Barb-in-the-Kitchen: Ski Babies

Skye signed the kids up for the ski program, the first winter they lived here in Reno. Having lived always, at sea level, we were astonished that kids could attend school for just a half-day on Wednesdays, and then get up to our mountain and spend afternoons learning that most essential skill around here---skiing or snowboarding. The lodge was filled with moms and dads, babies, equipment! Shoes! The school parents could hold a PTA meeting there because everyone was on that mountain. The "Rosebud" ski program is some kind of magic. You turn your kid in at their little gate---they slip a vinyl vest over the kid, hand you a claim ticket, slip the other half of the ticket into a clear plastic window on the front of the vest, and whisk your kid away. They pop out through a door on the other side, suited up with helmets, goggles, boots and skis. The little "rosebuds" lumber into a miniature red sleigh pulled by a snowmobile and off they go to the lift! Sometimes you can catch a glimpse of the bright yellow vests, but mostly, the kids are just gone! Some hours later, they reappear in the lodge with bright rosy cheeks, BRIGHT sparkling eyes! Their hair is wet and steamy, they sit on stepped benches with hot chocolate in hand while their boots are removed...also steaming, gloves tucked into pockets, all smiles and you claim your baby with your little ticket! They fall asleep in the car on the way home, and they sleep harder that night, than any night ever.

That first year, Emma and Harrison were six, Carter was two and Dylan was just one year old. They moved up the skill ranks...not always so easily, from "turtle" to "BEAR," and now beyond. They crashed, they fell instead of smoothly skiing off of the lift, they complained of having been way too cold---but they just never came in! They are all expert-level skiers now and ski all of the trails of our home mountain, Mt. Rose. They choose where to go based on the scenery; this year, they buried a little token by a tree, on their favorite trail.

When I moved here, I kind of turned into a "ski-grandmother." I don't ski, but I pushed them all to go and keep going. My car was filled with cases of water, hot chocolate, "Hotties," just-add-water-dry-soup. They constantly lost their $14 fleece face masks, so they chose fleece colors and I sewed them into tubes...about a hundred tubes---at 1 cent each, they haven't lost a single face mask... I took them skiing whenever they even thought they might like to go, and sometimes when they didn't. I wrestled their boots on, braided Emma's hair, whacked helmets on everyone, gloves, hotties in pockets and watched with a lump in my throat, as they clomped on their own to the "big" lift. I put them out there in blizzards, out there in seven degrees, out there on warm sunny days when I had to fight them to take a jacket "in case the lift stops and you spend the night dangling there!" I sometimes can't believe that I pushed them like that, to get out there like a "grown-up-quit-complaining-we'll-go-when-the-lift-closes!" At some point early on, it went past the delight of a half-day off from school, noodling around with friends in the snow. At some point, they started to crave it.

They've spoken of moments that were purely enchanting to them, moments the four of them shared together, off on their own mountain tops. They've urged me to ski because they want me there with them for those moments. I've come to realize that of all the childhood experiences, there is an almost total lack of self-destiny. We decide when and what they'll eat, what they'll wear, where they'll go, sleep, be...at all times. Kids make suggestions...a lot, but the final decision is always with their adult caretakers. And we wonder why they're such crazy drivers at 16!! Being able to ski allows a kid to make the decisions. Their judgement is in play the whole time they're out there. Carter recently sped around a blind curve, encountering a man stopped in the middle of the trail. He instantly decided that he needed to crash on his own, because he could control the crash---more than he could control the certain bad injury if he hit the brick-wall-of-a-big-man. He's had practice making instant and sound decisions like that! There was no time, and he knew what to do!

I want to learn to ski, to share their moments. To breathe the air they describe as the most special air! I won't be there as "the adult." They're the experts out there and have proven themselves to be considerate and certain. I want to be there to see their faces---not the rosy smiling "rosebud" faces of years ago, but the faces of maturity. They're enjoying the view from the top of the world! They know how to get there! And they sure the heck know how to get back down!