I have never been this sore in my entire 20 years of life.
Three weeks ago, I decided to try a new sport. The entire premise of said sport is: how fast can you slip-slide your way down a mountain without dying. You start the descent with your feet locked into a a piece of high quality plastic. You then dig your heals or toes into the mountain and begin a deliberate fall on a search for thrill and in the hopes that you will be able to walk again once reaching the bottom. The people that do this sport are, respectfully, crazy. They are generally people that don’t care about what others think about them and people that scoff at the boundaries of nature. But they are also people that love the deepest. Care the hardest. And people who have learned to get up quickly after crashing, both in life and on the mountain.
In the next few paragraphs I want to explain what I will forever call, “The Snowboarding Effect,” and answer the question why on this green earth did I buy a season pass to a ski resort despite the fact that I am moving back to the flattest state in the U.S. in exactly one week.
First of all: Some basic snowboarding information from someone who has watched too many Youtube videos:
So you can stop two ways. The first and easier way (at least in my opinion) is when you are standing up on your board and you dig your heels into the mountain. This is what is called stopping on your “heel edge.” The other way is when you are face up the mountain and you dig your toes into the snow. This is called stopping on your “toe edge.” I wanted to include this excerpt into this post in case a future snowboarder out there ever reads this post. Save them some grief. Save everyone else around them some grief too. Because snowboarders don’t really like to stop.
So you can keep yourself from stopping by never aligning your body at a 90 degree angle, but instead a series of 45 degrees, completing what are called “S” Turns. Let me back up: a turn is when you switch edges. Yes, you change directions, but when a snowboarder refers to turning or “linking turns” they are referring to switching from putting pressure and gripping the mountain with your heels to your toes. Your body switches from facing down the mountain to facing up the mountain depending on the degree of angle you need to stay upright. To stay locked into the snow. What I learned to practice first were called, “C Turns”. They literally make a C shape because you start on one edge and then switch edges and you loop down the snow suddenly changing what you are facing. “S Turns” add a second step to that: returning to your original edge. If you successfully “S” your way down the mountain, you won’t need to stop. Unless you run into a skier child. Then you need to stop because they typically don’t know how to yet.
Also your shoulder plays a dominant role in your turning and changing directions. Where your shoulder is pointed is where you are going to go. If your shoulder is pointed straight down the mountain, it will vomit you down like someone with the stomach flu. If your shoulder is pointed to the other side of the mountain, then you will slide to that direction. If your shoulder turns into the mountain, your body will follow and you will change edges from your heels to your toes.
Now forget everything that I have said and you will be ready to snowboard.
Are you confused, yet? Why would I tell you all of this technical “how to” and “what to do when” if I were to ask you to disregard it? Because you have to.
The Snowboarding Effect is what it feels like to get out of your head. To stop caring about rules and agendas and how you are supposed to do things. You can’t worry about morality or being loved or finances or childhood trauma when you are racing down a mountain. No, that’s not what happens.
The Snowboarding Effect is thinking about the sound of snow. The sound the snow makes when you stop: the forceful spray that pulls itself up around you. The crunch of icy snow. The magical, unreal sound of boarding straight through powder and watching it fill the air.
The Snowboarding Effect is vulnerable. It is falling a lot. And falling hard. Falling hard with a community of people who have made the conscious choice to fall with you. A group of people who have felt the pain and the bruises from the mountain’s hazing. It is pushing each other and running into each other and apologizing. You can’t hide your fears when your friends can actually watch them. Watch them in the way you hesitate. In the frustration you feel when you get to the bottom of the run but didn’t give it your all. When you let fear stop you.
The Snowboarding Effect is freedom. A freedom from obligations and memories and the weight of this world. Snowboarding feels more like flying than a sport. Feels more like living than anything I have ever done.
When I asked one of my snowboarder friends (the one who, in fact, trained me) why she loved snowboarding, she initially couldn’t answer the question. I kept asking her and eventually she mentioned what I have already mentioned here: community, fun, and freedom. But I truly believe that her inability to answer the question, answers the question itself.
The Snowboarding Effect cannot truly be articulated. It just is. You just do. You just let yourself fly down the mountain. And you stop questioning it.
