Snow Day!
Monday, February 26th, 2007
As most of you know, I recently moved back up to Maryland after living for 15 years in Florida. My girls pretty much grew up there, so they’ve never experienced many of the joys of winter…such as lying in bed on a wickedly cold morning, listening to the radio while you huddle under the covers, praying for a “no school today” announcement…or at least a “2 hours late” one.
Now, of course, they hop out of bed, run over to their computer and check the school board website. So do I. It’s quicker.
Anyway, about two weeks ago, we had our first real snowstorm of the winter. It wasn’t much, just a couple of inches, but it was enough to get them out of school. We sledded, made snowballs and snow angels and drank hot chocolate. (BTW: They lasted outside for about 1 hour before complaining and wanting to come in. Wimps…we used to go out wrapped like mini Michelin men and stay out there until our lips froze off!)
The thing is, that piddly 3″ of snow wasn’t much of a big deal…BUT that night, it was followed by an ice storm. I am talking 2-3″ of straight ICE landed on top of the snow and it really shut everything down. They were out of school for 3 full days and 3 partial ones! Just unbelievable–there were accidents everywhere, you couldn’t shovel your driveway because you couldn’t break through the ice to get to the snow beneath.
It was hellish for driving.
But oh, was it fun for sliding down!
That Saturday, we went up to Liberty Ski Resort in northern Maryland, rented inner tubes, and flew down the side of a mountain for a couple of hours. It was fun, but horribly busy and crowded, so the thrill was quickly dashed by interminible lines to get up the people-movers to the top…or worse, trudging up by foot. (Did that once…no more!)
We’d gotten a taste of winter fun, but not nearly enough. So the next day, when we had a big family gathering, my goofy kid brother (guess he’s not actually a kid anymore since he’s 35!) and I decided we wanted to try ice sledding in my sister’s front yard. We had two rubber discs and a lot of liquid courage. Dragging my older sister, Cheri, with us, we went out onto the front porch, which was so icy we kept slipping off. We’d ease our adult-size butts onto the kid-size disks, give ourselves a little push, and FLY down the gentle slope of the front yard. It’s a long yard, like I said–gentle, easy slope–no big hills. But, remember, it was solid ICE. Once you got started…you flew!
One more problem: at the bottom of the yard is a line of pine trees…beyond that, a ditch….then the road…then another HUGE hill that ends in a lake.
The trick was to STOP before you ended up in the lake.
Sounds easy, right? But believe me, if you can’t break through ice with a pickax to try to shovel it (we were doing that earlier in the day so Killian–the “beast” great dane I wrote about last summer–could get out to go to the bathroom) you could just forget about trying to stop yourself with a boot clad foot. I don’t care how “gentle” the hill was, once you got going, there was NO easy way to stop!
There were a few choices:
1. Roll off when you got to the bottom of the first slope and pray.
2. Try desperately to avoid the trees, and a big stump where one had been removed last summer, aim for the ditch, desperately throw yourself off before you rise back up onto the road, then hit the major hill and plunge down to the lake. And pray.
3. Beg someone to catch you at the bottom. And pray.
4. Head straight for the trees and let them stop you. And pray.
After trying all of the above with my gleefully cackling siblings, we decided landing in the pine trees was the best alternative. Evergreens have soft, brushy pine needles. And it smelled so much like Christmas. Scratches we could live with…we weren’t giving up our fun.
The one problem was, we had to avoid the sharp, pointy spikes we created every time we crashed into the trees and broke another branch.
Our shrieks of laughter drew everyone else out of the house, including my hubby and my daughters. Soon *everyone* was flying down that hill. And as the trees grew more and more sharp with broken branches, we started taking up positions at the bottom of the hill to try to “catch” whoever was flying down toward us next. Usually catching equated to “diving on” as it was the only way to stop anyone.
Eventually, someone brought out the camera…
Here are my hubby Bruce and I, getting ready for our first joint descent!
Ready…set…GO! Bruce and I go down together, holding hands, after a gentle push from my youngest and a shout of encouragement from my brother (the one in the goofy hat!!)
Okay, we’re picking up steam now…passing the first obstacle (I think I forgot to mention there’s a huge pine tree–without those nice soft fronds–right in the middle of the yard! And I also forgot to mention…you can forget about trying to steer on the way down!)
Okay, cut to the bottom of the hill. We’ve missed the stump. And the ditch. So we’re safe from the lake.
But now we have to make the slide under the tree!!! 
And here’s where we end up! Safe and sound, wrapped in the lovely smell of Christmas trees. And, oh joy, no eyes poked out from protruding broken limbs.
People ask me…Why do I write romance?
Why else: Bruce! My best friend…and my hero! :love2:
Now this next sequence of my crazy baby brother and I makes me laugh…it brings back such wonderful childhood memories! (Except, back then, I was usually tormenting Lee…on this particular day, he was the one who kept spinning me out of control on purpose!)
Here we are heading down the hill… 
We end up in the same spot!
But it takes a lot to get my good-natured baby brother down!
All in all, it was an absolutely hilarious day. Whether we were sliding down on the disks, our butts, big trash bags, plastic bin lids…whether we were sent spinning in a whirl by my brother Lee or our family friend Nathan, whether we held hands two by two…three by three…or once, four by four…whether we were holding a beer in our lap (oy) we somehow managed to NOT kill ourselves!
There were a few times when we had to react quickly when deciding who to save. Which my 15 year old is never going to let us forget. (My hubby and I both instinctively dove for her little sister…the older one was, umh, quite indignant and accused us of not caring if she got killed as long as the little one was okay.)
Though the quality’s not great and you really can’t get a feel for how bloody fast I’m going, I thought I’d share this video Bruce took with his cell phone. Remember: He’s holding the phone. He’s also the one who decided to ’save’ me at the end. Which is why things get kind of upside down.
Let me say again…Bruce: My Hero!
BREAKING NEWS:
Our family friend Nathan Riska saw this blog today and sent me HIS video of the very same slide above…it’s much better quality, and you can actually see what happened when Bruce dove to save me.
So much fun!
Thanks Nathan!
