Let it snow, let it... never mind

It's raining and raining and raining in Toronto as I write this. The temperature has averaged about 6C for the last week or so. This is not winter as I remember it.

Remember when ski resorts used to do lots of business around Christmas time? You might remember skiing: it was a winter sport in which people took bits of wood or plastic, strapped them onto their feet, and then travelled at varying rates of speed down hills covered with snow. You might remember snow.

I tried downhill skiing when I was a teenager, mostly because all of my friends were doing it. (This was before I found new friends.) I never really enjoyed it, mostly because I never learned how to stop properly. Expert, or even marginally expert, skiers learn how to parallel stop, which is where the skier suddenly and gracefully turns his or her skis 90 degrees and comes to an abrupt halt, sending out a elegant spray of snow while doing so. I never figured out how to do this.

My method of stopping consisted of turning my skis inward at about a 30 degree angle and digging the inside edges into the snow. Eventually, I would come to a stop. Most of the time, that is: I still recall the two times I went hopelessly out of control.

Time number one was at Mount St. Louis. There, the hill was straight, and there was a lot of deceleration room at the bottom (with hay bales at the very back just in case), so I let myself plummet downwards and hoped that nobody as clumsy as me was in my way.

The other time I lost control could have been more serious, I guess. I was at Blue Mountain, on one of their easy hills. I think it was called Happy Valley or Cute Fluffy Bunny. All my friends were better skiers, and were on hills called Total Nuclear Death, while I was stuck on hills whose very existence branded me a nerd. Anyway: Blue Mountain is a huge mother of a hill, or was when I was last on it (this was a long time ago). When I started to lose control, I had about like half a mile still to go, including a couple of places where I would have had to turn. Going out of control all the way down would have meant certain doom, so I headed for the trees, hoping for a relatively smooth stopping place. Luckily, I found one, and didn't end up like Sonny Bono.

I also remember sometimes falling when getting out of the chair lifts. This was not only embarrassing but dangerous, as I was at the total mercy of the group of three behind me. If any of them were as bad at skiing as me, I would have been skewered. It may very well be a miracle that I am still alive.

Actually, now that I think of it, I am lucky to be alive. In 1990, I was a passenger in a 1984 Chevette heading from Guelph to Kitchener. It was late at night. Suddenly, unexpectedly, a car came out from a side road and turned onto the highway right in the path of the car I was in. My friend who was driving had the presence of mind to take evasive action, and successfully dodged the other car. If she hadn't done that, the Chevette would have been T-boned at highway speed.

I was wearing my seat belt, but a Chevette has no actual padding to speak of, so I likely would have been very badly hurt at best. Perhaps I should remember this more often, and be grateful to be alive and breathing and all that.