Ski Therapy

I hated skiing as a kid. Hated it. I don't remember too much about actually skiing. Instead, I remember that by the time I took my first lesson around age 10, all my friends were so good and had been skiing for so long that it seemed I would never be able to keep up. I remember sitting next to people on the ski lift and hearing their shock that I was starting "so late". And I remember being embarrassed by the mix and match hand-me-down clothes from my older brother and sister. The navy gloves simply did not go with my black ski pants and nothing matched my hot pink and turquoise ski parka, which made me look something along the lines of an 80's abominable snowman. Definitely not ski bunny material at all.

"We hated it because we were cold and nothing fit right," said my sister. "It's totally different now. The equipment's better. You can control the skis now; they are shorter and wider and with all the other good gear, you won't even feel the cold." She's become a devoted skier in the last two years after dating a truly devoted, excellent skier. "Not only that, you'll be amazed at how much will come back once you start."

And so, last weekend, I started. I signed up for the Beginner's Package and had the rental shop outfit me with all my equipment and my friend Leah and I were assigned the bottom level teacher. We started with learning how to strap on a ski and slide around on one foot. That I could handle. And my sister was right- it wasn't cold at all. We progressed to putting on both skis and sliding around with the three-year -olds in a fenced pre-bunny-hill area.

"I just know we will get off the bunny hill today," my friend Leah said to me.
"We haven't even made it TO the bunny hill yet," I told her.

We did make it to the bunny hill though. And came down over and over again without falling. I felt only slight tremors of fear as we went down the steeper side of the bunny hill. But there were no falls, no broken wrists, and no bruised tailbone like the last time I tried snowboarding. My sister was also right about the equipment. I could snowplow with the short skis without tangling them up, and I did have control.

"We are amazing!" We told Vin at lunch. "We had so much fun we signed up for afternoon class too, and our teacher said we are incredible! She is going to take us off the bunny hill."

"I'm glad you love it so much! Maybe I'll come find you wherever you go and do it with you."

"Absolutely!" We devoured our overpriced chicken sandwiches as though days had passed since breakfast. I looked around at everyone walking past me on the outdoor terrace and over their heads to the peaks towering above, poking in and out of clouds. "I completely understand why people love this so much," I said.

We went to meet up with our teacher after lunch. "Hey, are you the beginners?" asked another ski instructor. "Georgia told us about you two. She said you are amazing and she has never seen beginners pick this up so quickly."
"Well, she's an amazing teacher," I answered back.

Our teacher, Georgia, walked up to us, "Are you ready?" she asked. "We are going to walk a little ways over to another part of the mountain. You'll see walking in ski boots is the hardest thing you will have to do all day." I wish that had been the case.

We followed her for a ways, until we strapped on our boots and got ready for the lift. I was afraid of heights when I was little, so I was relieved to find that the ski lift didn't seem to affect me. I did keep my eyes a little ahead rather than straight down, but the quiet was so deep and the scent of pine so strong that I felt at ease the entire time.

We slid down from the lift a little way and suddenly, I felt the old "I hate skiing" emotion rise in my chest again. Only this time, I knew enough about emotions and myself to recognize it. It was terror. Here I was, standing on two long, slick sticks that I couldn't control, facing down an enormous mountain and there was only one way out. I battled back the terror. "You are more athletic now," I told myself. "You do pilates; you have balance and control. You'll be fine," I thought, and suddenly, I fell for the first time all day. And then I fell again. And then again. And the terror kept building. Leah was ahead of me, right alongside the teacher. She hadn't magically lost all her skills from the morning as I had. "It's very normal for people to regress when they are on the mountain," my teacher called up to me. I had managed to regain my standing position, but my legs refused to move. "I've forgotten how to do it!" I shouted down at her. I was drenched in sweat and we hadn't even started. She coached me, step by step, until I managed to join her and Leah a little further down the mountain.

"See, you are doing great!" They both reassured me. "This is all psychological," I told them. "I start going fast and it isn't even that I am falling; I am sitting down! And then falling over."

"Do you have trust issues in other areas of your life too?" my teacher asked. "You have no idea," I said. "I know it's irrational, and I know I was fine before, and yet..."

"All emotions are irrational," she said. "You can't control them. They just are. Actually, you are probably going to laugh, but I am a meditation teacher, and the one thing that you can do to sort of gain control over your emotions is to breathe out. That's it. In fact, let's do that. From now on, every time you turn, breathe out. Breathe in as you go across, and breathe out as you turn again. Let's try."

I followed in her path, breathing out forcefully at every turn. She and Leah stopped and watched me coming slowly down the mountain, this time without falling. "Breathe out, breathe in," I told myself. The tension didn't melt away. It kept my hands stapled to my poles and my legs locked in place, but at least I didn't sit down once on the way to them. "Great job!" They both said.

"I'm drenched," I confessed to Georgia when we made it down the mountain. "And it isn't from the work out."

"I'm drenched too," she responded, "from worrying about you." But she still turned and headed to the next lift. "No more blues; this time, we'll try a green (an easier run)."

I sighed and followed. Perhaps this time I would love it. "I know now why I hated skiing as a kid," I told her on the lift. "I must have been scared to death the entire time. I remember this feeling. And I remember being so embarrassed about it and yet not being able to stop it. And I remember my dad being mad at me for how irrational it was."

"It is irrational, but there isn't anything you can do about it," she said. "You might find that you love skiing and that the feeling eventually goes away, or you might decide that this just isn't the sport for you."

I did two more runs, breathing out on every turn. It wasn't exactly fun, but I survived. And I wonder if I can become accustomed to some sense of speed and enjoy skiing more than just the bunny hill. Even if I never love to ski, I'm glad I had a teacher who managed to get me down the mountain patiently, kindly, one breath at a time.