Just the fax with Pepi
It was late in the summer of 1988 when I joined Pepi and Sheika at Gasthof Gramshammer. Hired to learn their front desk and perhaps one day computerize, I came on board to help them prepare for the 1989 World Alpine Ski Championships when their hotel home would be the center of it all.
Still relying on the teletype machine at the Lodge at Vail to timely correspond abroad, one day I suggested to Pepi that we might actually type a letter on letterhead and use Turnovszky’s fax to send. I don’t recall who he wrote, but I do recall it being early enough in the day that a timely reply was likely.
Well, it seemed that no sooner had I shown Pepi confirmation that his letter had been sent, a call came from the Lodge letting us know a response was waiting. Flabbergasted by the speed and thrilled at seeing his friend’s logo and written signature, Pepi’s eyes sparkled knowing that the future was in his hands. He had me order “dat machine” that very same day.
Over the next couple of years, we spent many hours writing letters together in the quiet nooks and crannies of their hotel home. Pepi so enjoyed sharing the love he had for this valley, enumerating the blessings that skiing had brought into his life. Those were some pinnacle years in this man’s inspirational journey and some of the more memorable in mine. Our heartfelt thanks to the Gramshammer family for sharing Pepi with us then, now, always and forever.
With love,
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Sara (Jordan) Fisher
