Defining Dogma
One writer finds reason to paws and reflect.
By MITCHELL SCOTT

I used to hate dogs.

To me they were ungodly creatures, faking allegiance to man in exchange for lazy, insouciant lives spent shitting on lawns and sleeping on couches. It's bad enough, I reasoned, that humans actively pilfer the Earth; it's even worse that we're dragging another species into over-consumption with us. The way I saw it, dogs were our Sacred Cow. If we were starving, we still wouldn't flank the little mongrels and flap them on the barby.

So of course, dogs surrounded me. I think they sensed my hatred for them, and in some kind of cosmic payback I continually stepped in their crap, got barked at, licked, chased, you name it. You can bet your favorite pair of sticks that every one of the myriad late-eighties Toyota 4Runners in my ski town has a tongue-dripping leech-Lassie sitting in the passenger seat.

And of course, all of my friends have dogs. In fact, some are unintelligent enough to have a few. I go mountain biking—dog. Backcountry skiing—dog. Have a porch party—10 dogs. No one ever tried to understand my hatred for the furry fools. If anything, they'd rub it in my face. "See man, they smell it on you," I'd hear as Fido growled in my direction.

"The only thing I smell," I fired back, "is that little plastic bag of feces hanging from your back pocket." Unfortunately this kind of loathsome wit had little effect.

I really truly wanted to annihilate the domestic dog, those loving beasts so wrongly personified with names like "Jack," "Sadie," or "Chuck," from the Earth. I thought the world—my world—would be better off without these wretched welfare woofers. But I've since had to rethink my position.

That's because I met The Dog That Hucked.


It was my first winter here and I was enjoying a classic day of backcountry skiing with friends at a nearby snow-ravaged mountain pass. Quality lines can be scoped right from the car. After a few runs in deep, fluffy snow, we crossed the highway to our truck for a little lunch.

Half way through a PB&J someone pointed to a skier dropping off the peak. Ripping through sparse pines, the skier then linked three massive airs, sticking them with ease as if landing on flypaper. He flashed the line as if he'd done it for millennia. As quickly as he came, he dropped out of sight to exuberant hoots and hollers of approval from our group.

We figured the show was over until we heard a faint but high-pitched yelp from high on the ridge. To our surprise the dog dropped in, following his owner's difficult line. He plowed through deep powder to the top of the first cliff, easily a 30-footer. I watched dumbfoundedly, my tongue hanging so much like the accused, as the dog hucked seriously fat air.

We yelled wildly as Scooby continued to charge, following his owner's blazing tracks. He launched the next air, 25 feet, no hesitation. He nosed the landing, but after a tight forward roll he was back on his paws and straightlining the steep slope.

The last air was the biggest and of slightly lower angle, but ripper mutt tossed his carcass anyway, springing from his furry hind legs to clear 30 feet of granite to a sweet transition landing. The parking lot erupted. I dropped my binoculars and rose in genuine delight and screamed my approval.

But wait a sec. What just happened here?

Soon two snow-caked characters emerged from the woods and crossed the highway. We all sang expressions of praise to them. It turned out the skier was Pierre Yves Leblanc, a nomadic athlete known for his death-defying jumps. His dog, a compact Husky-looking mutt, whose eyes shined with vitality and poise, strutted proudly beside him.

"You rule," I confessed to Pierre's furry mate, and when I realized I meant it, my dog-hating philosophy crashed in on me like an old abandoned doghouse.

I can't hate dogs anymore. My own line down the same face didn't even come close to his. And my dogma says that if a K9 can rip a fatter line than me, then dogs, no matter how much I hated them, rule.


B.C.-based writer Mitchell Scott is a regular contributor to Powder and Bike.


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