“I need to help that little girl up,” said Sean Marusich, after she careened into him on the beginner slope at Ski Apache. As his Ski Apache Adaptive Sports (SAAS) coach gently reminded him that it was her fault, that she was skiing out of control and that she needed a lesson, Sean answered: “But everyone falls sometime, don’t they?” It is difficult logic to argue with, made all the more significant since, nearly 12 years ago, doctors removed the…
When she was 17 years old, while walking on the campus of Cal Poly Pomona, a drunk driver hit Mona Patel. Her lower right leg was crushed. She was airlifted to UCLA Medical Center where the orthopedic team told her distraught parents that amputation would be the easiest course of action. It was possible that she could be walking in three to four months. The plastics crew told her parents that they could try and salvage what remained of her…
Seven women, five from the Ruidoso area and two from Denver, returned recently from reaching the 14,199 foot summit of Mt. Yale in Colorado. There was a 20 year age difference and a varied range of climbing and backpacking experience within the group. The one thing Shippen Salas, Sue Morris, Lori Lamphere, Devonna James and Ann Ellis agreed on when interviewed this week was that they came back changed people. Salas had taken backpacking trips to Colorado since 2012. She…