Snowboarding: Season 2

I had been looking forward to Saturday all week, it's what got me through what seemed like the longest week of the semester.  The reason why was because Thomas and I had plans to go to Grand Targhee Ski Resort in Alta, Wyoming for our first snowboarding day of this season.  Last year I went like three times and so I was excited to see what I could do this year.

It was the most perfect day for snowboarding.  Clear and the snow wasn't too hard, perfect.  We bought a 4 day pass that lets us go full day for the price of a half day.  We got there around 9am and headed right up the mountain.  I was nervous about the lift because I hadn't quite perfected getting off it last year.  I'm happy to report that this time I had no troubles at all.  Didn't knock myself or anybody down :) We stayed pretty much on the same part of the mountain the first part of the day and I was feeling pretty good about the improvements I was making.  I have a hard time going from heelside to toeside and tend to stay on my heels the whole way down.  But that first half of the day I had some good transitions from heel to toeside.  We went down a different side of the mountain after a couple times down our preferred side but it had a lot of cat tracks and up and downs.  I wouldn't get enough speed going down and then didn't have enough momentum to go up the hill.  So I'd either have to akwardly crawl or bounce up.  Eventually Thomas just told me to take one of my feet out of the bindings.  That helped. 
For lunch we had planned brilliantly and brought a little propane stove and a pot to make chili dogs.  It was wonderful to not have to pay a bunch of money to eat at the lodge but still get a hot meal.  We'll definetly keep that little tradition going. 
After lunch we met up with our friends Karlee and Will who came for the half day.  We started going down that same cat trail that was hard for me before but cut off through some powder.  Powder is hard! You are in a lot of trouble if you biff it cause then when you try to get up you sink like three feet and it takes a lot of energy to get out.  This really tired me out.  Then we tried some more trails that were really to advanced for me.  I felt horrible because everybody had to keep waiting for me to get unstuck.  I really just wanted them to go ahead cause I felt like I was slowing them down and that made me feel guilty and I was embarrassed for my lack of skills.  The confidence I had at the beginning of the day was totally zapped.  Finally, Thomas and I just decided to call it a day and ended up walking a half mile out of the cat tracks with our boards.  I was really upset at myself and swore that I hated snowboarding and was done doing it. 

This is my sad snowboarding face.

Thomas was so patient with me.  He knows that I am very hard on myself and explained that I am a beginner and can't expect to be able to do everything right when I want to.  I told him I know but this is like my 4th or 5th time going and I swear there is something wrong with me cause I still have to stay on my heels most of the time.  And I let him know that I felt bad holding him back.  He explained to me that he just wants snowboarding to be something that we enjoy doing together and doesn't care if he has to wait, if he wants to he'll do his thing and then wait for me.  His explanation totally made sense to me when I put it into context.  If I were teaching him to play volleyball I wouldn't care if he shanked the ball a ton of times and wasn't as good as I was.  I'd just be happy that he was playing with me and willing to learn.  I love that guy!!!
So after a little pep talk I felt a lot better.  It totally reminded me of having a bad volleyball game and being so mad at myself.  On the car ride home my mom would make me repeat out loud over and over "I will not be so hard on myself! I will not be so hard on myself!"

My sexy snowboarding lova'

So I will be snowboarding again :) After I recover though.  I am so sore in the weirdest places.  My knees, ankles, wrists, and most of all my kneck.  I had a really bad spill where I flipped over a couple times and my head flopped all around, luckily I was wearing a helmet.  I would never ever go snowboarding without a helmet! As we were getting on the lift one time, we saw this kid with blood running down his face and on his head.  He obviously wasn't wearing a helmet when he crashed and he was totally out of it.  His ski had split in two it was crazy! I don't care how good you are you should always wear a helmet. (I'll get off my soap box now).
I love seeing the little kids skiing and snowboarding.  I seriously saw a little three year old learning to snowboard on the bunny hill.  His mom would be at the top and push him down and his dad would be a few feet down the hill to catch him.  Adorable!