One of our employees wrecked our panel truck. The truck was totaled, but we were able to salvage the engine and transmission. We decided to mount them atop the lift house as auxiliary power for the new Snowshed #3 lift. We connected the engine to the main drive shaft with a chain link connector. A…

Some things can’t be hidden, such as the Moon, the Sun, and the stars. Try as it might, the truth also cannot be hidden, at least not forever. This is very much about this new era. As the systems and structures embedded in society’s fabric increasingly reveal their irrelevance, we will all handle this period…

By James Kent Catholicism and its many mysteries and secret rituals are on full display in “Conclave” (in theaters and on-demand.) The pope is dead. And the process of transferring the powers of God from one human vessel to another begins. Depending on one’s faith and knowledge of the subject, that process, the subject of…

The holiday season is upon us. Thanksgiving through New Year’s is a busy time for most people. Was it like that back in the ‘50s? Let’s take a look! Preparing Thanksgiving dinner took a lot more time and effort back then. There were no microwave ovens to heat the various components of the meal. Usually…

We’ve been riding the same chairlift up the same trail looking at the same trees for weeks now. We all talk about whether or not to choose Trail A or Trail B and then our minds are blown when Trail C opens up!  It’s a snowmaking miracle, giving credit to the combination of Mother Nature and…

When I graduated from college, very few people had a personal computer. Instead, we had campus computer labs that required students to reserve space at designated workstations. At your allotted time, you would enter the lab with a dozen other people and then reference your assignments from 5.25” floppy disks. Then, only a handful of…

I’ve been checking in with myself on a concept I like to call The Gray. I am focusing on the gray as a way to meet situations I encounter in an open, honest and wholesome way. Paired with extreme ownership and radical acceptance, I am feeling more in control over things I previously felt discouraged…

Killington’s Spartan office was a concrete block structure above the maintenance area. I had a tiny office adjacent to the lower maintenance area. Preston Smith’s cousin, Barry Leete, was assigned to me, and he shared my small office with no other place to put him. At his request, I gave him the task of redesigning…

Several weeks and many baths ago, my dog discovered a black-and-white stranger crossing our lawn. Wagging vigorously and ignoring my frantic shouts, she ran up and offered her canine greeting: a nose-to-tail sniff. The encounter ended predictably, with the skunk waddling off into the dark, the dog staggering in circles, and me searching desperately through…

Many, many moons ago, someone told me that relationships end the way they begin. At the time, I remember thinking that was such a cynical attitude. It was like predicting the bitter end at the beginning when things should feel magical. I’m much older and wiser now, and I do have to admit there was…

“Wicked,” the global musical sensation based on author Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel, arrives in theaters some 20 years after its Broadway debut. Even if you haven’t seen the musical, you know about it, and chances are, you knew this movie was coming out around Thanksgiving. It would be near impossible not to know because the…

The Town Hall theater in Middlebury was the happening scene for ski and snowboard enthusiasts of all ages on Wednesday, Nov. 20, for a special roadshow screening of “Warren Miller’s 75.” Now, if you’re like me-a person who gets queasy the moment I step off a ski lift, or if  the mere mention of the…

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about “The Apprentice,” where actor Sebastian Stan had to put on the mask of an egomaniac for two hours. Here I am, a couple of weeks later, reviewing another film where Sebastian Stan has to wear a mask of sorts. This time around, the film, "A Different Man,"…

Every now and then, there is a moment in time that defines an era. Those moments are rare. When they do happen, we tend to look back saying, “Where were you when…”  Where were you when heard about the planes crashing into the Twin Towers? Where were you when Kurt Cobain died? How about John…

My friend Terry Gulick, who passed away earlier this year, used to tease me about my favorite yard tree. Terry did a lot of gardening jobs when he wasn’t mentoring kids, and he was amused and a little offended by what I’d allowed to grow up in my former vegetable patch. It was bad enough…