My Skiing Accident in Lake Tahoe

I was a college professor on vacation in 1987, in Lake Tahoe at a ski resort near the resort where Sonny Bono was killed a few years later in a skiing accident hitting into sa tree. I went on a ski trip vacation with my yougner brother and my cousins from the Bay Area around the holidays, in 1987. There was plenty of snow. I had very limited skiing experience. My cousin gave me some skiing lessons as a gift. I also paid for a few on my own,

I was doing well with the skiing and the lessons. On New Years's Eve my brother and I were on top of an intermediate ski trail. He said you go first. I came down the trail at about 80 miles an hour and hit a patch of ice and couldn't slow down or stop. I was heading right into a huge sequois tree on the right side of the trail. I went head on into the tree and threw my right arm up and was wearing contact lenses. My lenses filled with blood and fell off my head. I had thrown my right arm up and banged my head against my arm and also hit the tree somewhat.

I hit the ground like a sack of potatoes. It was a cold snowy day. We were supposed to go out that night to dinner for New Year's Eve. The para medics came and took me to a cabin and took my jacket off and cut off the sleeve of my new ski jacket.They put me on a board and said my back may be broken and my arm may be broken. They put the stretcher on z sled and sledded me down the mountain to an ambulance to a local hospital. This was in Truckee, Nevada. The ER. Doctor said my right arm was dislocated after the ski accident.

He gave me some valium drip and pulled my arm in and put it back in place. He gave me some pain killers and some sleeping pills and told me not to drink any alcohol on New Year's Eve. It was a horrible New Year's Eve away from home. My brother had gone with me to the hospital in the ambulance. The doctor said I should come back to the hospital in a week for him to see how i was doing.

I had all bandages and my right eye had stiches and a bandage over my head. I really was badly injured from the accident. It was one of the worst accidents I ever had in my life. My cousing back at the condo told me not to take the pain pills or the sleeping pills or I would become a drug addict. I still took them since I needed them.

They went out to dinner for the New Year's Eve festivities and my brother stayed back with me. He must have felt guilty that he told me to go first on the slope and trail. I never went back to skiing again after that terrible accident. We went gambling in Reno and one of the attendents thought I was in an auto wreck. I told her how my accident had happened. She said you should never have gambled with your life like that.

I got through the two week vacation at Lake Tahoe and then flew back to the East Coast to return to my professorship at the college. I saw the Dean and he said, Would you like to lead the ski team at the college? I laughed and said no. I said not the after what happened to me and way I ski. He said I told you to be careful on your vacation. I have had so many things happen to me in my life.

This was another experience to add to my list of near death experiences. I was luckier than Sonny Bono who died in a similar skiing accident a few years after me in Lake Tahoe at. a resort near where I had my accident. Life is full of near calls. I am a very lucky person. I have had so many close calls. I guess my time isn't up yet. i am meant to be here still. I hope I have many years left. I have defied the odds for many years and am still here. I must have many great things to do in my life ahead of me. That is the reason I am still here.