Blue sleds

The Niagara Escarpment was created in a process that has taken millions of years, in order to provide me with a place to sled today.

Sledding is still fun. It has been well over a decade since i went sledding. Today we used a large blue sled-shaped sled, and also a blue saucer-style sled. Tom had an orange "magic carpet" sled, which is just a thin piece of plastic with two hand holes, but that one did not interest me because i am a traditionalist when it comes to sledding.

The most immediate sociological observation that we could make upon arriving at our particular portion of slope along the Niagara Escarpment was that we were the only people over the age of fifteen. Oh to live on Sugar Mountain.

On my first descent, i glanced against a small tree and became separated from the blue saucer, and i rolled down the hill the rest of the way in a flailing mess of arms and legs like a commercial for Tylenol.

My successive descents were almost as violent, but i did not become separated from the sled anymore. I think that my tailbone may have fled into the snowcover during an incident on my fourth descent, which involved a massive undulation. That one made all of the teenager eyes pop in amazement at my heroics. "You were airborn, dude!" they said. I would chuckle humbly. Oh, i'll pay for that later i would say, exaggerating my decades.

I have not considered teenagers in a very long time. I sort of forgot that they existed. I guess that i do not happen to stumble over teenagers since i stopped going to school buildings for a living. I only ever see old people, and unhappy fortysomethings. And sometimes i see people in their thirties and twenties. And i see babies and very young children. But i hardly ever see teenagers.

Teenagers are like smallish elfin people with braces. It is strange that they seem so odd-looking, considering that i was a teenager once myself. Gosh, they sure do look young. I wanted to point out to Tom, like i was observing wildlife on a safari, "Tom, look at that teenager! Look at how young it looks! Awww!"

The teenagers only made two or three descents before escaping en masse.

It is the same gravity which makes sledding so enjoyable that also makes the ascensions dubious and challenging to constitutions. Which is a fancy way of saying that it didn't take much hill-climbing to cause my lungs to start bleeding. I am all tuckered out, underclothings are thoroughly damp and cold, i am full of viruses and thirsty for earl grey tea.

etc.