King of the Bunny Hill

Some say he hasn't fallen once in 28 years.

He's a permanent fixture of the local beginner slope. Everybody's seen him, but his motivations remain opaque. He seldom speaks outside of canned quips.

"I fear not the man who's read ten thousand books, but the man who's read the same book ten thousand times."

"Every snowflake is different, but all snow is the same. A slope is a slope."

"Good skiing is defined by not falling".

He is King of the Bunny Hill.

Majestic, godlike, confident -- you watch him steadily slide past you from that prone yoga pose you've improvised in the snow. But you are determined. You will improve.

And you do improve. Within weeks, you scoot past dozens of cold yogis. Each day brings a new batch of beginners that repeat your mistakes from yesterday.

Each time Earth tilts her head, you find yourself back on that short slope, armed with more confidence than last year.

Winter's gravity is now your familiar friend.

Your old friends weren't loyal. They always ditched you to eat at that overpriced restaurant parked on the bigger hill.

So forget them. If you are to become king one day, you need loyalty more than friendship.

You will stay on this slope; you will die on this hill.

The Old King dethroned himself on a random Tuesday afternoon.

Without explanation, he took a lift to an intermediate point up the mountain. On that bigger hill, witnesses say he crashed and tumbled and bruised and cursed at the sky.

The Old King has adopted a mysterious new phrase:

"All slopes become plateaus."