2-24-07

2-24-07

I’m writing this entry laying down on my bed because it hurts to sit. As a great man once said--let me explain, or try to.

Woke up this morning and showered and then, through a series of text messages, debated cross-country skiing today with my traveling companions. The temperature was hovering at about –16, but we decided it was early and it would warm up, so we set off. We went to a place called, in English, “Okhta Park.” Okhta Park is located a marshrutka ride away from the last stop on the red line, Devyatkino. It’s fun to ride the Metro to the last stop on a line, when it’s just you and sleeping bum in your car.

At Devyatkino I met up with Becky and Hannah. It was swarming with people with skis and snowboards, setting off for other ski resorts in the area. We had a very nice marshrutka ride, largely due to a nice driver, and in spite of the slippery, bumpy, terrifying roads. Okhto Park is not only a cross-country skiing park; it also offers downhill, snowboarding, and ice-skating. We rented skis and waited for Kate to arrive. When she did, we suited up.

Well, I should say that with Becky’s help I suited up, because I was like a 5 year-old child at that place. I think it was the fact that I was wearing mittens. I couldn’t keep my boots tied, I could get my skis on, and I couldn’t get the Velcro on my pole straps to stay together. This should have been an indication as to how I would fair during the rest of the afternoon. I think I should make that a life rule: When attempting a new sport, if you can’t put on the gear, give up now.

Despite being 100% flatlander, I had, before today, never cross-country skied. Or downhill skied. Or touched a pair of skis. But somewhere deep inside, before I took my first few shuffling attempts at getting onto the path, I wanted to be really good at it. I think everyone feels something like that when they’re trying a new sport. Everyone wants it to come easy to them; everyone wants their friends to say, “Wow, you’re a natural!” or “Looks like you were born to do it!” Haha, I’d like that to happen just once when trying a new activity. At the very least, it’d be nice to be competent at some kind of winter sporting event. For someone who loves the Winter Olympics as much as I do, I sure wasn’t born to compete in them. Not that I’m born to compete in the Summer Olympics, either. I think I’m just born with the ability to watch the Opening and Closing Ceremonies.

At some point in the future, should I become some kind of Olympic champion in, say, curling (Doubtful—Can’t walk on ice, let alone slide or sweep), maybe I’ll write a book chronicling my attempts at other winter sports before I found my true calling. In this book, the chapter on cross-country skiing will be entitled, “Cross-Country Skiing: Not the Disaster it could have been.”

Perhaps if Okhto Park’s cross-country skiing paths had been in something more akin to a field, which would be flat and upon which I could develop some kind of rhythm, perhaps then I would’ve shown like the skiing diamond I am. Okhto Park’s trails wind through a lovely pine and birch forest. It was quite beautiful in the bright, sunny afternoon light with a nice snow cover. It was not, however, flat. Or anything close to it. When I asked Katie if she wanted to join us, she said that cross-country skiing required too much effort, and in reality it was more like “uphill skiing.” A large portion of what we did today was actually uphill.

This lovely, winding path had quite a few hills, actually. Hills that would be no problem to walk up. Maybe a little slippery, but not too bad. God, it was a disaster. I managed to establish the very, very beginnings of a rhythm when we encountered our first tiny hill. Making it up was a challenge. I just couldn’t maintain my balance. I didn’t fall, I would just wobble, and once I wobbled, I would slide back down the hill. Luckily for everyone involved, I made it up this anthill, only to be confronted on the other side with the startling realization that I would have to go down.

I certainly went down faster than I went up. Too fast. I would panic and become not a skier, but a flailing mix of poles and skis. And keep in mind, dear reader, that this hill would not trouble an old man with a walker. But up until this point, I had not fallen. The hills got bigger. I would take longer to get up them and less time to go back down, but I still hadn’t hit the ground.

That was, until, the hill with the bridge. The bridge was situated in a gully, such that on both sides there were hills that people would be going down on skis, but the bridge itself was only wide enough such that one person could go across at a time. Now, this hill actually was fairly steep. I can’t really provide a reference, but it’s less steep than the hill at the golf course in Portland that we used to sled on, but steeper than the hill outside Wright food court where Julia fell. Haha, I’m the only person that now has any idea of the relative steepness of this hill.

Anyway. Kate, whose mother is a cross-country skiing instructor, took her time and somehow managed to slowly get halfway down the hill before taking the time to line herself up and make it across the bridge. Hannah and Becky make it across as well, although not as easily. Then it’s my turn, because I’m obviously at the back of the line because of my issues getting up the hill in the first place. I think to myself, “Okay, get yourself all nice and lined up like Kate did, this’ll be easy.” As I’m getting myself lined up, I fall. Not a big fall, just kind of sideways. The hard part was getting back up. I would forget that I had skis on, and so I would twist myself into all kinds of positions that, had my feet been their normal lengths, would’ve made it possible to rise. Instead, I just banged my skis together for a while before reaching a standing position.

Then I started heading, too fast and with no control, toward the bridge. Surprisingly, I was all lined up to make it across just fine, but I fell again, right at the edge. So I rather unclimatically shuffled across the bridge and then made the long trip up the next hill.

On this hill, Becky suggested, after I fell after sliding all the way to the bottom, that I attempt going up the hill by turning sideways on the side of the path where there was more snow and stepping up the hill sideways. This worked relatively well. The problem was that my skis were sticking into the forest. So I would bang into trees and get caught in the underbrush and stomp all over saplings. But I made it to the top.

Repeat this process a few more times. Then I got to the largest hill yet, had signaled everyone to go on ahead of me, and while attempting to climb it, had a rather spectacular wipeout. Sitting at the bottom of the hill, struggling to get back up, I had had enough. Don’t get me wrong, it was plenty fun. But I had hit my left knee pretty hard on that last tumble. I did a quick mental calculation and figured that if I turned around at that point, I’d get back to the main lodge at the same time everyone else would after they had gone to the end of the path and circled back. So I set off the other direction.

On one of the hills I took another impressive dive, this time slamming my right knee into the hardened ice and snow. When it came time for the bridge hill again, I steeled myself for the worst. Luckily, there was no one on the other hill who would want me to go before them, so I was able to take my time.

And by take my time, I mean, “Stand at the top of the hill for a second or two, trying to decide if I should just take my skis off and walk back and then shifting my weight and setting off down the hill at a blistering speed.” So yeah. Without meaning to, I had shifted just enough to put my center of gravity in such a position to decide that the bottom of that hill was really the place I needed to be.

I waved my arms, clacked my poles together, but never closed my eyes. Because I never closed my eyes, I can tell you that I crossed the bridge in the dead center of it before having enough momentum to carry myself halfway up the next hill. I’m not sure how this happened. Of course, I fell at the top of this next hill, but whatever. I had my one success.

The rest of the way back went very slowly. I fell a few more times, but also I was just moving really slowly from exhaustion, cold, and pain. Though it’s embarrassing, I’m willing to admit that I got passed by an old woman. Walking. An old woman was walking faster than I was cross-country skiing. You don’t see that happening at the Olympics.

I survived and made it back to the lodge. I had all of my limbs. Unlike my mother’s first attempt at skiing, I did not wind up with a cast anywhere. I had had some successes. I didn’t end up alone and crying somewhere in the middle of the woods with snot all over my mittened hands and my skis somehow on backwards.

Suddenly I’m having a flashback to some time at the Winchester roller-skating rink, I must have been younger than 5, and I was in the big rink for the first time. Roller-skating, that’s something else I can’t do. I was always the kid at the elementary school skating parties who pulled herself along the bar all the way along the wall, all the way around the rink while everyone else skated backwards and did tricks and the like. Anyway, in this memory I had yet to discover that roller-skating would be yet another activity that would prove surprisingly difficult. I was with Mom, but, probably because I fell, we got separated. She was going with the flow and circling back to come get me so she didn’t get hit in the cross traffic. But I remember it feeling like it took half an hour for her to get back. I just remember crying and sitting on the floor and watching people skate past in the purplish glow of the black light. I couldn’t get up, I couldn’t move, everyone around me just passed on by and the person that could help me was nowhere to be found.

Anyway, my point is, that didn’t happen today. You see? It could’ve been much worse!

I met up with everyone back at the lodge and got out of my skis. For the next five minutes I kept tripping because I was walking like I still had skis on. We headed back to Devyatkino, and then back into town for a late lunch and then checking our email at Café Max.

Once I got back here, I ate an unsatisfying and headache-inducing meal of borscht, sausage, and mashed potatoes. I’m really wishing I still had those cookies that I took to the movies the other night. Maybe I’ll go to a supermarket tomorrow to stock up on snack food. Anyway, after dinner I looked at my knees. They’re both large tomatoes, and by tomorrow I expect they’ll be large plums. Sitting hurts, but it’s not uncomfortable to lay down, hence my reclining position to type this entry.

We discussed just going out to the mall tomorrow to shop and hang out someplace warm, but we’ll see what happens. I have homework for Monday, and I know I sure as hell don’t feel like doing it tonight. I have no idea when I’ll be able to post this. Tomorrow night, Becky and I are going to see a production of Chekhov’s “Three Sisters.” Monday night, there’s an internship fair. Tuesday night, there’s a party with free food sponsored by the American Consulate. So maybe Wednesday. Looks like I’ll have plenty to write about between now and then.