied there already today, but the new storm snow that rolled in this afternoon has nearly buried any sign of them. I have some inkling that avalanches are a concern, mostly from memories of ski films as a kid, but there’s a false sense of safety since we’re right next to the ski area boundary, and with careful line choice, you can ski to the base of the lift. The slope doesn’t look TOO steep, and it seems like it’s probably okay since others have been there before. Yet, I’m nervous. As a staunch rule-follower for much of my life, I liken it to the uneasy feeling that I might be breaking a rule, but a rule that no one has explicitly said or written down anywhere. How will I know if skiing this line is the right decision? But as I watch my friends drop in, spraying huge clouds of pow, whooping and hollering, I follow. As expected, I make some of the dreamiest, softest turns yet that day.

At the bottom, we catch the last lift of the day and ski an inbounds run back to the car. It’s all smiles, and that uneasiness from earlier has nearly vanished, shrouded by memories of floating through perfect powder snow. But something sticks in my gut - did I get away with something?

Fast forward a few months and I’m furiously studying for the online exams of my very first Hybrid WFR course. My brain is overflowing with information about volume shock, hyponatremia, high altitude pulmonary edema…the list goes on. It’s the first time that I’ve come face to face with the risks of my hobbies. It’s the first time I’ve considered exactly how people can die from doing things that I love to do, and from forces that surround us all the time.

As I study, the first verse of this classic nursery rhyme sticks in my brain:
“It’s raining, it’s pouring
The old man is snoring.
He bumped his head when he went to bed,
And he couldn’t get up in the morning.”

Pre-WFR course, I never gave this rhyme a second thought, it was just a harmless play on words. I liken this to how I navigated the world, with a charmed belief that I had managed to avoid major calamity because I wasn’t engaging in anything particularly risky. Post-WFR, I had a jarring realization: did the old man develop increased ICP from bumping his head? Is this little rhyme actually a cautionary tale about monitoring a patient with a head injury? Just as the seriousness of the true meaning of the rhyme became clear, the enchanted gauze was lifted from my eyes. I saw the way I navigated the world in a different light. I came to realize that I had avoided major calamity mostly because I had gotten lucky. I flirted with all sorts of risky situations, I just didn’t know it. Ignorance is bliss, as they say; or is it just dangerous?

Taking my first WFR course was a huge wake up call, because I learned the very real consequences when things go awry in the backcountry. Before, the possibility that someone could get hurt was abstract, a dull threat. Now, the exact ways someone could get injured, sick, or even die were crystal clear. The consequences of my actions came into sharp and alarming focus. With this clarity came a major paradigm shift. Instead of trusting that nothing too terrible will happen, my brain was reprogrammed to take a hard look at what’s around me. Do I have the skills to deal with the hazards present? And if I can’t identify the hazards, is it because there aren’t any, or is it because I don’t even know how to recognize them? Though wilderness medicine training didn’t provide me with every technical tool required to deal with every risk I engage with, it pushed me to think critically about the activities I do outdoors and whether or not I have the training I really need (like an avalanche course) to avoid making mistakes and paying a high price. That uneasy feeling that I might be getting away with something turned into a well-respected alarm bell. Wake up! Look around you! What are you missing here?

The nagging feeling like I was breaking a rule while skiing out of bounds with my friends on that perfect, stormy day was that alarm bell. What would I have done if there had been an avalanche? We may have gotten lucky. Or maybe that slope wasn’t loaded or steep enough to slide. Either way, our ignorance was a roll of the dice. Instead of being forced to confront such ignorance through a tragic accident, we skied some amazing turns to round out an already epic day, further reinforcing our naive sense of sound decision-making. It’s not that a wilderness medicine course would have given me the skills to assess the avalanche hazard and make a more informed decision, only specific training and experience in managing avalanche terrain could give me that. It’s that after taking a wilderness medicine course, I realized that my choices could have profound and devastating outcomes, and I was depending much more on luck to avoid them than I ever considered. I became more willing to at least take a pause at the precipice. Is it possible that I’m about to get away with something?

Getting away with it: it’s a common trope in the outdoors, and so often we do get lucky. Whether it’s slashing sweet powder in a precarious avalanche path, or pothole jumping in a slot canyon just a hair to the left of a rock hiding in the murky pool, or simply choosing to leave the first aid kit at home on a day hike. The problem with luck is that sometimes we associate it with actual knowledge or good judgment. How do we know? It can be very difficult to tease apart the details of luck versus sound assessment and preparedness, but through training we strive to get as close as we can. For me, wilderness medicine was the paradigm shift I needed to start moving away from just “getting away with it” and towards actual preparedness. It played a key role in motivating me to get informed, gather skills, practice problem-solving, understand my ability to assess situations, focus on prevention strategies, and recognize when I am in over my head. I started turning luck into a delightful treat, like happening upon the perfect crop of wildflowers, rather than using it as a lifeline I didn’t even know I was depending on.  

Maybe this story has inspired you to start gathering skills and to depend less on luck, or maybe you’re already somewhere on this journey.  No matter where you are, taking a wilderness medicine course is a critical step in understanding the consequences, and how to deal with them, when things go wrong in the backcountry (and even the frontcountry). If you want to learn more, sign up for a wilderness medicine course. You can find all of our available courses here. 

If you like this article or have a similar story to tell, leave us a comment! We love hearing from you.
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About the author: Zoey is a licensed instructor for WMTC and owner of Headwind Backcountry Medicine, LLC. She’s spent many seasons exploring outdoor education, recreation, and wilderness medicine from a variety of angles, and she’s excited to share pieces of her experiences here with you. Thanks for reading!