The majority of my family lives on the east coast, which gave me cool points as a little kid, because I, unlike many of my Bay Area bound friends, had seen snow. Meaning, I had looked at it from the inside of a house, and possibly stepped on it while running from the door to the car. I do recall touching it a few times and realizing that snow was cold and wet, therefore not as amazing as I thought it to be.
Due to these fleeting experiences, I thought I was hot shit and figured, when I was 12, that winter sports were probably up my alley. I decided to take an extracurricular class trip to the snow, because, “seriously, how hard could skiing and making new friends be?”
Really hard.
No one would talk to me on the bus, and I spent the majority of the day with my feet tangled and in the air. This was the day I realized that puberty had set in- and yes, I was now official awkward, both in body and personality. Needless to say, I’ve block a good portion of this day out of my memory. All that exist now are vignettes of horror.
Flash forward fourteen years…I’m still awkward, but not ‘tween awkward, and I have friends who will talk to me (thank the lord). A few of these friends invite me up for a week-end in the snow, and I figure- I got two of the major problems solved from that freak show of a snow trip 14 years ago… so why the hell not, let’s do it.
As we pulled up to the slopes, I couldn’t help but feel like I stepped right into Whoville. The snow peaked mountains, the tiny ski lifts floating through “happy little trees” as my favorite TV artist, Bob Ross would say, and the Dr. Seuss like ridiculousness of snow sport clothing. I wore a plaid hot pink hat, thinking I would be funny, and also to help locate my broken icicle body if I happened to biff into the great beyond. Turns out, I fit right in… if it was fuzzy- people were wearing it. If it was plaid and neon- people were wearing it. If it was a dumb looking jester hat with bells- people were wearing it. I even saw some guy wearing a garbage bag- which made the same amount of sense the jester hat did… none.
After I got my gear, I stood out by the snow waiting for my friends to arrive. Standing with my snowboard and RayBan sunglasses, I felt cool, especially since my snowboarding boots allowed me to walk semi-normally compared to the robot shuffle the skiers where maneuvering with theirs. “I could so do this.” I thought while looking at all the people of various age groups easily slip into their skis or snowboards and take off towards the line of a near by ski lift. When my friends finally came out with their gear in hand, we headed to a patch of empty snow, and proceeded to put on our snowboards. I flopped my board on the ground and finally got a look at the giant weird contraption- then it sunk in: I had to attach my feet to this. How the hell would I get around when both feet were buckled into this flat giant skateboard with no wheels? I quickly learned you strap one foot in and sorta shuffled yourself in a Rainman type of walk to the line of the ski lift. I was reminded of a classmate of mine, who’s feet would turn pigeoned toed while he sucked on his sleeve… I had to square dance with him and his sloppy sleeve in the second grade.
Before actually getting on the slope, I decided that it would be a good idea just to see what it would feel like to attach both feet to the board and slide down a hill, which was acually more like a mound. While my friends waited at the “bottom” I stood, feeling very precarious… “Just GO!” they said. My foot shook, but because it was strapped into a boot which was strapped onto a board which was in turn strapped to my other foot, my knee began to spasm. “GO… you’re gonna fall, so just get it out of the WAY!” Knowing that you are going to fall is a weird feeling… it’s almost like paying for someone to punch you, there is a light thrill, but in the end it’s a loose-loose situation. So I finally got over myself, managed to slowly shuffle my giant snowfoot off the ledge of the mound and abruptly fell flat on my ass. Strangely my friends applauded me- conensidely I felt mildly retarded and totally accomplished. I released one foot and step dragged my snowboard- Igor style- to the ski lift.
The ski lift is a flimsy ridiculous contraption. First you have to hustle to get to a red line where the lift essentially scoops you up. Hustling with a 5 foot board connected to your left foot sucks. At this particular place, the ski lifts consisted of a bench attached to a pole attached to a wire which brings you to the top of whatever hill you want to fling yourself down. No buckles… no belts… NO HANDLE BARS…. just you, your freak ass clothing, and a giant flat board glued to your left foot, weighing you down awkwardly as you float miles above the ground. It would be beautiful, it would be relaxing, it could be a wonderful little Whoville ride, if it weren’t for that tiny little voice calmly saying, “hey, if you shift a little to the right… you could die a horrible winter wonderland death!”
As I reached the end of my joy ride, I realized I had to get off this thing, and I wasn’t quite sure how. My friends had instructed me that this would possibly be the hardest part of my snowboarding experience- so to be prepared to fall. I had already fallen on the mound… so I thought, “This can’t be that bad,” as I reached the platform. Thinking the bench would slow or stop allowing me to hobble off and casually reattach my snowfoot, I was in complete shock when I came to the realization that the ski lift waits for no one. The platform was under the bench, I put my loose foot on the board, I prepared myself to glide effortlessly down the mild slope off the platform to the embankment. I stood up on the board, felt it move, I wobbled like some jelly rag doll, my arms in the air, my mouth a gape, and I fell. I fell flat on my face. Realizing I was in the direct way of other ski lift bunnies, I freaked, where am I going to go! Gathering myself to my hands and knees, I scooted/crawled my way to where my other friends where waiting. In my head all I could hear was “AHHHHHHHH!” As I struggled to get out of dangers way. I think I played it cool.
I got to the edge of the slope, and collapsed… already I was spent, and I hadn’t even started to snowboard yet. I put on my snowfoot, accomplished a wobbly stand, and looked at the first hill I had to conquer. Granted we were on the weenie puff-puff slope, that various children were sailing down practically with their eyes closed, but to me- it looked like the Thunderdome… My friends slowly took off, and shouted, “You can do it!!!!” to me as I stood in the slight breeze staring at the journey I was about to embark on.
We don’t need another heeeeeroooo…
I decided, that I fell on the mound and survived being flung from the ski lift, “what the hell…how hard could this be?” I scooted my snowfoot slightly forward and fell on my ass. “Ooookay… let’s get up and try that again.” I coaxed my snowfoot to the edge of the hill, teetered a little bit and proceeded to fall, not snowboard down the first section of the slope.
“Yay! Good job!!! You did it!!” I have to give my friends credit, they have the patience of fasting monks. This continued for a little bit… slide-fall on ass- slide-fall on face-slide-fall on ass, again. I thought that this was pretty much how my day would consist until, during one wobbly stand, I took off without completely erecting myself, and was promptly flung at the rate of a bullet train down the hill towards the right, which was a snowy embankment… something I could possibly have gotten stuck in the rest of the day. I stopped the only way I could, I leaned back and fell on my increasingly sore behind. I tried to get back up, but slid in the wrong direction. I started to crab shuffle myself towards the center of the slope- when I got to a flat enough area, I slowly stood and slid back to where I was before. “FUUCK.” I thought as I sat, not having a clue what to do with myself, giant snowfoot, and goofy pink plaid hat…
Having told my friends not to wait, because I had become a cocky bastard during my slide/fall phase… I was now left alone. A fool on a hill… surrounded by a flurry of fast moving babies… BABIES on skis. “jerkbabies” I thought to myself as I contemplated how to get out of this predicament. By some sick twist of the alignment of the stars two groups of friends managed to get on parallel ski lifts at the same time. One group on one side of the slope I was planted and the other on the opposite. Both groups spotted my pink plaid hat, and both groups simontaneously started to scream my name and wave. During most circumstances, I would feel like the most popular princess at the ball, and would have provided a pleasant little party wave- not this time. I was in full pout, threw some ice, and crossed my arms like some jack ass 9 year old in detention. My thankless friends shouted encouragements… and continued on their way. I sat, and sat, and pondered until finally one of the groups managed to find me. They guided me down, and strangely… probably because of the high altitude, I decided to have another go at the slope. You know what? It was better, yea I fell on my ass and boobies the majority of the way down- but this time it felt less like a fall and more like a weird half stepchild version of snowboarding- which prompted me to go a third time. The third time I discovered I could actually semi control the board- and when I reached the bottom, I managed to stop without falling. I pumped my arms in the air and screamed, “I DID IT!”
We don’t need another heeeeeeeerooo!
Because of the pumping I fell, but I still felt accomplished. While I was getting up, I noticed a small man wearing a Winnie the Pooh (what is a “pooh”, exactly?) beanie. He looked at me and in a very nasally voice asked, “Whhhhy would annny one want to snowboard?!” I was never a skater, I never road a surfboard, but at that very moment I felt connected to my extreme sport brethren, I turned to Mr. Pooh and said,
“I do… and I love it, ok?” I unstrapped my foot, and hobble-slid to the line of the lift for a fourth run of the slope.
When I got to the ski lift, the operator chick, looked at me and said, “you look tired… you’re going again?!” First of all, I hate it when strangers tell you that “you look tired” it’s basically saying, “hey buddy, you look like a pile of shit,” and second, I have no idea how she could tell under my pink plaid hat and giant black RayBan glasses. I casually thought, “whatever bitch…” smiled, and let the ski lift fling me to the top of the mountain. When I started my way down, I realized that I was in fact, tired. It was getting increasingly harder to get up, and my ass… my ass had seen better days. After falling twice on my face, and twisting my ankle I decided, I was reaching my limit. Then, it happened. I had hit a particularly slick patch of snow, and was flying down the hill at an incredible death defying rate. My arms started to flail and I was rapidly loosing the teeny bit of control I had managed to learn the past three runs of the slope. I did what I knew best, and forced a fall, which landed me directly on the tip of my already mistreated tailbone. Snow kicked up in the air, and a shock wave travelled from my butthole to the roof of my mouth, causing black dots to flash in my eyesight. This fall was bad… so bad I wouldn’t have been shocked it I got up and had to shake my detached anus out of the bottom of my pants leg. I sat there in shock for a minute or two… I found myself scared of falling on my broken butt again. Then I realized, nobody is making me snowboard the rest of the way down. So I figured, fuck it, detached my giant snowfoot, and proceed to walk down the rest of the mountain. I felt a little bit like a rebel in a pink hat as I marched my way to the lodge for a well deserved drink.
I woke up the next morning with my body on fire… but amid the searing pain my joints were enduring I smiled and delighted in the thought that I, for a tiny little moment in time, had managed to pull off some snowboarding swagger.
