It was a cool, sunny afternoon.  My family and I went skiing at Mount Southington.  We were in the car.

Man, I thought, I haven’t gone skiing since I was 3.  I hope I don’t get hurt.  And it was true.  I hadn’t gone skiing in a long time, and I could just barely remember the basic moves to slow down and to turn, (Such as “Pizza Slice”, which would slow me down and allowed me to turn a lot) and I wasn’t getting lessons, either.  We walked into the ski rental place rented skis, ski poles, and 4 hour passes for admission. The closer we got to putting on the skis (and going up the chairlift), the less confident I was in myself, and the more I was worried. I was trying to take my mind off of it, but we were at the mountain.  How could I not get reminded of it when I saw people skiing down a mountain?

We were getting ready to go.

I got my skis on and all the other equipment, now all I had to do was get up there.  My thoughts kept lowering my confidence, and adding to my fear and anxiety. I had to go on the chairlift with my dad.  I just couldn’t rely on myself to know how to properly dismount the chair. On the other hand, my sister hadn’t gone skiing once in her life.  At least I knew a bit about the chairlift, unlike her. But I hadn’t gone skiing in forever, plus I didn’t know how to stop or anything.

We got to the top of the hill.  We were here.

“Ok guys, so we’re going to start off with this path,” my Dad said, pointing toward a path, “This is as easy as it gets.”

We started pushing off with our poles in order to get to our first drop, leading to a turn.

“So what you do,” Dad said, “Is you have to make a snowplow shape with your skis, as such,” he went on to make an example.

Right down the hill. Piece of cake.  But was it? I was up first.

“Here I go!” I exclaimed.

I tried to make a snowplow shape, better known to be as “pizza wedge”, and it didn’t go too well.  I struggled to make it big enough, and went too fast to stop. I ended up crashing into a pile of snow, and my dad had to help me get up.  Sarah somehow did fine, although she did fall. Now it was time for lesson number 2. Going down a fairly tall mountain. It was probably 6 feet high.  Still, tall enough. I tried again. This time, I did actually make a pizza wedgem but it turned into parallel skis, and then I was going faster than I wanted to.  My sister was doing a lot better than me, so she was in front of me.

“WATCH OUT!” I yelled, narrowly missing her.

Oh no.  This was a big drop.  I couldn’t stop. Forget this, I’m going to stop whether I’m ready for it or not, I thought, as I rammed right into a pile of snow, just big enough to stop me.  A ski fell off, and the other one was still on, so it was hard for me to get up. My dad eventually came to me, because my sister had fallen back there as well.

After I had gotten up, my sister had already gotten the hang of skiing, as she was zooming and turning perfectly down the hill.  It was just me now. My dad helped me get up.

“Now, just go down the side of the hill slowly, and either stop or keep going to turn onto the other side of the hill.”, Dad said, as he gave me an example.

“Ok, I’ll try” I said, trying to sound confident.

I got to the other side, but I was going down on too much of an angle, gained too much speed, and couldn’t stop (I didn’t know how to stop with the “Pizza Wedge” move yet).  I slammed into the snowpile there, losing a ski again. And I was in a ditch (about 6 inches deep, but enough to keep me down so I couldn’t get back up.). I needed help back up.  My dad helped me up and reinstructed me.

“Can’t I just walk down the hill?” I asked, putting my ski back on.

He answered with a no.  So I tried again. This time, I actually got it!  I got to the other side and made a full stop!

“Now we know you can do it, so now go to the other side of the hill and stop a few more times…” Dad said.

I went to the other side, but when I tried to turn, I dived down the hill, but I knew how to slow down and control it!  I came to a stop at the end of the slope. My dad congratulated me. Now there was a flat part of the hill. I had to push for a while.  Sarah is probably already getting on a chairlift again, I thought, coming to the edge of the flat part of the hill.  Now I had to push uphill. I could have used that speed from earlier, I thought, moving ever so slowly up the hill.  Oh no no no no no, I thought, slipping back down the hill.  I had stopped myself with my poles, but I wasn’t getting anywhere anytime soon.  I was stuck. My arms were tired and I was cold as ice, although my hands were sweating a lot because of the gloves I had on.  But I had to make it up there. I had just enough energy to get me to the top of this hill. There was a big drop, along with the snow machines that had so much snow coming out of them you couldn’t see through the snow.  I had to go towards the middle of the hill, where there was no thick amount of snow.

As I came to the middle of the hill, I saw how tall the hill was.  I saw that there was a flat part at the bottom of the hill. I don’t know if that flat part of the hill will be enough to stop me, I thought.  I saw my Dad zooming down the hill super fast.  Well if he can do it safely, can’t I?, I asked myself, there were probably a ton of people who have tested this out before me and got out of this safe, or else this ski path would be closed.  I figured I might as well get it over with.  I went straight down the mountain, but turning ever so slightly where I was going to hit a snow machine if I didn’t change directions…

I was blinded by the snow for a second there, but I turned my way out of it, with the only downside being that I got snow on my hood and on the back of my neck, which was quite annoying.  I got to the bottom of the hill, and found something I didn’t see before. There were small “speed bumps” at the end of the hill, enough to easily slow me down. Even though I had to push myself about 50 feet to get back into line for the chairlift, I was happy about the “speed bump” safety feature.  I had casually gotten on a chairlift again and kept skiing for another 3 ½ hours.