Laughing All the Way

When I decided to become a ski writer, a lot of people laughed at me. I don’t blame them. I have been writing about the lovingly childish pursuit of chasing gravity and snow for 20 years now, and I still have to explain the job to most people. Ski writing may be a noble career to the people in my life, but it’s too damn fun and not nearly lucrative enough for most to take seriously. Queue the laughter.

It’s harder to weather the ridicule when there's no paycheque in the picture. As an unpublished rookie, the chuckles sting; the cynics laughing at your dream. But in the end, I did it. I became a successful ski writer. And I knew it when I had a story published in Powder. If there was one magazine my writing simply must be published in to be respected by others—other ski writers, editors, skiers, my dad—it was “The Skier’s Magazine.”

Powder was skiing’s bible. And that’s not hyperbole. For those of us who spent our formative years building a life around the mountains, it was a guiding light. For ski bums and ski writers alike, Powder set the trends. More importantly, it upheld the code of the skier. It suffered no fools. It (mostly) refused to follow the pay-to-play industry bullshit. Through the words of Steve Casimiro, Leslie Anthony, Mitchell Scott, Matt Hansen, and many others who dedicated their lives to mountain culture, Powder was skiing’s raison d'être spilled in ink and shared with the like-minded. The true skiers who didn’t care about next year’s hot apparel colour. The ones who knew top sheets are no reason to buy new skis.

Now that it is gone, shuttered alongside a few other iconic titles in a sad COVID-related death of print, I find myself having to address my own loss. In March, the pandemic arrived with the force of a Pacific Northwest tempest. When the call to close restaurants, bars, ski resorts and schools came down from whomever sends them down, Coast Mountain Culture was one week away from the ad deadlines, the early cash infusion that keeps the magazine alive in the dry months. The blood transfusion. The ventilator. The life.

Advertisers scattered, gone to ground with the same fears we all felt in the wake of this mysterious virus that refuses to go away. We kept hope that spirits would rebound, but as the months went on, Coast Mountain Culture’s chances for survival dissipated like fine January spindrift kicked up on a windy Cascadian peak.

CMC was dead. CMC is dead.

The first ten years of my career was spent shaping and honing tools to tell stories that made people want to go outside, attempt fresh pursuits, meet new people. Powder and a select few titles inspired me in that self-guided education. They were the blueprint for a career spent storytelling.

The second decade, I used these tools to help elevate Coast Mountain Culture into the pantheon of outdoor titles. For the entire crazy enjoyable ten-year run, I had the honour of being the editor. CMC was my own personal Powder, dedicated to Cascadia and the emerald green riches of the Pacific Northwest. A tiny team of brilliant Mountain Culture Group collaborators and I still worked other gigs, both freelance and full time. We had to; the lights must shine after all. But Coast Mountain Culture—and its sister title Kootenay Mountain Culture—stood above all other jobs.

The mountains and mountain culture are magical. They inspired Jake and David Moe to create Powder. In turn, Powder inspired a million wayward souls and dozens of magazines, most of them distinctly modeled after the Moe’s passion project.

I don’t know how many more businesses we are going to lose from the turbulence of this year, but I do know that few losses will have as much impact on skiing and mountain culture as the loss of Powder. Thank you to all involved. To those who chose the few photos I had published in its hallowed pages: images of friends lost, and hut trips recalled with crystal clarity. To the editors who put sharp points on my dull angles and whittled my words into tales of joy and loss in the mountains. The mentors who taught me to remove myself from the story. I am richer for all you gave me (although not in dollars).

Powder and Coast Mountain Culture may be gone, but life in the mountains rarely changes. There’ll always be cold death and greedy landlords and resort conglomerates who undermine entire communities. But the integral, soulful act of sliding on snow will sit at the centre, and we will still be here. On chairlifts and singletrack. On skis and snowboards, knee-deep and smiling. Laughter echoing through the mountains. So much laughter.

Thank you. — Mike Berard

"All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. And, you'll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you're going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It's the only good fight there is.”

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― Charles Bukowski