Glamerous, no?
No is exactly right.
Here's what happened:
A while ago I made somewhat of a "bucket list." On said list I apparently mentioned snowboarding. Now, I never really thought the entire thing through, but several of my really good friends loooove snowboarding. Rumor has it, it's really fun (once you learn what you're doing), and I wanted to try it because of all the positive press it's received.
My friend had remembered this and decided that a good gift for me (for my birthday) would be a lift ticket to one of the really nice ski resorts somewhat close to 'Vegas.
I hesitantly (...naively, stupidly, ignorantly, unprepared-ly, etc, etc, etc) agreed to taking on this beast and we headed up to Brian Head, Utah EARLY one Saturday morning to try the dang 'thang.
Chip poop
(once the bag semi-exploded)
Daunting, right?
We got to Brian Head around 9am or so, piled on roughly 39,029,348 layers of clothing (hoodies/coats/gloves/masks, etc) and some really comfy/easy to walk in boots (no). My friend Amanda let me borrow all of her gear, so I didn't have to rent anything, but Jess did, so we hauled our crap into the lodge and figured out the rental process with her. Once we were all uncomfortably stuffed and strapped into our equipment, we headed off to the slopes.
I, regrettably (sorry mom), was incapable of fitting a single item more into my jacket (chapstick, Kleenex, hand sanitizer, power bars, water, hand warmers, etc), so there are no pictures to document MY experience, but a quick trip to google afforded me a few photos that nicely summarize my morning of snowboarding:
Once we left the lodge, my experienced friend demo'd the "step and glide" technique necessary for getting oneself to the ski lift. You see (for those of you who have not experienced the joys of snowboarding), you must keep one foot "clipped in" or strapped into the snowboard and one foot free, when you aren't cruising (/falling) down the mountain, to propel and stabilize yourself as you awkwardly make your way to wherever you're going.
This was somewhat frustrating, but doable...
So as you are doing this, you lift your free foot off of the ground and simply try to not fall as the only thing keeping you up is the leg/foot that is placed in a painfully awkward pigeon-toed position, strapped into the board of death that just so happens to be resting on top of slick-icy snow. The best I can do to describe this part of the experience is to say that every time your free foot is off the ground, you feel like you've just stepped into a wet spot on a tiled floor and will soon fall...and die...but at the last second, you magically will your free-foot back down to the ground (hopefully somewhere productive) before you've absolutely lost your balance (sometimes settling for remaining exactly where you were before chancing the move), and continue on in such a manner until you've reached the lift (or lodge or...end of your patience).
These weren't too bad. You geek-shuffle-slide-slip your way to the thick red line on the ground, and wait for a chair to hit the back of your legs...and then you sit and cling to the pole and awkwardly adjust the snowboard that is painfully dangling from your one foot, so that it rests (somewhat) on your free foot, as you float through the air up to the top of ...the bunny hill.
Here's where things got really fun.
As you're getting off of the lift, there's a little hill, and a guaranteed fall for one who's never done this before. So, I'm mentally preparing myself for the fall, but also wondering how well I'll do with trying to stand up...sideways (as you approach the little hill, you sort of twist your body as much as possible, without falling out of the chair, and position your free foot somewhere on the board --you don't strap/click it in before you get to the hill...why, I'll never know, but you don't, okay?--to be strapped in sometime after the little hill).
There were a few Brian Head workers and my snowboarding company awaiting my arrival. All wonderful cheerleaders, ready to watch me fail miserably at the get-off-the-lift task. Once I was up and off (and had fallen for the first time), it was time to click in my free foot.
Easy enough, right?
Nope.
I had a special kind of board that required precision, expertise and patience (none of which I was equipped with) in order to get the freakin' free-foot into position and "click" in. Getting this to happen took a solid 15min and chipped significantly at my days alloted amount of "give a damn."
A bit frustrating, but this was my first time, so really, NOT a big deal (yet).
Lets start snowboarding.
I'm strapped in, ready to go. BUT, I was facing forward down the mountain and from pictures...I believe I want the board going long-ways down, not horizontally (another error in my thinking), so I simply 'hopped' into position (and fell).
Going down the mountain = a lot of falling.
Falling:
When you fall, you simply get up, right? Well, let's factor in a few variables before we go on judging me for being especially "special" when it came to getting back up on the snowboard:
1. I've got 100 layers of clothes on, therefore equating my agility level to that of...say, the Michelin Man's fat great-grandfather.
2. I'm on snow. Snow does one of a couple wonderful things: sinks in when I put any weight on it, piling up on the snowboard (the "quicksand" effect) and/or ices over and becomes slick.
3. BOTH of my legs/feet (from the shin down) are strapped tightly (an easy and very natural 2 feet apart) onto a 6ft x 1.5ft glazed, wooden board.
So, taking all of these factors into consideration, when I say "I fell," know that it involved a solid 5-10min of mental and physical bewilderment ("what in the HELL am I doing here?" "How am I supposed to get up?" "Why do I want to get up" "What happens next time I fall? I just get up and...fall again??" "If I land a little harder on my left wrist next time, I'm out of work for a couple of weeks...this is fun?" etc, etc, etc), a ton of self loathing (for being incapable of mastering this stupid sport as fast as I thought I could) and some pain.....not to mention, EVERY TIME I fell, my friend felt it necessary to tell me (and eventually yell at me) to "Get. Up.," like it was something I didn't know I should do, or that I was incapable of deducing that 'getting up' wasn't the only obvious next option for me once I had fallen...
Getting up (keep in mind that mental-image of the Michelin Man...):
When you are snowboarding and you fall, your feet are strapped to this blessed board and you can do one of two things:
1. Gracefully flip your spread-eagle self onto your belly and get up, with your back to the bottom of the hill, and then "hop" repeatedly until the board is facing the right direction OR...
2. Will yourself forward, much like this:
Keep in mind that once you get up, or even attempt to get up, the board starts to slide...
But hey, if you're capable of that Matrix-like move while fixed to a surface that is moving down the mountain at an ever increasing speed....you're a better person than I, and are probably an excellent snowboarder. ...Kudos to you. ...Go to hell.
I made it down the mountain (a minimum of 1 hour, 30 falls and 2 semi-serious breakdowns --yes, tears-- later) where my friend and sister were waiting for me. Jess decided she was going to go on and try to go down a second time on her own. I told my friend that I seriously didn't know if I could talk myself into doing that whole thing a second time.
She was pissed. I was livid. The whole thing was a mess.
I'm not sure how it happened (I'm almost positive there was some coaxing, a guilt trip or two and a few looks of disappointment and fury involved), but I somehow found myself on that damn ski lift for a second time.
On the ride up though, I could not contain myself and proceeded to unleash my every aggravation onto my poor friend. She took the verbal abuse well ("WHY in the HELL would you EVER think I would like this?! You've known me for HOW LONG?!? WHAT PART OF THIS SOUNDS LIKE SOMETHING I'D EVER DO?!?!? etc, etc), dished a little back, and was thoroughly fed up with me by the time we got to the top of the ski lift.
[Twist your body, don't fall off the chair, stand, fall down, get up/get the heck out of the the way before the next chair's occupants fall/glide/slide into you....]
We spent another 15 min or so getting my g.d. free-foot to snap into place again and then got prepared and positioned for heading down the mountain a second time...
I fell another 5-10 times, and after one particularly brutal fall, my friend yelled "GET UP." I decided I wanted to just lay for a second (I was...pretty much out of the way of the other snow idiots), but she repeated, "GET. UP." I gave her one of my infamous 'looks of death,' and politely informed her, very seriously, that I would take the board off, walk my butt down the mountain, and quit if she told me to "get up" ONE MORE TIME.
She did.
My "give a damn" broke.
I took the board off and walked down the mountain and never went back. It was about 11:30am, we'd been there all of a couple hours, but I sat my butt in the back of the truck while they continued to snowboard.
They only lasted another hour, and then we headed back home...
I felt a little guilty at the time...I knew my friends really wanted me to like snowboarding and I really, really, really wanted to like it too........but it's (really, really, really) not for me.
I thought that time would heal this wound.
Obviously I'm going to need more time.
I also thought time would make me feel a little guilty about how I behaved, and a bit desirous to try the sport again...
A big fat NO to both.
So there bucket list. Take that. I tried...and failed, but tried nonetheless, to snowboard and never, Ever, EVER have to do that again for as long as I live!
What a relief!
OH! The best/only good part of the whole trip:
(sorry it's blurry, but check out the antlers on the mutt!)
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