Some People Probably Just shouldn’t Ski!

My father used to say, “Be Careful honey! Your face, your career!”…I mention this all the time and it is a rule I live by…and I have absolutely no idea what career he was talking about, but still…Daddy was always right! I got in the car with my mother and “guy friend” and set on the path to go cross-country skiing. I even found the release in my Volvo’s back seat that is apparently meant to carry skis…or something else long…maybe a flag or something?….I have no idea what else it could be for come to think of it…and I’ve never carried a flag with me anywhere. I dressed like a snow bunny! I was wearing the ear covering that an ex bought me when he had tried to make me into an outdoor athlete, the coat another guy picked out for me when he wanted me to wear something other than an evening gown and dress coat to the races, and the ski boots and skis chosen for me by a guy who apparently thought that if I killed myself on them it would be easier than breaking up with me…All in all- I really looked the part! Before we arrived at the trail, I sang a little something for my new friend so he wouldn’t expect me to be the caliber of an Olympic athlete! (I hoped it would clarify the fact that no one who is obviously a musician, participated in many sports as a kid. I wanted to prevent any high expectations where I was concerned in the sports department from being met with a huge disappointment! Personally, I got extra credit in phys ed class as a kid for singing the anthem!)

People were crashing all over the trail. It was one person falling on their face after another. It is clearly a ridiculous event. Then again, I did have a lot of fun…other than the time on the hill as I crashed into a tree and couldn’t do anything to stand up because my darn feet were apparently too long when they were strapped into 6 foot skiis…and I couldn’t stop laughing long enough to regain my demeanor. Also…we broke my mother on the first strategically placed hill that occurs at the very beginning of the trail. My sister would be so mad if she knew! She gets very protective of our mother. She worries all the way from California that skiing with skis from the early 80’s may not be the best activity for a woman in her 60’s. Oh well…all she needed was a hot bath and some ibuprofen! She’s fine. Besides…she had 5 kids! She’s way stronger than any of the women in our generation! Her generation could squat in a field and deliver a baby while they wrote puppet shows with the older siblings! All in all- our generation is lucky that medical advances have evened out the life expectancy of the stupid things that people our age do to the overall natural well being and strength of the previous generation without super-sized fries and liquid toxins in our bottled water! Thank God for all of our organic foods! We’ll all live 200 hundred years…either that or the next generation’s feet will be really BIG!…no one really knows!

Anyway…the ski trip! It was a really great time but it certainly didn’t seem like it followed the “your face, your career” life rule! I didn’t hit my face on anything but if I laughed any harder, my face was going to freeze that way!…

When we arrived home, I got into a snowball fight with my brother with Down's syndrome! I was trying to miss him because I felt like it wasn’t really a fair fight. The snow he threw would break into 4 snow balls and hit me directly in the face!…After about 8 or so of those and a “slush puppy brain freeze”, I yelled, “Hey! My face, my career!…Daddy?…Can’t I hit him with just one?”…Just then, another burst of snow broke with such force on my head that my teeth clanked together!… I assumed the answer from my father was, “No Calia. You can’t whip an ice ball at the boy with special needs!”…but Daddy! I’m just a flute player…aren’t we a little bit even?…