Skiing in denim is fire, it just makes life better. Historians claim that the bicycle was the defining symbol of the emancipation of women, but what is going to emancipate the millennial, generation ME, from our phones, from ourselves? Freedom is both the right but also the reflex to think independently, and independent thinking has been struggling against a crescendo of conformity, as consensus and popularity are distributed through an algorithm about as odd and random as global wealth. You can feel the Orwellian sameness on the slopes, casting its pall over the last 2,600 years since society first embossed creativity as a pillar of humanity. Literature, rock and roll, the camera, have shown us that capitalism and unbridled freedom and cultural revolution can flow together. Skiing in denim this weekend reminded us of when we were first helping our friends (Chuck and Chris) launch Pit Viper Sunglasses back in 2013, we skied Aspen in March and all the bizarre shield helmets, fur coats, and pomp melted away to what was an echo of the fun loving, free-for-all spirit that helped define Aspen in the 60’s and 70’s. Ripton is a new breed, vibrating on a different wavelength, but wholeheartedly echoes this battle for the human spirit of creativity.
Revolution has often been about the upheaval of the silliness of class and aristocracy, and the rigidity of past thinking. Performance denim, Ripton & Co., should play its own little role. And, as we sat there taking it all in on Sunday, sun beating down on our denim, a healthy dosage of psilocybin connecting neural networks, connecting time-space, across humanity, across ancestral lifetimes, to remind us that the drum beat of the heart will always win out, it will always take us forward and upward.
#lifeisjort
