You can’t let an accident be a defining moment of your life.

THE ACCIDENT

It was just a normal day in Vail, Colorado, spring break 2012. This was my 49th consecutive season of skiing.

I was with my wife and two kids. It was the last day on the mountain until we would head back home and it was the last run down before lunch.

I was skiing on a pair of my Salomon Screams and this was the last season I was going to ski them, so they were pretty shot, but I’m not blaming the skis for what happened next.

I was just cruising down to lunch, nothing too crazy. There wasn’t really anything on my mind; I wasn’t distracted, maybe I was thinking about what I was going to have for lunch. Then I made a turn I’ve made over 500,000 times. A second later I’m in the air.

CRUNCH.

I’m on the ground.

My first thought was that I got a hip pointer, which I’ve gotten from sports in the past. But then I realized it couldn’t be that, because it was just, RIP YOUR HEAD OFF excruciating pain.

I thought, “maybe it’s just dislocated.” I stood up on one leg with help from a ski pole and I sort of tried to turn my hip into place. But then all I heard was a bunch of crunching noises. It sounded like crunching potato chips, accompanied by torture and agonizing pain.

I knew it wasn’t dislocated.

I had tried to put the ski back on to see if I could just make it down, but there was no way.

My leg was like rubber.

My wife and kids were filled with concern. My wife tried not to show how worried she was and my children held back their tears. My kids have always looked up to me as this amazing skier and I was surely one of the most experienced skiers on the mountain. So, when I went down, my children didn’t know what to think.

It would take about fifteen minutes for my wife and kids to get back with ski patrol. I was bordering in and out of shock, and, being an Eagle Scout, I am well trained in first aid, so I knew what was going on. I knew not to start crying or start screaming, because once you do that, you start hyperventilating.

Stay calm and stay focused; find something to focus on. I kept putting snow on my face, trying to stay as calm as I could. FOCUS. Focus on anything except the pain.

It was the determination. The strength of will to say, I’m not gonna lose it until it’s time. And I waited.

And I waited.

And I waited.

I thought, “God… this is really hard.” You get woozy and start sweating, your pulse is racing, you feel like you’re gonna pass out.

But I still had to interact with my family; I still had to interact with the ski patrol. I had to answer the same question over and over again.

“Where does this hurt? Where does that hurt?”

The ski patrol couldn’t believe how alert I was. They were just looking at me like, “You’re still conscious?”

They were very cautious making sure of two things: it wasn’t a compound fracture and when my leg had shattered, that I didn’t rupture an artery and wasn’t bleeding to death internally. If that would’ve been the case I would’ve been helivaced off the mountain.

I did not make it to the bottom of the hill.

I stayed conscious until I didn’t have to stay conscious anymore.

I kept it together until I was on the sled, or meat wagon, and out of sight from my kids. Then I just let go and I was done. I could just feel it and I just thought, okay, I am now going to go into shock. I had done everything that I had needed to do, give closure, hug my kids, kiss my wife. Then I went down, and three to four turns… I was out.

THE RECOVERY

It was a little under two hours between when I was unconscious and put into surgery.

I broke my femur… A bone in your body that should never break. My surgeon had mentioned to my wife that my femur looked like I was either hit by a train or shot with a gun. And so I had surgery.

I was in the hospital for three days. As soon as I could be mobile enough to use the restroom the hospital kicked me out. They suggested that I stay about two to three days in a motel. About five days after the accident, they flew me back home.

That was the beginning of bed rest.

My recovery consisted of two months of bed rest, about a month in a wheelchair and two months on crutches. I had to undergo therapy to get my muscles to work. Not to mention I was in chronic pain through the duration of my recovery.

My family was very supportive during my recovery. My wife was very helpful; my kids were very tolerant because it was a very difficult time. It was hard for them because Dad couldn’t do anything for almost a year.

The most difficult part of the recovery was that I had just gotten the nod to perform at the Chicago Blues Festival that June in the Blues Harmonica Showcase. There was no way I was going to turn it down. It was the apex of my musical career. That was my driving force to rehab. I used that blues festival to focus and make sure I was prepared; physically and mentally. It was the light at the end of the tunnel.

I was on crutches when the festival rolled around; I definitely should have still been in the wheelchair if it weren’t for that experience. Before I got up on stage I just sucked it up and I did it.

I’d say unquestionably that there’s a sense of posttraumatic stress. It comes back in a dream occasionally. Some people have recurring dreams, and replaying the accident is mine. I dream it in slow motion. Not as much now as when it first happened, but it does still happen. It tends to happen before I go skiing, and yes, it does shake me. But I can’t control it; your dreams are your subconscious.

I had used the cane up until that next season. That being said, the following year (2013), on Casimir Pulaski day, I went skiing for one day so that I could keep my streak alive. Fifty years. I certainly did not want to start a streak over.

I still tell people, “if you fall off the horse, you get back on it.” You have to show the kids that you can’t just give up on something you’re passionate about. That’s why I got back up on my skis that season. I wanted to prove that it’s a lifelong commitment and you just don’t give up on stuff like that.

Since the accident, my family and I went to the Grand Canyon, we’ve hiked the Tetons, we’ve gone to Yellowstone, and we’ve explored Canada. I’ve traveled. I’ve skied. I’ve had fun. I haven’t given up on myself or my commitments. You can’t let an accident be a defining moment of your life.