Every year, the Summit County community reads one book to create a shared experience from reading. This year’s book, “Powder Days,” is part memoir, part nonfiction as author Heather Hansman tells the story of her ski bumming days and the climate changes threatening the entire industry.
Hansman says her story is likely very similar to many others who headed to the mountains in their early 20s.
“I think that's part of why I wanted to dig into this idea of what it meant to be a ski bum and why we get so interested in moving to the mountains is because I think I'm a little bit of a stereotype or a cliche when it comes to that,” Hansman said. “I'm from New England originally, and I moved to Colorado right out of college, just kind of on this idea that I was going to move to the mountains for one season, and ended up staying, you know, over 20 years now, which I think is a familiar story for a lot of people.”
But with the consolidation of ski resorts, climate change, increasing property values and nonstop growth pressure on mountain communities, the ski bum lifestyle may be a thing of the past, unless one is independently wealthy – which she says really isn’t part of the ski bum definition.
“I think that it is harder in a lot of ways than it ever has been before, from economic pressures from the way people are moving and can be more mobile and can live in in places like Park City,” she said. “But I think people are still doing it. And I think every generation has kind of faced this idea of, was it easier before? Was it cooler, more interesting before? But I think, you know, we're facing these theories of really real questions about the viability of ski bums and ski town living right now that I think are really important to talk about.”
The One Book One Community event happens Tuesday, Aug. 30, at 7 p.m. at the Jim Santy Auditorium. Hansman will spend a portion of the time talking about her book, and then will open it up to audience questions. She says she is hopeful mountain communities can take away a few lessons from the book.
“I think the biggest overarching lesson in a lot of ways is that the status quo and the systems that we've built up, since the ski industry started, aren't really working for a lot of people,” she said. “And we see that in the debate for real wages, we see that in people's ability to actually live and find housing in these towns. So, I think in a lot of ways, the paradigm really has to shift about how these places exist, and who's able to exist in them. One of the hard parts about this book is that there's no easy answers in any of this. But I think, you know, I'm glad we're talking about it, because I think a lot of this does take investigating the systems that exist right now.”
Hansman’s book, “Powder Days: Ski Bums, Ski Towns and the Future of Chasing Snow,” is available in quantity at all Summit County libraries and is also available for a free download from the Libby app.