Once I acquired the e-mail from Burton inviting me to the Tradition Shifters snowboarding expertise, I blinked. Sat with it. Closed my laptop computer. Reopened it. Learn it once more. I’ve all the time thought of snowboarding—someplace between a bucket listing merchandise and a possible ER journey—however I by no means imagined it could truly occur. “Do you actually need to go on the market and break your neck on digital camera?” I requested myself out loud. Dramatic, certain, however truthful.
Then I saved studying.
The phrase Tradition Shifters jumped off the display like a neon signal, so I did what any curious millennial with Wi-Fi would do: I Googled it. That search led me to Zeb Powell and Selema Masekela—the snowboarder and the storyteller, each with deep roots in shifting what tradition seems like on the mountain. By the point I completed watching a number of movies and scrolling their pages, I used to be typing out a “Sure, completely” sooner than my altitude headache would hit me later.
As a result of Black snowboarders? That’s some Disney Channel fever dream I didn’t know I used to be nonetheless holding on to. And never simply snowboarders—however stylists, artists, creators, queers and cultural engineers of each form—gathered in Aspen prefer it was the underground reunion no person needed to gatekeep.
Now, no person advised me the altitude would knock me upside the top prefer it owed me cash. I landed in Aspen, took one breath, and immediately understood why bottled oxygen was a factor. However a pair gallons of water and some BC powders later, I discovered myself on the slopes, helmet tight, knees comfortable, praying for stability and vibes.
The vibe? Immaculate.
In all places I turned, there have been Black people—not simply there, however flying via the air off lifts, touchdown tips, serving to one another swimsuit up, and transferring via the snow like they’d been born into it. Zeb Powell, the primary Black snowboarder to win gold on the X video games, stated it finest:
“There’s a sure freedom to it that’s simply insane. You’re in nature, you’re on the mountain, and it feels so free—like mountain climbing, however with out the work.”
This was about greater than snowboarding—it was about reclaiming pleasure. Selema Masekela, who co-founded the occasion, put it plainly, “We determined a number of years in the past that that is going to be a Black-centered occasion. We’re on the middle of it—however we’re holding the door open and alluring everybody in.”
And everybody was there: Black queer, trans, Indigenous, creatives from the Bronx to the Bay—all invited to really feel one thing this world not often provides us: ease, security, softness on a snowy mountaintop. “As Black individuals, that’s what we’ve all the time carried out,” Selema added. “We’ve created house, made room, and constructed group—even after we weren’t given the blueprint.”
Zeb echoed that sentiment in his personal means, after I requested what mattered most, “Experience together with your rattling associates. The extra individuals you experience with, the higher. The larger the group you might have, the higher. It’s not the identical with out it.”
And that’s the factor—this wasn’t some unique influencer getaway. It was a soul-level gathering. As Zeb advised me at one level, “I maintain seeing the identical smiles from new individuals. And by that, I imply soul smiles.” That feeling—the heat that hits your chest when you already know you’re precisely the place you’re alleged to be—was all over the place.
So yeah, I got here to Aspen anticipating to possibly discover ways to get up on a board with out falling. However I left with one thing deeper: proof that the mountains, just like the tradition, are ours too. Snowboarding doesn’t should look a technique. Pleasure doesn’t both.
