Cross Country

Cross country skiing. A great sport. A sport that I have missed.

I used to ski several times a week. Every chance I could get. Even at night. I started when in college, bought my first pair of skinny boards from a Swedish exchange student, and skied around Ithaca, some in the Adirondacks, and here in Biscuit Hollow. One winter while on break, I skied up on the hill and, well, cross country, until I found myself between Knoxville and Osceola some miles away. I called Dad to come get me from Payne's Dairy.

When I was teaching high school in Wellsville, NY, it was at an evening cross country ski outing that I would discover my next career with USDA while visiting with some friends.

When I lived in Adams, NY for nine years, it was easy. For months at a time, there was snow on the ground. Lots of snow. I would ski several times a week. Often with neighbor Charlie Bangs and Pastor Peter Bolster. We would go to a number of local ski areas on the Tug Hill Plateau and Peter and I would try to keep up with Charlie, many years our senior. Or we would go with a group of friends complete with trail mix and a thermos or two of hot chocolate shared along the trail. And sometomes I would just go for a ten+ mile ski as a workout. Alone. In the woods. Quiet.

There was never a worry about snow in the winter in the North Country. That was something that was always plentiful. I even remember going skiing in May once when after a quick 10" of snow, I left work early and Peter, Charlie, and I went out just to say we had been able to ski in May!

And then in 1989, I moved back to the barren foothills of Appalachia, the Southern Tier of NY. Where in Yates and Steuben Counties, less precipitation is received than any other area of NY. Too far west to get the coastal storms, too far south and east to experience much lake affect snow from the Great Lakes. Good if you don't like shoveling, bad if you like skiing.

I went out a few times. I joked that if you wanted to go skiing and you had snow, you better take the day off from work because it would melt the next day. That wasn't always the case and I do remember telemarking gracefully down the hill at my home in Campbell about the last time I went.

It has been 15 years or so. Jann and I agreed after finding some equipment at yard sales this summer that we would complete the packages with new boots and bindings for Christmas this year. And now that I am retired, I don't have to hurry home from work.
But when we got a quick inch and a half the other day, I made a mad dash to the farm since this was the first snow we had received since we got our boots. And. It was going to melt the next day...

I had fun. But, I recall now why you don't ski with only an inch or two on the ground.
The skis get scratched from rocks that don't have enough cover and they stick to grass and underlying wet spots.

Also, there isn't enough snow to cushion you when you fall. And I did. Nope. Definitely not enough.