ouch

I’ve been over this whole winter thing since the beginning of February. I’m really over it now that it’s March. And although my bitching seems a bit premature for someone who’s been living in the Midwest for nearly eight years now (holy shit), please remember that it started snowing this year in November. This seems very unfair when you think back to last winter and remember that I ran outside after my roommate’s dog in mid-December barefoot. Winter starts early, winter ends early…THAT’S THE DEAL I MADE WITH MOTHER NATURE.

Rushing the seasons by wearing leggings and flip flops hasn't been working for me. So this past weekend, I decided if you can’t beat ‘em…join ‘em. And I “joined ‘em” for a snowboarding trip in Wisconsin. You might be surprised by this since I’m not so much a winter sports kind of gal, but I figured if worse came to worse, I could always sit at the bar and read all day. I mean...I hate football games, but I don't mind tailgating. If I hate snowboarding, I could do the apres ski part no problemo.

Here’s how the weekend went down:

Friday after work we headed north in an SUV blaring 311 and feeling very X Games. On the way to the hotel we stopped in a little town called Baraboo in hopes of procuring liquor. Sadly, we were denied booze because it’s illegal to sell adult beverage after 9 pm in Wisconsin. You can however wake up in Wisconsin with a 40 oz Bud/clamato juice/lime/salt mixture, but I’m not sure why you’d want to.

Without liquor of our own, we hit up the lodge bar on Friday night where it was apparently encouraged to wear denim overalls embroidered with snowmen and Ollie could legally smoke indoors.

We woke up early on Saturday morning. I was (understandably!) grumpy, and when Ollie asked, “what’s wrong?” I screamed, “IT’S 7:30 AM!” and gave him a swift kick to the knees.

All worries I had about being cold throughout the day were gone as soon as I finished dressing and started lacing up my boots. I started sweating for real when i realized how obnoxious it was to carry around a heavy snowboard everywhere I went.

Felling pretty good about all I had learned in my semi private lesson that morning, i decided to join the group up one of the green trails after lunch. After falling off the chaif lift, I quickly realized what an awful idea it was for me to leave the bunny hill. Promptly forgetting everything I learned in my lesson, I kept sliding off the side of the mountain. I think Ollie also regretted my leaving the bunny hill. He has over 10 years snowboarding experience and yet he couldn’t make it down the green trail without first fetching my board out of a ravine (trust me, i had to take it off) and stopping to dry my tears every time I caught an edge and fell (hard) on my tail bone.

This was a beautiful experience, people.

I woke up on Sunday morning and realized everything hurt. My entire body ached. My soul was bruised. We had lift tickets that were good through Sunday night at 10 PM, but I looked up at Ollie that morning and said, “I know myself well enough to know that if I’m out on that damn bunny hill by myself and I fall on my aching, bruised body, I will sit and cry and be miserable and I might…might…die”. And even though I know he would have liked to hit the slopes for a few more runs, Ollie packed up his things and said, “Let’s get out of here”. Then he took me to Chili’s for lunch. He’s a saint.

I sit here on Monday afternoon and the only parts of my body that aren’t screaming out in pain are my fingers. And my hair. But my hair does have a lot of split ends. Everything else hurts. And I’m pretty sure no one understands how much. It’s like I was in a horrible car accident. No wait. It’s like I spent all day Saturday falling again and again and again and then breaking for a snack and then falling and falling again and again until dinner.

But…but…the moments when I was up on my board and actually moving and turning and not shitting my pants were fantastic, and I think I really dig this sport. Which is why even though I’m in an enormous amount of pain as I sit here on a make-shit donut today, I really regret not going back out there on Sunday.