My husband, Dave, went skiing down a forestedĚýslope behind our cabin near Collingwood, Ontario. It was a rare perfect dayĚýwhen he set out with our dog, Phoebe. The deep powder lured them both.

Phoebe loves to ski. She’s a golden retriever, and a homebody, with traits bred into her for domestic life. Her namesake is a character in Friends, and it suits her. On the slopes, she lunges through the powder on the tails of Dave’s skis. When they reach the end, she turns and runs home.

That perfect day, Dave and Phoebe took three turns. On the fourth, the edge of Dave’s ski hit a downed log. The impact catapulted him forward. With the trunk of a maple tree coming fast towards him, he remembers thinking, I better move my head.

After that, everything went black.

I could tell this story another way: it could be about all the trees Dave hasn’t hit.

The first time we met, I watched him kick-turn down the face of Mount Washington in Oregon. Over the years he’s woundĚýthrough the trees of the Central Cascades. We’ve skied on glaciers, volcanos, and through glades, and he’s come away unscathed. But trouble found Dave the day he went skiing out our back door.

When Dave became conscious, he was about 350 feet down the slope from our cabin. He thought that something was caught by his neck. When he reached to push it out of the way, he realized it was his collarbone.

Though Dave didn’t know it at the time, he had slammed chest-first into the tree. While his head was spared, he had 16 broken bones.

His skis were still attached to his boots. He tried to turn around, but he passed out, and woke up having slid further down the slope.

Phoebe, our dog, was panting, nervous, and running in circles around Dave. It was just before 4 P.M.ĚýThe light was flattening; the sun would set in another 30 minutes. He had a blurry thought about his phone, but it was buried deep inside an underlayer in a back pocket. He couldn’t reach it.

It’s not ideal to do any backcountry activity on your own, but we had come to the habit when our kids were young. If you didn’t make the most of each precious spare moment you had, you would probably miss your chance.

And now Dave was fighting an urge to sit down and close his eyes. It was well below zero degrees Fahrenheit.

He managed to get his skis off. The dog leash was around his shoulder. He pulled the end to cinch his arm against his body. The leash became a sling, which took the pain from his collarbone just out of fainting territory. With ski poles in one hand, he took a step. He wobbled, almost fainted again, then glanced up the hill. Which way was the cabin?

He couldn’t see it from that position on the slope. His vision had narrowed to a channel. Direction was hazy. He could only focus on what was right in front of him.

What appeared in that narrow line of vision was Phoebe. Looking into her eyes, Dave could tell she wanted to run home, like she always does.

“Go on,” he said, thinking if Phoebe appeared at the door of the house alone, it might prompt one of us to question why. “Go home,” he said.

Can a dog be a hero? Dog-cognition researcher Alexandra Horowitz, in her , asks if dogs can intentionally rescue people in need. She cites a study that tested the rescue capacity of pet dogs (rather than specially trained rescue dogs). A person was put inside a box. They called out in distress. Then, their dogs were allowed to enter. According to the research, one in three dogs “rescued” their human from the box.

Clive Wynne, the lead researcher on the study, said it’s difficult to assess aĚýdog’s intent. Did the dog rescue the person for an altruistic reason, or did the assistance come from a place of self-interest? Wynne believes that, byĚýfinding a way to end the human’s distress, the dogs felt better, too.

Instead of running home, Phoebe turned, moved a few steps, then waited. Dave put a foot forward, a ski pole, and took one painful step. (Eight of his broken bones would turn out to be ribs.) Phoebe took another step, then waited again. Dave inched forward. He kept his eyes fixed on her hind end and slow-moving tail.

This tail became his only focus. Step by step, Phoebe moved just ahead of Dave. He lost track of time. All he remembers is being aware that they were moving uphill—and that keeping the dog’s tail in his sightline was like a lifeline. About halfway up the slope, he stopped and had trouble catching his breath. He thought something had happened to his lung. He’d later learn that it was punctured.

They kept moving together. When Phoebe’s tail finally stopped, Dave looked up and was surprised to see the house. She had led him to the front door. He called and we came running.

Later, I retraced their tracks up the hill. The paw prints didn’t take the steepest or most direct route. Phoebe led Dave in a steady line, one that he could manage. She stayed with him.

When I saw Dave in the emergency ward, he wore a neck brace. Medical officials wheeled him off to a scan, and eventually theyĚýwould locate the 16 broken bones, including some along the wings of his vertebrae. The crash didĚýno permanent damage; he was incredibly lucky. Two years later, Dave is fully healed, though a little more crooked than he used to be.

But then, in the emergency ward, a nurse had just injected him with Fentanyl. He was fairly lucid, if a little loopy when they started to wheel him away, but there was something else he wanted to say.

As I leaned closer, I realized that in Dave’s mind, it didn’t matter whether Phoebe’s intentions were altruistic or not. There was no need to ask the question. What mattered was her presence. She stayed with him and that was what gave him strength.

He whispered into my ear, “Phoebe saved my life.”

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The day my life changed, I sat on crinkly paper in a blue hospital gown. A surgeon had cut wide incisions to remove skin cancer—melanoma—in four places on my back and neck. I had 34 stitches taken out, and the scars were the length of a hand, but there was good news. I was healing. As far as the surgeon knew, the cancer hadn’t spread, and I thought the hard part was over.

Then, the surgeon delivered a blow.

A blood test showed I had a genetic mutation. The in all of us regulates cell division. Mine is faulty, which makes the risk of cancer returning high. While genetics will probably have the greatest influence on my health, managing environmental risks is important. Limiting sun exposure is my best shot at survival. The ideal amount of UV exposure for someone like me? None.

The walk home was long. I had trouble digesting what the surgeon had said. I have spent much of my life in the sun, but not for the tan. I am a climber, a runner, a paddler, and a skier. Moving through mountains, over lakes, and across snow is who I am.

I met my husband, Dave, while working for Outward Bound in Oregon. We fell in love in the desert, climbing, drinking cheap beer, and sleeping in the back of his Datsun wagon in Joshua Tree. We’ve since moved to the city, Toronto, andĚýhad two boys who are now teenagers, but we drag those boys outside every chance we get, in canoes, hiking boots, and on skis. Getting outside is more than what we love. It’s us.

Dave has a cheery disposition, but his smile dropped when he saw me walk in our front door. He put his arms around me, kissed my hair, and asked what happened at my appointment. I explained that while the surgeon had acknowledged it was impossible to avoid UV exposure altogether, he said I needed to aim in that direction. I saw my disbelief reflected in Dave’s face.

“I’m from California?” he said, as if there were a way to plead our case. I started thinking about all the time we’d spent outside together. I was 45 years old, with boys who still needed me, and our relationship might never be the same. Neither would I.

My dad died from melanoma, the most deadly kind of skin cancer, when he was 42 years old. His started as a spot on his arm when he was in his thirties. Back then, doctors didn’t know the genetic cause of the disease, the human genome had yet to be mapped. They did, however, understand the risks of the sun. My dad started wearing long sleeves, wide brims, and sunscreen to protect his skin.

Skin cancer is the most common kind of cancer in the United States. The American Academy of Dermatology estimates that one in five Americans will have it in their lifetime. Everyone is exposed to Ultraviolet (UV) radiation, a form of energy from the sun. And we need to be; our bodies use it to produce vitamin D. However, too much exposure to UV can damage the DNA in your cells, creating a misfire. The abnormal cells divide and spread.

About a decade after the spot on my dad’s arm was removed, his cancer returned. It had found its way into his lymph nodes. My memories from that time are hazy, but I remember watching the effects of chemotherapy take hold. I went to his room to say good night and found a man who was bald, skeletal, frail—I wasn’t sure this was my dad.

He died when I was in fifth grade. Too young to cope, I shut down. I had trouble feeling anything for a long time.

I found sensation again on a month-long canoe trip in my early teens. Soon, I discovered climbing. I felt the highs and all the lows on a long trail, a slab of granite, or skiing on a glacier. As I gained experience, I took pride in my ability to respond to the elements, endure tough times, and keep going. In the wilderness, I came back to life.

A year after my operation, Dave and I took a trip into the backcountry in a canoe. We went to Algonquin Park, a wilderness area where I have led trips and traveled extensively, about three hours north of Toronto, Canada. The fall colors burst into a riot around us. The sky soared overhead. In my hands, the paddle felt like an old friend. The first J-stroke, a rounded pry that maintains the canoe’s forward momentum, felt incredibly elegant.

I wore a wide-brimmed hat, a long-sleeved shirt, and tons of sunscreen, but when Dave turned in the bow, he saw the reflection of the water dappling on my chin. It was late on an October afternoon, and the monitor on my phone showed a low UV index, but the water and the aluminum canoe were acting as reflectors.

Neither of us said anything, but we paddled to our campsite in silence. Given the risk, it wasn’t a smart place for me to be. In someone else, their natural immunity might stop cancer cells from duplicating. It’s much less likely in me. A year after our trip to Algonquin Park, I found melanoma in my eye. I had a gruesome operation to have it removed. Luckily it was superficial, but I’ve had more melanoma since. We were right to be worried about the exposure.

The trip became like a farewell, each graceful stroke an act of mourning.

We decided to try and swim at dusk. The UV was low, but the water was freezing. I chickened out, so Dave dove in for both of us. We wrapped in a blanket to watch the sunset from a rock. The giant orb in the sky slid down. It gave us light and warmth; it fueled the growth of our stunning surroundings, but it didn’t wield that power lightly.

The next morning, Dave pulled out the map of canoe routes. He pointed to a second set of lines on the map. Hiking trails ran in every direction through the park. I’d been too obsessed with my J-stroke to see them before. We started talking about how a different mode of travel might be safer. We could hike in the morning and evening, take a shady siesta, and choose routes covered by the canopy. In retrospect, I can’t believe I hadn’t thought of such a simple thing, but I had been looking in the wrong direction.

“What if this isn’t our last canoe trip,” Dave said, “but the first day we start backcountry hiking?” Before our eyes, the park opened up.

I could still take pride in how I responded to the elements, and my condition would be just another risk I had to manage. In the past, I had learned to be prepared—for a storm, for plunging temperatures, for an unexpected whipper while climbing. Now, I’d have to prepare for UV exposure, too.

Now, the dark days of November are my favorite. If it’s raining, that means conditions are perfect, and I pull up my hoodĚýand head out. Dave and I hike in the mist, or at the crack of dawn, and often have the trails to ourselves. When the moon is full, on a clear night, I’ve had some of the best cross-country ski outingsĚýof my life. I love the coldest days in winter because they require every inch of skin to be covered. I swim with the boys at dusk—the colors of a sunset look like magic from the water. On a truly gloomy day, preferably when it’s drizzling,ĚýI’ll go out in a canoe. The elegance of a J-stroke still brings me to tears. I will never take it for granted.

Cancer has changed the range of what I can do. Now, the risks are much greater, but being near the edge has always sharpened my senses and trained my mind. I’m aware of the wonder in every moment I spend outside. I’ve never been so alive.

Claire Cameron’s novels include and . Her writing has appeared in outlets including The New York Times, The New Yorker, and The Globe and Mail. Her forthcoming memoir, How to Survive a Bear Attack, will be published by Knopf Canada in January 2025.

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