I first put on a pair of skis seven days after my 41st birthday and one day after my mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer. This year I am living in the French Alps for the winter; skiing when the weather is good, teaching and writing the rest of the time. I never imagined that that surreal swollen-eyed weekend in February 2011 would lead me to this moment four years later. From the chair lifts, I watch the lines of toddlers, wrapped in blue Club Med bibs, snaking around