I just bought new skis. It's not that I am bragging or anything like that. I am an OK skier at best, but until last year when I went skiing three times, I hadn't been to the slopes in more than 20 years.
I come from Ireland, a place with lots of rain and wind that only gets proper snow every five or six years. Even then there is nowhere to ski.
Sliding down our street in my best Sunday shoes was the closest I came to skiing until I moved to Canada when I was 23.
The reason I mention this is because my wife skied for the first time last winter. She managed to stay on her skis for a lot longer than I did when I started, as for her it all seemed to be about staying in control. Nice, slow, gradual turns. "Don't rush me, I'm just learning," I believe is what she screamed at me once or twice.
Maybe the control thing was so she didn't mess up her hair, I'm not sure. However, although she is looking forward to it, she is a little tentative about skiing.
So I had to relay my first couple of skiing experiences to her so she wouldn't feel so bad.
The first place I remember skiing was at Tabor Mountain. A brave (stupid) 23 year old I was, donning skis for the first time decked out in my '80s pink fleece pants with big, square, purple knee patches. Yeah, I was some kind of cool.
After about 20 minutes of trying to get my skis on it was time to go to the lift. I had never experienced anything like it. As there was a slight incline to get to the lift all these huge things on my feet seemed to want to do was go backwards. Sweating, a little pissed off and totally embarrassed (not because of the pink pants, they were the business) I stood in line for the lift chair. Then I fell over. I got back up slowly and clumsily only to fall over right away taking three people with me. This happened every time I tried to move and resulted in several teenagers asking the people I was with if there was something wrong with me.
After falling off the chair at the top of the lift I finally managed to keep control until I got to the top of the run, which turned out to be the slowest run on the hill, and thankfully for everyone else on the run it was also the widest.
I distinctly remember my ski poles flailing all over the place as I tried to keep my balance, and not run into people. I was also screaming at them to watch out as there was a crazy guy on the hill, but being fresh off the boat no one could understand my accent.
Having made it to the bottom of the hill, and only fallen 12 times, I was unable to stop. (Apparently stopping is an important skill for skiers.)
Still in motion I slid past the lift and continued on past the lodge. It was only when the ground under me changed to an incline that I began to slow down. Having finally stopped, and having thanked a number of gods, I started to slide backwards. If going forwards on skis and having no control isn't scarey enough for you, going backwards would have meant doing something in my pink fleece pants I just didn't want to do. So I fell over.
Eureka! I had discovered a new way to stop.
However on my first trip to Purden ski hill the falling over method of applying the brakes would not have been a good idea.
After completing several easy runs, not very successfully, I started off on another slightly steeper run thinking the people who were with me, and trying to teach me how to ski, were right behind me. It seems I had taken off while they were still yapping at the top. After about 20 seconds I was totally out of control with arms and poles flailing like a blind man trying to swat a room full of flies with two large chop sticks. I remember shouting at myself in my head, (I was so scared the words wouldn't come out of my mouth) to snow plow. However, as I was crap at snow plowing, and at the rate I was covering ground, the only thing that was going to slow me down was a tree.
Unbelievably I managed to stay on my feet. My heart had busted a hole in my nice skiing gear it was thumping so hard and when the slope finally levelled out I felt I had slowed enough to go with my trusted fall-over-and-hope-for-the-best stopping technique.
What seemed like forever later one of the people I had been skiing with, who had been skiing since she was three, said when she realized I had taken off down the hill she got into a tuck position to chase me, but I was going so fast she couldn't catch me.
There I lay, one leg bent up behind me, my tuque covering my eyes, one nostril plugged with snow and breathing so heavily even the moose started to gather. The steam rose from my sweat-laden body as if the hill had discovered a new hot spring.
Now whether relaying these experiences to my wife will make her feel any better about her skiing skills, or cause her to return her skis to the store is yet to be seen.
But if I can provide one important piece of information from all of this to any would-be skiers it is this.
Do not wear pink fleece snow pants to the ski hill, no matter how cool you think you look.
