“I just can’t wait!” Jeanie squealed. Everyone within a twenty-yard radius turned and stared. No one in the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport could figure out why a nearly twenty-six year old woman was hopping up and down like a five-year-old. Hopping and skipping and swaying. She nearly ran into someone with every step, made unobservant by her extreme eagerness.

“I’m so excited! Do you know how long I’ve waited for an opportunity like this?” She asked, taking hold of my arm as we slowly made our way to her terminal. Christmas break now over, we were both returning to our respective colleges, her to Colorado State and me to the University of Florida. My plane didn’t come for another three hours or so, but I had wanted to go and see my sister off. Stepping on a moving platform, I thought of what I would do as I waited for my plane and all of the schoolwork I should have done over break. Just because I was technically on vacation didn’t mean my professors didn’t expect me to work. I had papers to write and texts to read... my mind was so abuzz with all I needed to accomplish that I paid no heed to the tiny woman hanging off of my arm, chattering about all of the excitement in store for her and her best friend on their much anticipated trip to Aspen.

We reached terminal B23 just in time. A nasally voice sounded overhead, announcing that all passengers were now free to board the plane. A sharp squeeze on my arm snapped me out of my own mind as Jeanie squealed once more and reached into her carry-on for her boarding pass.

“Well. I’m off!” She stated simply, jumping up to throw her arms around my neck. We hugged for a good long time. I felt a sudden wave of sadness flow through me, as if there was a finality about this goodbye. I felt the need to hold her and never let her go, to protect her. Ignoring the strange feeling, I released her. She hopped away with a huge grin.

I meandered off to the side, loitering in the waiting area as Jeanie stood in line to board. I remember her tapping her bright green converse in time with the radio playing throughout the airport. I remember her anxiously picking at the corner of her boarding pass, twisting it and curling it and folding it until the corner was soft and crumbling in her hand. I remember her nails, painted to match her shoes. I remember the sparkle in her eyes as it was finally her turn to board. I remember the way her heavy woolen coat bounced up and down on her body as she awaited the verification of her pass. I remember her turning within the doorway of the gate and making eye contact with me. I remember her scrunched up her nose as she blew me a kiss, then bounded off down the cattle chute toward the door of the plane. I remember sitting in the waiting area of terminal B23 on that frigid January morning, watching her plane pull out of the airport and take off into the sky.

I remember, because that was the last time I saw her.

It wasn’t until a few days later that I actually received the news. Jeanie was an avid skier. It was her passion. We grew up in cold, snowy Maine, and from the time she was nine, whenever it snowed Jeanie would strap on a pair of skis and go wherever there was space for her. Whether it was cross-country skiing or telemark, she did not care. As long as she was out on those skis, she was happy.

“It clears your mind.” She used to explain. “Whenever you’re gliding over the snow and there’s white all around you and the cold wind nips at your nose, you feel more in tune with yourself, with the world around you, and suddenly none of your problems matter. You are temporarily freed from your life!”

Ironic, this choice of words, considering that on her trip to Aspen the snow freed her from her life permanently.

Her best friend, another lover of skiing, had convinced Jeanie to spend the last three days of Christmas break at an Aspen ski resort. Jeanie adored the idea, not having much experience outside of Maine. Nothing could have stopped her from going on this trip. So naturally, when the man at the lodge told them to be wary of avalanches in the area they were planning on skiing in, Jeanie blew him off. This was the chance of a lifetime for her and nothing was going to keep her from this opportunity.

It was a freak accident, her death. There was nothing she could have done to prevent it, once she decided upon skiing there that day. Both her and her friend, one moment zipping down the Aspen slopes and the next, gone, buried under hundreds of pounds of snow, thrown against trees and rocks until, finally, she suffocated underneath the snow she adored so much.

I got the news from my mother. She was so torn up that I could barely understand her when she delivered the news. My father had to take over.

“She’s gone, son.” Usually stoic and calm, even my father’s voice held a slight tremor with the weight of his grief. “At least we can rest easy, though, knowing she left us doing what she loved to do.”

That has stuck with me to this day, that line. She died doing what she loved to do. That’s how my parents got through this tragedy, how they dealt with her death. Her last few hours of her life were filled with it’s happiest experience and she died happy.
I, however, never found any solace in this statement. Now, on the tenth anniversary of her death, I come to the very place where her body was found. They placed a grave marker on the mountain so people could pay their respects to her lost life, but also to stand as a warning for the other skiers. The mountain was dangerous and should be dealt with with caution.
I’ve come to this makeshift grave site every year on the anniversary of her death, to honor and remember her. As I stared at the dark, looming figure of the mountain, my father’s words rushed through my brain. She left us doing what she loved to do.
“Yes father,” I whispered to the stagnant air, “You were right. She died doing what she loved to do, but that doesn’t make it any easier.” I kicked the snow up around me in anger. Ten years later and I grieved as if she had died only yesterday. I took one last look at the ominously peaceful mountain and turned away. I never returned.