Associated With Rock and Snow

I had it in mind to get a pair for cross-country ski boots.  I’d already purloined the cross-country skis that were up there in my mom’s garage.  And she was kind enough to get me a gift certificate at “Dicks” to get a pair.  As reported earlier that’s not something Dick’s sells.  Today I was determined to visit “Rock and Snow” downtown where I could presumably get a pair. 

My older one had it in her mind to get some Vietnamese food.  She’d developed a love for it out west in Portland and the two of us headed over to iPho on Main St. to give our local joint a shot.  I called my pop, who was keen to see my daughter, before she went back to school and he came to join us, even though he’d already eaten lunch.  Both of us were pleasantly surprised.  The broth was flavorful, the shrimp in the summer rolls were juicy. 

We each gave my pop a big hug and drove down and tried one lot and then another looking for the right place to park, associated with Rock and Snow back behind Kossovar Law Offices, who’d helped me to buy my house years ago.  Some students were sitting at a bench and it took me a moment to realize they were playing Hendrix “Hey Baby” which suddenly felt like exactly what I’d have been listening to over a group lunch in my undergrad years.  I resisted the temptation to go over to them and tell them it sounded lovely.

The guy at the store asked a question I couldn’t answer: “What sort of bindings are your skis.”  Oops.  Before long I was considering renting the whole package, with skis, boots and poles which was only a hundred bucks for the season.  I haven’t cross-country skied in thirty years, so I asked a few clarifying questions and was reminded to take them off when crossing an areas that wasn’t snow, snow plow if you’re going down sills, and . . . here, by-the-way is the way you but the boots into the bindings. 

Out on the trail, it took me many minutes of fiddling to actually get the boot to snap in.  A guy came by with his own cross-country skis in his arms.  “I’d found these years ago in Brooklyn and they’ve worked all these years.  And today . . . they're busted."  Fortunately, he didn’t offer me help to get my skis on.  Once I was in I tried to remember the motions of what one does.  I found myself naturally slipping into something that was a one, two, three and slide.  I don't need the video to know it was not pretty.   The forest looks different on skis than it does on a bike and I tried to concentrate on this, but the going was slow and clumsy and after about ten minutes I turned back, having gotten as sweaty as I was going to get for the day.  

Thursday, 01/23/20