Weight centered over his skis, his first turn was a thing of beauty.

Robert struggled to keep his balance but with his arms pumping to stay upright, he suddenly catapulted away from the face, soared over two bumps and exploded into the third

Someone  was screaming, "DON'T MOVE ROBERT! DON'T MOVE!" and I knew the patrol feared he had broken his neck

I wondered if I would love Robert less if he could not bring his looks, speed, power and joyful charisma to the playing fields

In the course of skiing, bicycling and tempting the fates on motorcycles, I have broken a hip, compressed discs, punctured lungs, torn ligaments and dislocated both shoulders

All fathers need to question the value of sports before their sons set for their first scrimmage, drive toward the basket, crowd the plate or attempt any of a dozen other athletic acts that could result in catastrophic injury

if I could have predicted Robert’s wreck on the day I first strapped him into a pair of skis, would I have denied him the coming ten years

I can still see my son Robert standing in the start gate above the bump run. The sun is behind him and I cannot make out details––not his expression, or his smile, only how elegantly he stands on his skis and how the ice crystals sparkle around his square shoulders and narrow hips. Five foot six, a hundred and five pounds, my second son is tall for eleven years old. He is also a gifted skier.

Three decades on skis has taught me that skiing is a type of foreign language that cannot be learned by rote memorization. I was sixteen when I started to ski, too late by a decade to ever truly master the extremes of sheer chutes, breakable crust or massive moguls. When Robert was born, I promised myself that he would not struggle with the same limits and as soon as he was able to stand, I fixed a tether around his waist and slipped a pair of single buckle boots and tiny skis on his feet. I remember he was all of two and a half years old--a rosy-cheeked cherub yelling "Faster Daddy Faster!" on Sun Valley's Quarter Dollar Run.

Now, nine years and hundreds of days on skis later, Robert exhibits the subtle nuances of body position, weight and edge control that connote true mother tongue fluency. If I once wanted him to be comfortable in all conditions, I realize I succeeded too well, for in early January he exhibits a total lack of fear for big bumps, big jumps and high speeds.

"Robert loves to push the envelope!" his coach admitted before adding that the ability to push that envelope, without stepping through it, is what defines great skiers.

In all honesty, I have dreaded this moment for a week. It is not Robert's skiing that I fear, but the course itself. During the past week, torrential rains followed a series of deep powder storms. When the rains stopped, temperatures plunged to ten below locking Sun Valley's Bald Mountain beneath a glistening layer of boilerplate. By race day, the course amounted to five hundred vertical feet of ice bumps divided by a slick zipper. The icy zipper was brutally difficult to ski at all, much less at speed. Add two air bumps where the competitors would throw combinations of twisters and spreads and if Robert wasn't scared, he should have been.

A father's pride and prejudice aside, Robert is the toughest kid I've ever known. I've lost count of the times he's yard-saled through the bumps and walked away. I've seen an errant fastball lace blood blisters into his ribs then watched as he quietly shook it off and walked to first base. In the course of playing center for the basketball team, soccer goalie, martial arts, hockey and catcher/pitcher/power hitter for an all star baseball team, he had accrued an impressive collection of scrapes and bruises but, by some miraculous intervention of those fates that protect the young and innocent, he had not broken any bones. And while beseeching Robert's guardian angels to silence my fears, I told myself that this mogul run would be no different. 

Robert had trained with the Sun Valley Freestyle Team for two years and was only one of three eleven-year-old skiers selected for this bump competition. I knew that he had entered this competition partly to please me, but believed it was only natural that sons try to please fathers.

Then I heard the loud speaker announce his name and watched him skate out of the gate. 

His first turn was a thing of beauty. Weight centered over his skis, hands reaching down the fall line, he checked and set for the zipper line. He made a second perfect turn then inexplicably rocked back on his tails. I watched him fight to get forward then saw his right ski abruptly bounce away.

In the next instant the wheels came off. 

I watched Robert struggle to keep his balance but with his arms pumping to stay upright, he suddenly catapulted away from the face, soared over two bumps and exploded into the third. His poles, goggles and hat cartwheeled up into the soft afternoon light and I watched helplessly as he began to slide. In time he came to rest on the icy plateau of a large mogul and I started to run uphill at the same instant his coaches and ski patrol began to run down hill. 

 Someone was screaming "DON'T MOVE ROBERT! DON'T MOVE!" and I knew the patrol feared he had broken his neck. I refused to believe what had happened. I reached Robert seconds after the ski patrol. Stu Brown checked his neck and head, then to my lasting gratitude, had him sit up. In hindsight, I guess, in a way, we were lucky. Robert had blown his clavicle off the top of his shoulder, rotated it sixty degrees and then nearly driven it out the center of his back. Despite the incredible pain he managed to stand up and ski out of the course. "Aren't you supposed to be crying or something?" one of the ski patrol quietly asked him.

"It won't do any good," my son replied, his complexion ashen.   

At the emergency room, Dr. Del Pletcher, the orthopedic surgeon observed, "Robert suffered one of the most painful shoulder injuries I've ever seen. Why he wasn't hysterical is beyond me."   

That night as I watched the anesthesiologist wheel Robert through two white doors into surgery, I experienced a numbing guilt. During the two hours it took to piece his shoulder back together, I remembered the pride I felt when his coaches said he was skiing well 

I recalled how Robert had asked to spend Friday night with a friend who was allowed to up past midnight. Midnight was too late by hours for a serious free styler who on weekend mornings, dragged out of bed, sleep walked into his ski gear and stumbled out the front door. Though Robert promised to be in bed by ten, I knew it was a promise he couldn't keep and to my son's enormous disappointment, nixed the overnight. When he loudly argued that every winter weekend was devoted to ski team, I blamed his objections on hormones. Now, waiting for word from the operating room, I wished I'd jerked him from the very competition he’d trained so hard for. 

I was raised in a military family where grades, athletics and goals often provided dinner's tense fare. I was born to a tradition that insisted I name my first son after my deceased father. While waiting for Robert to come out of surgery, I wondered what I loved most about my second son. I realized that mine was not a mother's love––unconditional in its acceptance of scholar or C student, first string or bench warmer, leader or follower. I expected great things from both sons and though I valued the intangibles of humor, intellect and empathy that both posses, I wondered if I would love Robert less if he could not bring his looks, speed, power and joyful charisma to the playing fields. When I look in the darkest part of my soul, the part where I hide the secrets that compromise me as both a father and a man, I do not know if I would. And, if I indeed love my son as much for what he accomplishes as for what he thinks and feels, then I also wonder if I had wanted Robert to ski freestyle for his good, or for some undefined goal of my own. Did I want Robert to be the skier I never could be? And was the Freestyle Team good for Robert? Or was it good for me?

In contrast to Robert, who likes to sleep in late, watch cartoons and play video games, my eldest son Andrew is a first child perfectionist who excels at school and sports. Except for a third place finish at the Western Finals, Andrew went undefeated in classic Nordic races. Sitting in the waiting room, I remembered how Robert had also wanted to ski on the Nordic team. I believed, however, that there was already too much competition between the boys and wondered out loud, if perhaps Robert might prefer freestyle. And because my second son has a generous nature, he agreed, that freestyle would be fine.     

It wasn’t simply my influence in Robert’s choice of teams that haunted me. Because Andrew was the oldest, he and I had hiked through Hell's Canyon, shared father son float trips down the Middle Fork of the Salmon and skied together in Grand Targhee Wyoming. Because I did things first with his older brother, when it came time for Robert, I was slow to repeat experiences and even then, often included his older brother. I remember the year Andrew got his hunting license. Robert made me promise that when he turned twelve, I would hunt with him alone on opening day of doves, pheasants and deer.     

Robert was slow coming out of anesthesia. The nurse insisted he had to open his eyes before he could leave the recovery room. When calling his name and rubbing his uninjured arm failed to elicit a response, I stupidly said. "Robert the school bus is honking for you. You're going to miss the bus." And my youngest son, still under the anesthesia, came up fighting. His eyes were unfocused and he flailed drunkenly but he showed the same aggressive drive to catch the bus that he had shown earlier on the bump course.

The following afternoon Del Pletcher advised Robert that 20% of all clavicle breaks repeat the same injury within two months. He cautioned him to protect his arm until the sling came off. For that reason, he stayed home from school for the next two weeks and avoided any hard physical contact for the next six weeks. His baseball coach called often to find out how he was feeling. "If your arm hurts you can play first base," he promised. None of us, however, believed he would be able to play that summer.

I knew all about wrecks. In the course of skiing, bicycling and tempting the fates on motorcycles, I have broken a hip, compressed discs, broken ribs and punctured lungs, torn ligaments and dislocated both shoulders. I see Robert's injury as a life sentence, the first weak link in what was originally a perfect frame.      

Del Pletcher believed that since the surgery had gone well, the bone would mend and, in time, Robert would regain full use of his arm. If I was grateful and truly relieved for the surgeon’s optimistic prognosis, I continued to blame myself that the injury occurred at all.

In the weeks following the accident, I kept asking myself, if I truly believed that the course was too difficult, why did I hesitate? And my only answer was, once committed to a sport––whether it's baseball, football, soccer or freestyle skiing––your options are limited.   

Few fathers subscribe to the philosophy of sport as strictly fun. Without the practice, dedication and competitive drive, team sports can be your son or daughter's worst nightmare. Stand for any time behind a little league bench and you will witness the blindness of parents, who insist that the coach play all kids at all positions. Or you will observe the selfishness of fathers who coach to simply to insure their son starts. 

I believe that kids should make their own way, let their bats, arms, gloves or skis do their talking. Andrew played all-star baseball until the age of thirteen for a coach, who divided the team into first and second strings. Though he never missed a practice or game, Andrew played a total of five innings. No matter if the score was 20 to 2, my son would either sit on the bench, or at best run bases for the first stringers. 

There are times when sitting on the bench can provide a valuable lesson, but this was not one of them. Because team players are intensely competitive, they can also be incredibly cruel.

“One of these days they’ll invent a robot to take the place of you bench warmers,” I heard the coach’s son tell the silent B team.

Instead of allowing Andrew to quit, I encouraged him to stick it out––believing in the end, that dedication and hard work eventually win out. In the course of a losing season, the coach taught the team to bunt, run and swear. Of eighteen players that showed up for spring practice, only ten lasted to the season’s end. 

A week after Robert’s surgery, I asked his free style coach what he would have said if I had scratched my son from the competition. I wanted him to accept part of the blame by admitting that, in Robert's case, the course had been too difficult. Instead his coach insisted that the course was no more difficult than any other and that Robert had ripped all week. 

“If you had tried to pull Robert, I would have made every effort to talk you out of it," he admitted. "Maybe I could have addressed your fears, or maybe we could have talked to Robert but I wouldn't have wanted to pull him." 

You can't deny the experiences of life for fear of injury." He said. "You can't ask Robert to live his life in a box. You didn't and if you asked your son to learn from what you say, not what you do, then he'll eventually resent you for it."      

Robert’s coach made me wonder at what point does my second son’s desire, self-image and need to find his own direction, take precedence over my responsibilities as a father. And when do you heed your own voices while those around you are raised in protest? These are questions all fathers need to ask before their sons set for their first scrimmage, drive toward the basket, crowd the plate or attempt any of a dozen other athletic acts that could result in catastrophic injury.

All parents, to a greater or lesser extent, live vicariously through their children. Academics or athletics, too often the joy of learning or the beauty of sport, takes a back seat to GPAs and RBIs but it’s only when a parent places his desires and goals in front of the kids, does support turn to pressure.         

It happens most often when I’m convinced that I’m acting in Robert and Andrew’s best interests. The pressure may be as obvious as driving two hundred miles to a state tournament, then wondering out loud why they would ever swing at a high fastball on three and two. Or, it can be as subtle as watching every practice. No kid wants to fail and verbally rubbing his nose in it, virtually guarantees failure.       

So how do you avoid putting the screws to your child? By granting him the freedom to fail. Kids strike out, drop pop flys, miss easy lay ups, forget to block and goof off. Most educators will tell you that you should be grateful that they’re playing at all. A good place to start is to ask if they’re having fun. If they hesitate, shrug, or say no, you’ve got an answer. And then, even if you disagree with what they tell you, try to listen.

Five months after Robert's wreck, he’s back playing on the all star baseball team. Except for a three-inch scar on his right shoulder, the injury appears to have had little affect on him. His power is back, he’s hit five home runs in practice and though he isn’t pitching, he throws without apparent pain. And yet, despite his miraculous recovery and Del Pletcher’s optimistic prognosis, I wonder if at some distant point, his shoulder will ache when the weather turns, or hurt like hell when he tries to throw a baseball to his own sons.    

I see now that on the day of bump contest, Robert shredded the envelope. Perhaps it was because this was his first competition and he was distracted by the music. Or maybe he was freaked by the air bump. Or he might have seen me standing next to the course and focused for an instant on my hopes and expectations at the expense of his own. Because it resurrects images of Robert colliding with the icy mogul, I find it difficult to ask, could I have prevented his injury?

The easy answer? Only by pulling him out of the competition, which I’m starting to realize, included an equal, though more subtle penalty. In truth, I wonder if either Robert or I learned anything from his injury. 

In the past decade my second son changed from a toddler, locked in a wedge turn, to a competitive freestyle skier. At the same time, skiing has taken us to Europe, Canada, Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, and Colorado. Would I trade snowy mornings in deep powder, or brilliant afternoons on silky corn snow for an injury that might have occurred, competition or not? The image of him flying toward the collision still terrifies me, but I see now that Robert’s injury was the lone negative and as much as the memory still pains me, the answer now seems self-evident. 

In recent months, the same hormones that have produced the dark shadow across his upper lip have affected Robert’s verbal skills. When I ask if he would do anything different, Robert’s answer is short and pragmatic. Instead of telling me he’s had it with freestyle, he says, “Next time, I’ll make sure my bindings are tight.”

Robert’s wreck made me realize that my sons are not invulnerable. My first thought is to protect them––to try to cushion them from icy bumps, rocky landings or high-speed collisions. Perhaps the wreck will speak more clearly to them than any of my thousand cautionary lectures. 

Robert’s injury also reminded me that I need to spend more time with my second son. He thinks heliskiing would be fun. Just him and me and ten thousand acres of untracked powder. My main concern is how to keep up for, I see now, that if I were to tie a tether around his waist, he’d simply pull me up to a speed where I’d be forced to let go.