Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow
“Aging is a matter of mind. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.”
“Aging is a matter of mind. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.”
Given we are back in Lockdown, now is not the time for my weekly Reflection to be too deep and meaningful. So, this week (and hopefully for only the next four weeks, I will endeavour to keep things lighter. This offering is from some time ago. The day, close to 30 years ago, that I last went sledging ….
It was a snow-covered winter’s morning and my wife of that time, and I, stood in our kitchen drinking coffee together. I didn’t give a moment’s thought before saying, “yes”, when she suggested that we go sledging. We would use the children’s sledge as they were both out. Less than an hour later as I sped down the snow-covered hillside at an ever-quickening pace, I began to regret being so enthusiastic about the idea.
I had my first misgivings when, at the top of the hill, my wife said I should go first. However, the male ego soon put those misgivings aside. I never imagined the speed a few pieces of metal tubing, and thin wooden slats could achieve. Even when that tubing, and slats carried a thirty-something who weighed some fourteen stone.
It had been quite different when I started my descent. After a gentle push from my wife, I moved along sedately. A bespectacled Buddha sat upon the sledge. The gentle incline meant I picked up a moderate speed. Then, feeling self-confident, I made the critical error of leaning back to increase my momentum and add to the thrill of the escapade. Up to that point, my bulk, when in the sitting position, had acted as an air brake. Now, lying flat and skimming barely six inches above the snow-covered, icy ground, it took on an aerodynamic quality. This, coupled with the steeper incline, transformed the sledge, and me, into something akin to an out-of-control cruise missile.
“I don’t remember this happening when I sledged as a boy”, I thought, as I careered past other people who were happily making their descent at a gentler pace. My grip grew ever tighter on the sledge’s steering rope. Not because that gave me better control, it was more every drowning man needs a straw.
I hoped beyond hope that those around me could avoid my path, given their better control of speed and direction. I couldn’t see what was ahead while lying flat on my back on the sledge. Even if I had been able to see an obstacle in my path, I could have done little. My every effort to change direction, using the sledges’ steering rope, proving ineffectual.
Try as I might I could not sit up and I realised my only option was to attempt to bring the sledge to a halt. Reaching deep into my memories of sledging as a boy, I vaguely recalled that using the heels of one’s shoes was the technique I needed to employ. What I had forgotten was to do this gently. To effect a gradual slowing of the man-machine combination. The second I dug my heels firmly into the snow and ice my mistake was obvious to all.
Now airborne, my total lack of control of my speed and direction took on another dimension.
My forward momentum had shifted viciously from the horizontal to the vertical. While I clung gamely onto the steering rope from the sledge, it did nothing to arrest my progress through the air. Following the natural arch of a cannonball, I performed an ungainly somersault. Coming to earth landing squarely on my back. The force of my landing knocked every ounce of air from my lungs.
A split second later I felt the mistake of holding on to the steering rope from the sledge as the latter slammed into my forehead. My thought through the pain being, “At least these are my old spectacles”, as I both heard and felt them shatter. I knew it was not melting snow that now ran down my face.
Some moments later, with me still flat on my back, staring up at a clear blue sky and attempting to remember how to breathe, I heard a concerned older female voice say, “Are you alright, dear”?
“I think I might have broken my glasses”, I gasped forlornly as I struggled to regain my composure. My dignity had long gone.
“I don’t think they will be much use to you now”, said the kindly voice as its owner handed me a jumble of plastic and shattered glass.
I took them from her, thanked her, and struggled to my feet dusting snow from my coat and trousers. Her concerned look continued as I turned away to begin my ascent of the hill. After this painful reminder of lost youth, I could not help thinking of that well-worn phrase, “you are only as young as you feel”. At that moment, I felt about a hundred and two.
Standing at the top of the hill, my wife had watched my descent not believing what she saw. While concerned that I might have done some significant mischief to myself, she could not suppress the temptation to laugh as the spectacle unfolded.
As I slowly trudged back up the slope towards her, I wiped the blood from my forehead in preparation for another try. After all, I thought stoically, I was supposed to be enjoying myself!