bras in the trees
with an itch to go snowboarding, my cousin said "let's go to the poconos!" and i said "where the heck is that?" 'poconos' sounds more tropical than artic. (the poconos are located in northeastern PA.) so my cousins, their family, a few friends, shane and i went to the poc 'OH NO's this past weekend for a lil get away.
last winter i tried to snowboard, fell hard and got frustrated that i couldn't get the hang of it. i watched kids on their boards flying past me on the slope and stood in line with older folk talking about how they almost ate it on their last run. if they all could do it then so could i damnit! and so began my mission...
'you gotta bend your knees', 'you gotta shift your weight', 'you gotta blah blah blah'...mantras that played over and over in my head to keep me from falling on my ass so much. toe side to heel side and back again?!?!! i kept catching edge hittin' my tail bone hard against the ground. no matter how many times people kept telling me what i needed to do nothing clicked with me until i stopped being so afraid of falling.
snowboarding + no fear = new & improved self-confidence
our second day of boarding i finally went on the big boys and girl's trail in the upper mountain of camelback... and just as my lil nephew said when he fell boarding into a small ditch, "that was AWESOOOME!"