@sybylla I love your snow reports. 
With respect to the dead, Michael Kennedy’s accident was pure stupidity, playing football on the slopes. If Sonny Bono was going as fast as estimated, 30mph, he likely would have died even with a helmet or at the very least, had severe, permanent brain damage. Wear a helmet, but your best defense is not to ski terrain or at speeds outside your ability level.
Of course they were stupid. No one said they weren’t. Many of the rich and famous seem to think they are invincible. They aren’t. Maybe they would have died anyway even with a helmet. But maybe not. People survive acceleration/deceleration accidents when they have on protection. I work in the field, and brain injury recovery has come a long way. Don’t want to get off topic, but the real fools are the motorcyclists without helmets. In my state riders without helmets are fined, and the fine goes to the state brain injury association.
Michael Kennedy was skiing backwards. The back of his skis hit the tree/stopped, and his head ricocheted into the tree like a slingshot. Idiots especially should wear helmets. But yes, they shouldnt ski like idiots. Ditto for snowboarders. They should wear helmets and wrist guards. There are lots of idiots who tempt fate. And engage in high risk sports. But people should protect their bodies. especially their heads. IMO, saying “they might had died anyway” is irrresponsible. JMO. All skiiers should wear helmets.
Natasha Richardson wasn’t wearing a helmet when she fell on a beginner’s slope during a ski lesson. She died a couple of days later. I think helmets are kind of like seatbelts; you may not die if you’re not wearing one, but you have a much better chance of surviving if you do. My kids are avid skiers and they always wear them.
I don’t see what the stepson’s level of risk taking has to do with whether or not he’ll get a job and be self supporting after graduation. His skiing doesn’t seem to be affecting his education because he’ll be graduating with an engineering degree in a few weeks, and it’s not affecting his job if they’re willing to take him on full-time. His girlfriend doesn’t seem to care that he’s going skiing either because he’s still going. If the girlfriend moved to PA for him and expects him to join her this summer, I don’t think OP needs to worry about him finding a place to live after graduation.
There comes a point when we have to let go of our children. We may not like their adult choices, but all we can do is offer advice and let them live their lives. If we don’t, we likely won’t have to worry about what they’re doing because they’ll quit telling us.
One of my friend’s daughters was a “ski bum” for a couple of years after HS and now is enrolled in college.
Also sometimes you need to look the other way…not what he hasn’t done, but what he has done.
He has (will) finished college. He has a decent GPA. He has a part time job in his field.
He has passion about an athletic activity and likes to spend time outdoors.
I think many people would be happy with that!
“If I were a young petro engineer I would ride out the oil bust with a year or two of ski bumming out west.”
When my sister-in-law was a young petro geologist she rode out a prior oil bust by going to grad school and increasing her human capital by getting a master’s in her field. She graduated just as things were starting to pick up, She got a good job and had a great career. Got to travel to oil exploration sites all over the US and internationally from Africa to Siberia. She retired a couple of years ago financially well-off in her mid-50s, and now she’s the best kind of ski bum - a ski bum with money.
She wasn’t really skiing at all. She was on a flat, very hard packed area at the base. Sort of like falling in a parking lot.
Most deaths are from heart attacks or from smashing chest first into trees, crushing all chest bones. This year there have been a couple from people falling off chairs.
People should wear helmets but I have to admit I never have. It would have been more important when I was young skiing through trees off trail. Absolutely very dangerous but I was a teenager and stupid (and long before helmets were in use for anything except Olympic level racing). Now I’m so slow that it doesn’t matter.
^ It DOES matter- at any speed. I have had my share of out of control snowboarders crash into me and send me flying when I was minding my own business nicely vedeling down the slope. You may be a perfectly safe skiier but stuff happens. In additon to the falls from the lifts this year, riders have gotten their backpacks caught on the back of the chairs and dangled. Plenty of good skiiers fall. We were with a new skiier. She quietly complied with my insistence that she wear a helmet. She was skiing slowly and cautiously, but crossed her tips, lost control and ended up falling and hitting a rock. She was VERY glad she had on a helmet. Please, wear a helmet.
It just seems so dumb NOT to. Really, I think it is down to old folk being luddites, the youngsters are hip enough to be smoking weed and drinking beer on the chair ride up and THEY are wearing helmets. Helmets are light and keep your head warm and will help if you fall over and hit you head in the toilet.
Since he is a adult, agree with your husband what the boundaries are and tell your son what you will and will not do. I wouldn’t be paying for any ski trips and he will need to work out his post-college employment. Tell him if he can move back in and for how long. If he wants to choose a ski bum life, go right ahead, but have other plans for your money. Back to the GF - she seems to have made a bad choice. I’ve told my children I would not have left the county to move for someone to whom I’m not married. I hope she made a choice that works for her, no matter what he chose to do, since they are single and not obligate to each other.
I rather my son be addicted to skiing rather than drugs, your lucky. My son is addicted to paintball, I know this keeps him out of trouble.
@Akqj10 We do agree with that!
Something like 80% of all skiers (and 90+% of little kid skiers) now wear helmets. The few remaining holdouts these days are more likely to be the old geezers rather than the young guns.
I held out for a short while when my teaching my kids to ski (with helmets on). But safety aside, a helmet is just the better mousetrap. The current ones are pretty light in weight and you can adjust them to be warm or cool. They keep off the snow and sun better (and with less hat head) than a knit hat or sunblock. Even my fashionable wife now wears a helmet.
Since I wear a helmet all the time, that means I now also wear goggles all the time. So the 80s era Vuarnets only come out for après ski. : )