Oak Mountain
I couldn’t sleep trying to imagine
what it would be like, a real ski resort, with real ski runs and real ski
lifts. I was only eleven years old, and
though an accomplished downhill skier, I had never been to a ski resort. My friends and I were extreme skiers, hiking
to the top of different foothills in the Adirondack
Mountains with our Frankenstein-like ski boots and our skis over
our shoulders, and then racing each other to the bottom. Often the ungroomed, unchartered trails were
treacherous, filled with every natural obstacle conceivable such as tree
trunks, hidden rocks and thorny bushes that would rip our clothing or dig into
any exposed flesh with one swipe. But we
were never deterred, even though we usually had the physical and mental stamina
for only one such run a day.
Being carried to the top of a
mountain by a machine called a “T-Bar” was unheard of in my little circle. Trails without natural barriers seemed even
more absurd. But tomorrow the mystery
would be over, my sixth grade class was taking a school trip to Oak Mountain ,
a small ski resort in Wells, NY.
There were about thirty young boys
and girls who loaded into the yellow and black bus that would take us on our
class trip. Mr. Stafford, an athletic
coach and history teacher, was our chaperon.
He barked out orders like a drill sergeant, “Place all your equipment in
a pile behind the bus….if anyone misbehaves on the ride to Oak Mountain, they
will not be allowed to ski….Skip, if I see you grabbing Jennifer one more time,
I’m going to call your mother to come and get you….Once we arrive, we will pile
your equipment outside the bus; you should find your own equipment and wait for
the group. We will all enter the resort
together…” the ordering and barking went on and on.
Everyone was so excited about the
trip that we were all on our best behavior, everyone except Skip Johnson, who
continued to grab at and irritate Jennifer Lawson.
When we arrived, I couldn’t believe
the sheer size and majesty of Oak
Mountain . The runs were clearly cut through the woods
and looked like white ribbons on the head of a beautiful girl. The peak was so high that it was not visible
through the clouds. Giant machines were
twirling, taking people two at a time up the various ski runs. I couldn’t wait! I had to go to the top of Oak Mountain !
Unfortunately, I had to wait.
The first run of the day was down
the smallest of the ski runs. Coach
Stafford wanted to see our ability, before he released us to the main portion
of the mountain. So, one at a time, all
thirty of us grabbed the “rope tow” and proceeded to the top of the “bunny
hill”. It took Skip Johnson, Charley
Legero and me about fifteen seconds to conquer this little hill, and Coach
Stafford gave us the green light to proceed to Oak Mountain Run, an
intermediate level run that was the most popular ski trail at the resort. Initially our biggest problem was mastering
the “T-Bar” that would take us to the top.
The “T-Bar” was a piece of wood shaped like a “T” that was connected to
a wire that extended and retracted out of a large lanyard. The lanyard was connected to a huge metal
cable. When it was our turn, two of us
would scurry into position and the attendant would grab hold of the bar, pull
enough wire out of the lanyard, so that the two portions of the “T” would go
behind our two little butts. The “T-bar”
would then drag us up the mountain. It
all seemed very simple. However, it took
us four or five tries to make it up the mountain. We would either tip over with
the initial jerk when the cable started to pull, or we would lose concentration
somewhere along the way to the top and cross our own skis, get our skis tangled
with each other, or simply lose our balance and fall off. This proved quite humiliating, especially
because there were always classmat es
coming behind us, with brutal comments.
I still
remember Buddy Brown yelling, “Hey Johnson, you sissy, why are you getting off
here, all the girls are on the top of the mountain?”
Skip
retaliated by taking a large dead tree limb and throwing it across Buddy’s
path. This caused not only Buddy but the next eight “T-Bar” riders to go
down. It became a multi-skier pile-up
that was so severe that the attendant had to shut down the whole lift for about
twenty minutes. Skip hid in the bushes and snuck unseen through the woods. Fortunately, they never found out who had
thrown the branch or we would have probably been thrown out of the resort.
It took
us most of the morning, but soon we mastered the “T-Bar.”
Once on top of the mountain, we were
on top of the world. We looked down and
saw the scores of skiers zig-zagging effortlessly down the slope.
This was
different from what we had experienced.
We only knew one way of skiing, full speed.
“Let’s start the first heat,” said
Skip, “The person with the most victories at the end of the day will be the Oak Mountain
champion.”
Charley and I nodded in agreement.
There was also another incentive for
being the first two down the hill. Third
place had to ride the “T-Bar” with a stranger and this proved quite difficult
when the stranger was an adult because their butt was so much higher than ours,
placing us at even more risk of falling off the “T-Bar.”
“Three, two, one…go!” yelled Skip.
We all dug our poles into the hard
packed snow, assumed our downhill racing “tuck” and proceeded straight down the
mountain. The snow was hard packed and
icy in places, much different and much faster than the thick powder we were
used to. Our skis rattled on the ground. Soon we picked up an incredible amount of
speed. I would guess that we were going
somewhere between forty and fifty miles per hour and climbing. Our steering ability was crude and barely
existent. Like arrows shot through a
crowded street, we flew past the other skiers, with several near collisions.
Charley won the first heat, Skip
came in second and I was third. We
decided that after lunch, it would be time to impress the girls.
By 11:15
I was absolutely starving and couldn’t wait to eat lunch. I had gotten up early and made myself a fried
egg sandwich, grabbed a bag of chips and an apple. Unfortunately I had left my little brown bag
on the bus, and had to get Mr. Stafford to help me retrieve it.
“Ha, ha,” I thought as I watched my
friends open up their typical bologna and peanut butter sandwiches, “Wait until
they see what I have.” I pulled it out
of the sack, unfolded the wax paper and took a big bite….or tried to take a big
bite. It was frozen solid! I rapped it on the cafeteria table and it
made a loud knock, completely inedible.
I tossed it on the floor and we kicked it around like a hockey puck,
until Mr. Stafford yelled at us and I threw it away. I ended up having to use two of my hard
earned dollars to buy a hot dog and some fries.
It was time for the afternoon
festivities. Skip had gotten three girls
to agree to race us down the hill. The
only stipulation was that they would start at the halfway point and we would
start at the top. It would be difficult
to win, but not impossible. We would
have to go faster than ever before. They
agreed to wait seven minutes from the time they exited the “T-Bar” to give us
the opportunity to make it to the top.
We scooted immediately from the “T-Bar” into full racing mode. I got the best jump and was in the lead. Faster, faster, faster I went. I could feel the wind pull at my cheeks and
my eyes tear. I could see the girls up
ahead. I was going to catch
them….until….a middle aged man turned directly into my path. There was no way that I could get around him,
so I buried my chin into my chest and braced myself for a nasty collision. The top of my head hit him in the middle of
his left thigh, and my momentum picked him right up off from the ground. For a few seconds, I was carrying this two
hundred pound man on the top of my head.
It was an amazing feat of physics. The collision and weight of the man
altered my course and forced me towards the woods, through several patches of
thorny bushes, and a bunch of dead trees.
This was much more like the skiing I was used to. A small forest of pine trees finally stopped
the man and me.
I looked
him in the eye and could see only terror and pain. He was gasping for breath.
“Sorry, mister,” I said picking
myself up and making my way back to the trail.
I felt bad that I had maimed this man, but realized that I had lost
valuable seconds and had to get back into the race quickly if I had any
possibility of winning. I stumbled
through several pieces of his equipment as I followed the tracks back out to
the main trail.
Once on the trail I resumed my
racing form, but finished dead last in the race. Apparently the crash took more time than I
thought. Skip, Charley and the girls
waited at the bottom to mock me. I did
much better in the next race.
About
twenty minutes later the ski patrol came down the mountain pulling someone on a
toboggan. I recognized the man I had
crashed into.
“I always wanted to ride in one of
those things,” said Skip.
“Me too,” I repeated.
The rest of the day was spent exploring
all the different trails at Oak
Mountain . We even started turning a little, using the
snowplow.
On the
way home Mr. Stafford complimented us on our good behavior.
“Thank-you,” he said, “for being a
proud representation of Mayfield
Elementary School .”
“You’re very welcome,” repeated
Skip, Charley and I, together with the rest of my sixth grade class. It felt very good to be included, for once,
with the good kids.
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