I Stole the First Issue of POWDER Magazine I Ever Owned

I can't recall how old I was when this ordeal went down, but according to my mom and her wagging finger, I was "old enough to know better. "

As a kid from Delaware, skiing wasn't something I shared with many of my friends. We played soccer, linked our gaming consoles for LAN sessions, and did other normal, suburban kid stuff. Skiing was something I liked to do, but it wasn't a passion quite yet. I didn't have a community to share the experience with outside of my immediate family and 10–20 days we skied each season.

Here's what I remember: My mom would regularly ask me to walk down to the end of the driveway to retrieve the mail. On one sunny Saturday in the fall, the mailbox was stuffed to the brim with various ads and magazines. I normally would just stack the mail and carry it inside, but the capitalized word POWDER caught my eye on one of the magazines. Powder? Like powder skiing? I was intrigued.

I wish I could remember the specific cover, but I've sustained too many concussions playing soccer between now and then. That, or I'm just dumb. Regardless, I was immediately enamored. Up until that moment, I had only read about skiing in a brief section of Sports Illustrated, or in a coffee table book that my dad purchased.

I had no idea that skiers were creating entire magazines completely about skiing. My mind was blown.

I mentioned my memory issues before (super ideal for somebody who tells stories for a living). I can't recall what happened between my first glance at that issue and my dad scolding me for losing it, but we were all kids at one point. Kids do dumb things.

Holding that first copy of POWDER felt validating. It was my first glimpse into the broader skiing world that I was so very naive about.

What I do remember is that POWDER felt like it was written for me. I was young, probably only eight or nine years old, but it felt like the writers were speaking directly to me as a skier, not as a kid from Delaware who was on the outside looking in.

This introduction to POWDER is one of a handful of memories that evolved my love for sliding downhill into a passion and a way of life.

My dad remained displeased with me for stealing and losing his issue of POWDER, but we worked out a deal for future issues. He would read the new issue for as long as he pleased, and then pass it over to me once he was done.

It's still hard to believe that I work here all of these years later.

This piece is part of POWDER's Summer of Ski Nostalgia content series. Stay tuned in daily for more nostalgic articles, and keep an eye out for the upcoming Summer of Ski Nostalgia badge to identify future content.

You can also view all of POWDER's summer nostalgia content here.

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