Our own personal planning for this event happened in the midst of the great pandemic of 2020. Nevertheless, I was certain that we’d be sending in our applications and mapping out a route for driving to this event. No need to worry about travel time. After all, we’re retired now. But the pandemic showed no signs of letting up.
Being correctly conservative and very caring about their audience, the Ski For Light International board members were skeptical that the event could take place with what was known early in their planning process. It seemed that the only wise and prudent course of action was to cancel in order to avoid contributing to the spread of the virus.
However, the leadership board is made up of some very smart and inventive people. Given the creative talent and technological prowess of the team, cancelation was not considered for very long. Instead, a virtual event using video conferencing tools began to take shape and everything fell into place from there.
Registration, special sessions, and evening social activities took on the same sequence of development complete with opening and closing remarks and awards. When the schedule was finalized and published, it looked pretty close to what every international event looks like with one exception: the Zoom Link.
Here is where I might include a few snapshots of the trails or a place visited in some far away state in the U.S. where there is snow. Since we never left the house for this event, those snapshots are being replaced with a few screenshots of presentations by the Ski For Light International team of guides and participants.
In this screenshot, Julie appears to be suited up for cross country skiing with a snowy landscape in the background.
The second screenshot reveals that she is actually in front of a green screen in her living room. Ah, the wonders of personal computers and digital special effects.
The special sessions included fitness presentations detailing the use of easily acquired low cost special equipment and even the use of household items in an exercise routine (unopened cans of soup or full half gallons of milk).
John Elliott demonstrates how a small, lightweight, go-anywhere exercise band can keep your muscles toned and flexible wherever you go.
Sure, you could google “low cost fitness” and find 150 pages of equipment, “how-to” articles, and countless YouTube videos but these presentations were put together by folks we know. Also, the routines were described for the blind and vision impaired. While we did not specifically engage in the fitness challenge, we did maintain our normal workouts at our local gym. But we learned new exercises that we can incorporate into future routines.
The biggest challenge for me was ordering my day around the several Zoom-casts that I specifically wanted to attend. When Marilee and I are physically at an event, there is little debate over the order of the day. But “real life” was still going on around a virtual schedule. Suddenly I felt like I was 10 years old again when I needed to be home by 4 PM if I wanted to see The Lone Ranger on channel 11 at 5:30 PM. And so it was for this very unusual but very wonderful event.
UPDATE — Summer of 2021 — The shirts arrived and, as promised in an earlier version of this post, here are the images with descriptions on the shirts.
Here the traditional Ski For Light International logo is seen in a bit more detail rather than just the silhouette. The skiers are shown on the trail with a mountain range in the background and stands of trees in the foreground. Framing the oval image are the words “The 2021 Ski For Light International Event — Virtually Everywhere.”
This is the 2021 palm sized emblem on the front of the t-shirt over the heart: A hexagonal outline encloses the traditional Ski For Light International logo silhouette above the words SKI FOR LIGHT, INC. followed by Virtually Everywhere 2021.
In conclusion, everything about this event was an affirmation of the SFL motto: “If I can do this, I can do anything.” This year was especially heavy on the “…I can do anything” part.
