Merry Christmas from Adventure Base Colorado, 8,000 feet in the Rocky Mountains 2024 from Sandi and Frosty Wooldridge, Golden, Colorado
Dear Michael, and family,
We wish you a fabulous, wondrous, spiritual, healthy and joyous Christmas with you, your family and friends. May you enjoy every wish and every smile during this “Season of the Heart.” May the world grow closer to peace among all countries in 2025. Please God, Great Spirit, we’re wishing that we humans quit warring on one another, and move toward peace and understanding in Ukraine, Gaza, Iran and beyond. We’ve witnessed so much war during our lifetimes—-that it’s time to try for human understanding and peace.
Sandi and I enjoyed quite a year of discovery, working toward health, travel, friends, events and all the normal aspects of daily life. Yes, we face HUGE challenges with this thing called, “Alzheimer’s.” And yet, we manage to live our daily lives with simple appreciations of living. In the morning, we cuddle. We pray for her intellect to return. She enjoys a magnetic mat to balance her magnetic field with the Earth’s. She enjoys a full body massage, front and back, seven days a week. We enjoy a very nutritious breakfast, lunch and dinner. She visits an oxygen chamber twice a week to drive oxygen to clear her brain for one hour each visit. She sees an acupuncturist for one hour weekly. She puts both feet on an “Earthing” pad daily to balance her vibrations with the planet. She takes the finest and most advanced supplements to activate her brain. We study words, maps, vocabulary and drawings. She hits the sauna. She works out 45 minutes on the track six days a week. She’s cleared all the heavy metals out of her brain. She does chiropractic. We pray for a miracle cure or some kind of remedy from scientists because over 50 million people worldwide suffer this disease. About 10 million in the USA.
To tell you the truth, I’ve cried so much in the past three years that I don’t have any more tears left. It’s like being trapped in a prison with no bars, but you cannot escape. Never in my life did I EVER think something like this would happen to us. And still, I pray, hope and wish for Sandi to recover from this cruel, heartless disease. Thank you Laurie, Cynthia, Holly and John, Debi, Pam, and Linda for your help with Sandi. Thank you to Keith and Linda Whited/Cutting for your gracious time with Sandi. You all are trail angels.
Last winter, Fred Elebel and I skied all winter. Also, David, Tim, Steven, Dave C., and I skied our 10th Mountain Hut trip during the winter. Love to be with those exceptional mountain men. Always love our two day backpack trip to Magic Lake through the autumn aspen gold. The trail is literally covered in golden aspen leaves.
In June, Sandi’s brother Bob Reed took Sandi for eight weeks while my brother Rex and I rode our motorcycles 10,000 miles to the Yukon Territory and Alaska. We saw the Salmon Glacier, largest landlocked glacier in North America. Traveled Glacier Highway up the Cassiar in British Columbia. We stepped into Jack London’s cabin in Dawson City, Yukon. What a treat to step into my hero’s cabin from the 1897-98 gold rush. Later, we crossed the Yukon River to ride The Top of the World Highway. At one point we had to stop to watch 300 caribou cross the dirt road on the tundra. Like being in a Nature Channel Movie! Gees, adventures live in our souls. Thank you Rick Hoying and Bruce for riding with us to Glacier National Park. Also, thank you and Connie for sharing your fabulous son Scott as he leads the Pentatonix in singing around the world. Also, glad that Allan Herdman lived through his ordeal.
We enjoyed Fairbanks, and an amazing car museum, then, that great mountain, Denali (The Great One) at 20,035 feet into the Alaskan Sky. We saw the Alaskan Range in full bloom. We rode through Anchorage and Seward. We saw moose and their calves, six grizzlies, 10 black bears, that massive herd of caribou, great rivers, stunning wilderness, and truly all the magic of the Last Frontier. Can’t begin to share with you the energy of a motorcycle adventure into the Alaskan wilds. Just incredible! Thank you to my brother Rex and our friends. Also, HUGE thank you to Sandi’s brother Bob and Purina Reed in Megget, South Carolina.
Back to our house in Golden, Rex enjoyed relaxing time while I drove to South Carolina to pick up Sandi. We drove into the Blue Ridge Mountains and up the Blue Ridge Skyline Drive. Met with a cycling team that rode coast to coast, www.pedalingtoendpoverty.com. We enjoyed the Great Smokey Mountains. Such beauty all over America. We hiked some of the Appalachian Trail. Thank you John Muir for all our national parks.
From the mountains, we headed north to our farm in LeRoy, Michigan. For 10 days, I worked my rear end off to cut, clean, paint, repair, renew and brighten the farm house, yard and trees. Thank you to Carol and Rick Paalman for all your help. And, Carol, thank you for the horseback ride to our back meadow where we took the horses into the trees with that magical light show through the leaves. Just pure wonder to share that with you.
We have been Air BnB’ ing the farm out, so it’s paying for itself. It’s been interesting with our property manager who has swindled us out of a lot of money. We’ll be changing him out next summer. Our farm is one of the most beautiful pieces of 80 acres in all of Michigan.
Off across the Mackinac Bridge to Upper Michigan, we crossed the Great Plains to Yellowstone National Park to see my old college roommate John Stchur, retired teacher, very successful novelist, and his incredible artist wife, Sharon. We wondered how we got from being 19-year-old college stud-muffins to old men so fast? Always a treat to see the waterfalls of the Yellowstone River, Old Faithful and the grand march of Nature.
Back home, Sandi and I enjoyed bicycle rides, hikes, gym workouts, dinners at the Chart House, Sandi’s girl’s group meetings, attending Mile Hi Church, Meditation Rock, and talks with friends. Just to share with you, Sandi and I have enjoyed a 30 year love affair. She has been the sunshine of my life each day, on the dance floor, and wherever we have traveled. I wouldn’t trade a minute of our lives together.
As for me, I am nearly finished with a book my brother Rex and I are co-writing: When Your Father Died Too Soon—I Miss My Dad by Rex Wooldridge and Frosty Wooldridge. It’s a compilation of dozens of people who suffered the same fate as we did during our teen years. And, how they did or didn’t do well from that one tragic moment in their young lives. We hope the book will reach 15 million people who suffered that fate, and hopefully, it shows them how others handled the trauma or didn’t. We hope the book will show them they aren’t alone. I’m also about finished with another book: What is the Shelf Life of a Dream? by Frosty Wooldridge
Also, I am in my 21st year of writing columns for quite a few news service websites. I write about politics, health, disease, overpopulation, religion, adventure, and more. I’ve also been published for the past two years, monthly, in the ColoradoSerenity.com Magazine. You can see all my work in their archives. My latest in December: Living Your Life in Radical Amazement.
As I look back on my life, it’s been a spectacular ride. I am thankful no one ran me over in my 15 bicycle rides across America and across six continents. I am thankful for my good health. I loved my 30 years of triathlons. I loved my 40 years of racquetball and tennis. I loved my ski bumming years as a bartender and dance teacher. I loved my six months in Antarctica. Each journey brought me amazing moments, amazing friends, and amazing books. I’m proud of the 24 books that I wrote, and the 17 that enjoyed publication. I’m proud of my teaching career, and I’m proud of those years as a truck driver for Corrigan Moving Systems. Paul Corrigan and Kathleen, and their family afforded me my world travels. Thank you to the Corrigan Family. And, God bless you!
It’s hard to believe that I’m two years from age 80! Good grief! Good God almighty! How in the hell did it all go so fast? And yet, here I am, an old man, facing old age, with some HUMONGOUS challenges with Sandi’s situation. I could fall into the trap of long-term sadness, which sometimes, I do. Yet, I wake up to smile with Sandi daily. I encourage her every day to live life at its fullest.
How many years do I have left on this planet? I’m hoping to reach 90. If I stay healthy, I think I can make it. Next summer, I expect to bicycle the Lewis & Clark Trail, some 4,100 miles. Should make for a great book on that epic journey: Bicycling the Lewis & Clark Trail in the 21st Century—A Ride Into History by Frosty Wooldridge.
Thank you to my friends near and far. Thank you Linda and Keith Whited for your tireless support. Thank you Gary and Gayle for sharing the slopes and plays. Thank you Bob Johannes for your friendship all these years. God bless Marie Johannes. Thank you Jason and Linda Brent for your brilliant essays on population. Thank you Peter Cerf for prayers and friendship. Thank you Debi Cooke for visiting. Much love to Jeff and Patty Freeman. Thank you Larry and Elaine Gingrich for visiting with us this fall. Loved our dinner with David and Deb Martin, and Mickey and Mary Gruda. Love you Linda Humphries at church. Thank you Lance Hill for a life of adventure and friendship. Thank you Ken Hampshire for your support. Love you Samantha Hedberg. Love to Mike and Marcia Kosar. Thank you Jerry Lovejoy for all your work. Love to you Robert Montgomery and Aoy. Much love to Dave and Tali Montessi. Love to Gregg Roberti and family…congratulations on your new book: Legacy of Light. Thank you Bob Reed, Tami Ford and Cheryl Schell, Sandi’s siblings. Much love to Jerry and Shanna Schudda. Loved seeing you Marylou Tanton. Very best to lifelong friend Art Visser and his family. Very best to Greg and Shanna Wright. Blessings to Al and Kathryn. Thank you for breakfasts and our friendship Keith Cooper. Thank you Jack Alpert for your friendship over the years. If you are reading this letter, well, you have graced my life and I am thankful.
And so, the beat of life continues. We’re living in such interesting times with wars, people shooting people, diseases, divided nation, ecological horrors in our oceans, atmosphere, rainforests, land, and leaders like Putin, Ji-Ping, Ung, and Hamas trying to exterminate other human beings…and the list grows. I try to keep my body, mind and spirit in balance so I can handle all of it.
Hopefully, this annual letter finds you and yours in good health and high spirits. May all your wishes come true. May you enjoy your family and friends. If you have lost a loved one, and I lost a dear loved one this year and Marie Johannes, I hope your pain is softened by love, family and time.
Much love, joy, heart, Merry Christmas,
Frosty and Sandi
Kissing under Mountain Man Thunder Jack, Route 287, Montana.
“If the roar of a wave crashes beyond your campsite, you might call that adventure. When coyotes howl outside your tent–that may be adventure. While you’re sweating like a horse in a climb over a 12,000-foot pass, that’s adventure. When a howling headwind presses your lips against your teeth, you’re facing a mighty adventure. If you’re pushing through a howling rainstorm, you’re soaked in adventure. But that’s not what makes an adventure. It’s your willingness to struggle through it, to present yourself at the doorstep of Nature. That creates the experience. No greater joy can come from life than to live inside the ‘moment’ of an adventure. It may be a momentary ‘high’, a stranger that changes your life, an animal that delights you or frightens you, a struggle where you triumphed, or even failed, yet you braved the challenge. Those moments present you uncommon experiences that give your life eternal expectation. That’s adventure!” Frosty Wooldridge
The Spell of the Yukon
The summer no sweeter than ever,
The sunshiny woods all athrill.
The grayling aleap in the river,
The big horn asleep on the hill.
It’s that big, broad land way up yonder,
It’s the forests where silence has lease.
It’s the beauty that thrills me with wonder,
It’s the silence that fills me with peace.
It’s the strong life that never knows harness,
It’s the wilds where the caribou call.
It’s the freshness, the freedom, the fairness.
Oh God, how I’m stuck on it all. (Robert Service, the Poet of the Yukon. We stepped into his cabin in Dawson City, Yukon.)
“Someone once said that “time” stalks us all our lives. I rather believe that time is a companion that goes with us on a journey. It reminds us to cherish each moment, because it will never come again. What we leave behind is not as important as how we have lived.” Jean Luc Picard, Starship Enterprise
Merry Christmas,
Sandi and Frosty