I got my new life motto from a ski sign.

That near-death life experiences are the fodder for many a travel story is as apparent as the abundant Amazon adventure book (virtual) aisles.

 

You will recognize the genre when you see clichéd chapter, or book title with some version of,

“No shit, there I was…”

 

But, the reality of it is that for some of us, we might rather exclaim,

“Oh shit, I wish I wasn’t…”

 

For famed travel authors that have inspired us for decades, like Tim Cahill, it might be a drowning death in the Grand Canyon, with a miraculous second chance at life—or given Cahill’s predilection for adventures that could kill him, maybe his third, or fourth, or…

 

Or, for us wannabe imitators, it might be some latent arrhythmia that prematurely ends an intended adventure along the remote Panamanian coast, with my own miraculous second chance discovery of a previously unknown cancerous hitchhiker.

 

Contrary to the old adage, “What doesn’t kill you, will make you stronger, ”if you happen to need a kidney, I ain’t got a spare no more.

 

I don’t know if Cahill has yet jumped back on the horse, or into the whitewater raft again, but it has taken me a full year to venture away from my trusted medical support, and into a country where English is not the native language.

 

But here I go.

 

I decided to take heed from a sign I happened by on a recent ski run.

 

 

 

I took that as a celestial hint, so for the next week I will be spending some time three flights distant and under the warm Caribbean waters.

 

However, I have every intent of staying above ground, if you get my gist.