My relationship with skiing didn’t start well. I first went skiing with my boyfriend (Future Husband to be) and his family, or as my dad called him, The Current Applicant, when we’d only been together a few months. And in theory it should have all gone well. There was just one problem – I bought my ski coat with my boyfriend and went back to get the matching trousers on my own.
So no one knew that I’d got a pair of trousers that were just outer waterproofs, and didn’t have any padding, warmth or frankly, protection.
You can see where this is going, can’t you??? By day 5, when I was crying yet again about how much my legs were hurting, I actually dropped my trousers in front of my father in law to be and boyfriend, sobbing, to show them the front of my legs – burnt, red and very sore indeed. They looked at each other, realised I was not complaining without reason and set about getting getting cream, thermals and painkillers!!!!
Needless to say, it took another 8 years for me to agree to go skiing. But we did, in February 2013, and of course, we got unlucky and arrived in the coldest weather they’d seen in weeks!!!! Nonetheless, I gave it a go and with the help of one to one lessons, got my confidence :)) And the rest as they say, is history!!!
Elliott and William had lessons as well – Elliott took to it like a duck to water, whilst William took longer to warm up to it – literally!!! From William’s perspective, he’d found something much more fun to do – drink hot chocolate from the nice lady who gave him colouring pens and paper each day!!
We loved the food, we loved the warm swimming pool, we loved our chalet host and her care for us. And I loved challenging myself – setting an example for our boys that it’s good to do new things, to not give up on learning even when it’s challenging and that its good to do things together – the feeling as we all went down the blue runs together – stopping for lunch in a cafe. My Father in Law, Husband and I were all teary at different parts of the holiday and all for different reasons. It was a very special thing. My Husband would like me to add at this point that for him, Grandad’s original all in one, from the 1980’s, complete with dayglo yellow, orange and green stripes was one of the sources of tears for him – a mix of laughter, and embarrassment!!
So here’s the thing – I want us to go skiing again – for us all to continue to learn – from my black run Husband and Father in Law, to me as the resident blue run bird, and my boys who were more confident on the slopes than me, by the end of their week. I want to up my game so that when they go on to the red slopes I’ll be able to keep up with them, because that’s what life is all about – doing things together – as Team Weston :))
PS. You’ll note that these photos are all of us looking happy and when I am in them, looking high on life. I really was. I’d go between sobbing and feeling like Rose Dawson at the front of the ship on the Titanic, with Leo DiCaprio. So if you’ve never been skiing – I totally reccomend it!
Leave a Reply