A Lesson in Winter Sports and Frozen Hubris

(Yeah, tomorrow all we'll care about is the stupid election, so I'm publishing my ridic own life post tonight)

For years, I've been telling people that skiing is like riding a bicycle--a bit tricky to learn, but once you learn, you can always recover the skill again with a little practice, and be off and enjoying yourself amidst the beauties of the snow-covered outdoors blah blah blahdy cakes.

I based this wisdom on my experience in my 20s and 30s, when for a decade I did a mild bit of beginner to intermediate downhill in Maine and New Hampshire every year with various clumps of family and home town friends.

Back I would then go to Washington, DC, for the nonce, where the entire nation's capitol is halted by two inches of powder three times a year, and as soon as a flake falls, everybody panics, leaves their offices and crashes directly into one another.

I'd be all smug and "I'm from Boston," and secretly laugh at my fellow office workers who "made it in" from Northern Virginia two hours late in their North Face jackets during a snowfall about as deep as the top of their coffee cup.

Apparently, though, karma was hiding under the desk and hearing all this and totally about to disprove my thing about skiing. It seems I've been lying about those skills staying with you, or at least, they have an expiration date, like milk. And expired skiing skills will kick your booty even worse then milk gone bad which you only discover after you have poured it over the last bowl of cereal in the house.