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Crossing the New Jersey-Pennsylvania state line at the Delaware Water Gap, I paralleled the muddy-appearing Delaware River near the Appalachian Trail, the interstate narrowing to two lanes and shallowly ascending into the brown-treed, gray shale rock-covered Pocono Mountains.  The slender, finger-like white patterns representing the still-snow-covered ski trails of Camelback Mountain were now visible through the left car window. As the miles rolled by, I thought of the past two ski trips, trips which had been highlighted--perhaps "warped" is the better word--by the personalities of my group. Put them on skis and they excelled in more ways than you can imagine. Did I dare subject myself to them again? I could have turned round right now...

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The descending, right-curving off-ramp led to my hotel, located four miles from Jack Frost Mountain, itself the converging point of my company's third annual ski trip.

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We had consistently attempted to overnight in a different hotel property each year. It had nothing to do with variety, mind you, but instead the inescapable fact that the group's noise, rowdiness, and animalistic release had always banned their return. I had hoped that sufficient demand would prompt hotel construction in the area; otherwise, we would someday run out of locations--because, you see, they had not only shined on skies, but wherever we had stayed. Read on.

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The setting sun released an orange bath into the dense, bare brown trees blanketing the area. It would not be long now.

At about 11:30 there began a series of uninterrupted door openings and closings down the hotel corridor which continued until almost sunrise, indicating that my "group" had arrived. I do not think the manufacturer of the door hinge itself had subjected them to such frequent testing before release to the public for sale. Oh, well, I had another look round my room, since it would be the last time I would see it. We would not be welcomed back here.

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The night clerk quickly rethought his "nice" gesture of reopening the pool for the group when their excessive noise, the equivalent of a tribal, return-to-barbarism chant, had quickly forced him to oust them and re-close it. Content source www.hysjw.cn

The group had apparently collected numerous, hopelessly unmixable types of alcohol and proceeded to join their liquid forces together in a single glass under the collective name of "death"--with or without ice. It made no difference--except, perhaps, for those headed to a hot place on the way out. Content source www.hysjw.cn

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Whaid, who barely returned a primordial grunt to my daily "hellos" at work, launched into an alcohol-induced, therapy-session-waiting-to-happen lament during the dark hours of the night in his hotel room, crying, "Nobody loves me" and followed it with a finger-pointing, broken-record monotone of "But I'll be there for you..." copyright www.hysjw.cn

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"I'll be there for you..." Content source World Travel Information www.hysjw.cn

"I'll be there for you..."

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The following day he had slouched into a Road Runner position on skis and had wizzed by someone who had fallen and obviously needed someone to be there for him. He wasn't.

Luckily, Munny, who devoutly lived by his "you need a hug" philosophy, had been in the room with him the previous evening to dry his tears. Content source World Travel Information www.hysjw.cn

Josue had apparently also "tasted" one of these liquid suicides. So intoxicated had he become, in fact, that Berqui had been forced to deposit him in the bathtub, where he had continued to sleep. It is a good thing that he had been the designated driver. I dare not look for adjectives to describe the conditions of the others. Source of this article www.hysjw.cn

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Poor Dorit. The hotel's front desk, apparently pegging her as Mother Hen, had called her in the wee hours of the morning as she had finally drifted off to sleep and warned, "If you don't keep your boys quiet, I'll be forced to call the police!" If she had ever dreamt of having children, they were not them. copyright www.hysjw.cn

We had agreed to meet for breakfast at 8:00 and bleary-eyed Dorit, Rocio, and Ronald had walked into the hotel's breakfast room at this time. The other dozen, having only fallen asleep three hours earlier, would be lucky to make it by noon. www.hysjw.cn

Completing the five-minute drive down deserted Route 940 from the hotel on that cold, clear morning after a brief pause to allow the night's collected windshield ice to melt, I had been among the first to arrive at Jack Frost Mountain. The lodge, the same one used the previous year, had already taken on signs of our pending invasion, with food and drink lining the outside deck and the inside bar, and the fireplace having been recently stacked with logs and lit. There he stood inside it, the Mike, nucleus of the annual event. Source of this article www.hysjw.cn