• Nonfiction

    The Sexualization of America’s Children

    by Breeyana Marshall I was in a mad dash to pick up my twelve year old son from a late night session at Diamond Skate Land. As I drove up I saw a little girl, no older than eight or nine. She was standing there, legs spread behind, pushed outward, thrusting her hips hard and fast in a very provocative fashion. It appeared that she was humping the air. I was appalled and disgusted. This later turned to sadness for a generation of innocence that has been lost with the values of my parent’s generation. What I witnessed made me realize how sexualized America’s children have become. The definition of…

  • Nonfiction

    Jeri

    by Brooke Hartman The aroma of day-old fish nuggets and burned Tater Tots wafted from the lunch line. I sucked in a breath, trying to forget that tomorrow I would be watching reruns of SG-1 while every other guy in the universe (well, every other guy in my school, which was my universe) would be going to the Homecoming Game and the Homecoming Dance and making out with Homecoming Cheerleaders. But this was my senior year. Time I got some action. The kind of action Kirk got from Uhura. The kind of action Gaius got from Number 6. The kind of action Billy the Poet got from scores of Junoesque…

  • Nonfiction

    Back to America!

    by Thomas O’Harra Going into this last weekend’s races, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. I had never raced that much in three days before, and so it was really a big adventure, and definitely a new experience. The races this weekend, which were in Campra, Switzerland, were all part of a mini-tour, as I mentioned in my previous installment. The opening race, a skate sprint, was actually a pretty good race! I qualified 10th and advanced out of my quarterfinal in 2nd. In the semifinal, I missed getting into the draft of the leading skiers on the big downhill of the course and then couldn’t quite catch back…

  • Nonfiction

    Switzerland!

    by Thomas O’Harra After the races last weekend in the Czech Republic, we packed everything up and drove ten hours through five different countries to end in Campra, Switzerland. After the smog of Kazakhstan and the general gloom of Czech, Switzerland is a veritable paradise. I did not have great races at Nove Mesto for a couple of reasons. I think that the gloominess of the place that we were staying at coupled with sitting around all the time and not getting enough to eat led to me having very low energy levels going into the races. Subsequently, I didn’t perform very well, certainly not as well as I had…

  • Nonfiction

    On to the Czech Republic

    by Thomas O’Harra Hello all, Thomas again… So, last weekend (Sunday the 7th) I raced the relay at Junior World Championships. I was the scramble leg, which means I raced first. It was a 5km classic race, and it started fast. I held onto the leaders as long as I could, and then died really hard, at about 3.5km. I lost several places and dropped back to 11th, but I am happy with being able to ski with the leaders for as long as I did. It was a lot of fun, and I am really excited to come back next year and try and hold onto the leaders for…

  • Poetry

    The Station

    by Steve Rubinstein [divider] I was already worried when he took my hand to wipe at his tears. By then through the wall-high windows I noticed wet splatters, sleet, painted streets. He looked me over first to see if I was waiting on a friend, on a train, for him to move further away. The rain would not stop so he stood there dripping cursing the night; I would not talk so instead he sat down. October, selfish, had stolen the last bit of sun from the stripped down days left of autumn. I did not tell him, would not talk, did not ask when sun would come again, where…

  • Nonfiction

    Along the Way: Chapter 0

    by Nick Jenkins It all began at a Halloween party in 2012. I (Nick) was dressed as a vintage mountaineer and Sean was an incredibly convincing Chewbacca. We were talking about classes we planned to take the following semester and I told Sean about a directed study I was developing where I filmed and edited a feature-length ski movie. Sean, who had always been my primary backcountry skiing partner, jumped at the idea immediately and we sealed our newly formed partnership with a disgusting jello shot. For the next few months we scrambled to get all the necessary paperwork pushed through the university and filed with the state. Since we…

  • Nonfiction

    Krazy Kazakhstan

    by Thomas O’Harra So, we’ve been in Kazakhstan for about a week now, and I have to say, this place is crazy (also a note on the title, I figured that it was only a matter of time before someone said it). Not in a bad crazy, either. It is just… different here. Personally I have no background in Russian or Kazakh (which are very similar) or any other Cyrillic languages, so walking down the street I feel very lost. Also, the drivers are worse than L.A. and Chicago combined, and it seems like using your horn is expected rather than frowned upon. That said, everyone that I’ve talked to…

  • Nonfiction

    Dasan Shantidas Marshall (1990 – 2015)

    First published in the Anchorage Press. [divider] On Sunday, January 18th, Alaska Pacific University student, Dasan Marshall fell to his death on the North Face of Mount Yukla. Marshall was scouting a section of a route in a couloir when he slipped and fell 1,000 feet down the face. An avid climber and explorer from Portland, Oregon, Dasan Marshall had been living in Alaska since 2012. Marshall had been attending his last semester at Alaska Pacific University (APU) to complete his Bachelor’s degree in Outdoor Studies and working on his senior project that involved starting an alpine club for the student community at APU. The following tribute to Dasan was…

  • Nonfiction

    On Racing

    by Thomas O’Harra So, on Tuesday and Wednesday of this week (the 3rd and 4th, respectively), I had my first two races of the championships. Tuesday’s race was a classic sprint, and Wednesday’s race was a 10K skate individual start. For those who don’t know, a sprint race is rather confusing to someone who hasn’t seen it in action before. The day starts out with an individual start time trial around the course, with racers going every 15 seconds. Then, the people who post the top 30 times advance on to heats. This starts out with the quarterfinals, which are five heats of six people. The two fastest skiers from…