Downhill

“Downhill”

SO THERE WAS THAT TIME he went on a skiing trip with Mina and her brother and her dad. This was during the first winter break of their college careers, when he and Mina had been going out for less than a year. It was one of those excursions with the SO’s family that he couldn’t help regarding at the time as a character assessment opportunity for the paternal unit. A little test arranged by the father, to see what his daughter had brought home exactly. A chance to prod and dissect, observationally, this dubious specimen Mina had chosen to give away obscene amounts of her free time to. He expected to be under close watch the entire time, and he welcomed the chance to prove his worth as a suitable suitor. He planned to stand up to scrutiny, pass any tests required of him, and come out of the weekend with the dad’s stamp of approval. (The thought of being able to call him “Dad” instead of “Mr. Lane” by the time they headed home was more than a little presumptuous, but proved to be too delicious to oust from his reveries once it was embedded.)

The only problem was the venue. Yes, there was also the fact that he had never skied before in his life, but oddly enough that wasn’t what concerned him. He knew he was a fast learner; confidence transuded from his pores and there was little doubt he’d soon be gliding down the slopes with ease. What concerned him, however, was the cold. Having spent all his pre-adolescent life in San Diego, he was unaccustomed to the Pacific Northwest’s climate, to put it mildly. At that point he had lived in Washington for four years and he still wasn’t even close to being acclimated to its wintry conditions. (Even now, after ten New York winters, he was only just beginning to get sort of used to winter as a traditional season, or at least becoming better at mentally steeling himself as the end of the year approached.) Forty degree weather was ridiculously cold to him, so the prospect of freezing weather—along with its concomitants snow and ice—was especially horrifying. Add in stuff like blizzards, black ice, wind chill, frostbite, zero visibility, snow drifts, and hypothermia, and the whole environment became a mythological nightmare. That people willingly ventured into such conditions to frolic and glide around on hilt-less longswords attached to their boots was a bit nutty to him, but he chalked it up as yet another example of how divergent people could be, sometimes.

The ride up to Whistler-Blackcomb (the best conditions being north of the border of course) was pleasant enough, ensconced in the back of Mina’s dad’s SUV, the heat blasting, music playing, a thermos of hot cocoa being passed around, the feel of Mina’s hand in his, the sight of her face, the sound of her laughter. But as the white-capped peaks in the distance grew closer and the road became more and more inclined (to the point where it was almost roller-coaster-like, pressing his body firmly into the seat), he started to get nervous. By the time the utterly imposing, treacherous-looking, bowel-loosening mountains loomed over them, surrounding them, cutting them off from the rest of the world, he was using his other hand, the one not lying limply now in Mina’s, to grasp the door handle in white-knuckled terror.

When they parked outside the lodge and he opened the door, the cold hit him with a left hook that nearly took his breath away. This despite layers of clothing, a coat so heavy he felt he should’ve been weight-training to wear it, scarves, a hat, and gloves. At the start of the trip he thought their gear suitable for an arctic expedition. Now he realized that he, at least, was unprepared for what they were about to face. He was grateful for his scarf, not only for the warmth it provided but also because it hid most of his face so there was at least a fighting chance that his grimace could be interpreted as a variation of the merriment he now saw on Mina’s face, if not quite to the same degree. They left their gear in the car and headed to the lodge to check in, him resisting the urge to abandon them all and scramble ahead.

To his dismay the inside of the lodge provided little reprieve from the inhospitable conditions. While it was definitely warmer inside, it didn’t help that the entrance doors kept opening to admit the steady, unceasing flow of bundled up skiers, not to mention that a section of the back wall, the one facing the majestic slopes, was entirely open to the elements, its garage-door-like barrier in the “up” position and staying that way until the close of day. The huge fireplace in the main room initially lifted his spirits until it brought them crashing down again when he saw that it was unlit and apparently for decorative purposes only. While Mina’s dad took care of their day passes, he scurried to the bathroom and stood in a stall rubbing his arms, breathing into his hands, trying desperately to get warm. He stayed there for many minutes, figuring it was far less emasculating to feign constipation than it would’ve been to be seen shivering in the corner like a pitiful bedraggled Chihuahua.

When he finally rejoined them they were all strapping on their skis and checking their gear. He sat down on the bench and pulled the borrowed ski boots from his bag. When it came to attaching them to the skis, the latching mechanism eluded him, forcing Mina to bend down to help him out, like a mother helping her child tie his laces. She gave him a reassuring smile, a look of naked belief, and for the first time he felt a pang of doubt whether he could do this. They got up to head outside and he tottered after them, slowly and gingerly and awkwardly, already having to rely on his ski poles and finding himself suddenly changed into an old man who had aged back into infancy.

To his secret dismay, it was quickly apparent that Mina was in her element in the snow. She slid around with ease, the frictionless surface beneath her feet not an impediment at all, instead actually augmenting her movements and turning the simple action of going from here to there into a sight to behold. He thought she had been joking about being a ski instructor at age 15. He had never seen her more graceful. The same held true for her father and brother. He supposed that this was what happened when you grew up with Mt. Rainier in your backyard and had relatives, in this case Mina’s cousin, who competed in the downhill at Vancouver in ’10, for chrissakes. (He didn’t medal or anything, but still.)

The plan was to teach him enough fundamentals so that he was at least able to tag along with Mina on the intermediate slopes. He had approved of this plan back at the house in that smooth, self-assured way of his. But now that his latent skiing skills were no longer notional, here at the base of the slopes, and he was being put to the test in the actual field with the pressure on for him to manifest cold-weather aptitude a whole lot sooner than later, everyone realized that their estimate for the time he would require to get the hang if it was wildly optimistic and off by a factor of at least ten. He couldn’t even quite manage to get the basics down, like staying upright. With Mina calling out instructions and encouragement, he tried to cover the fifteen feet of distance between them and still somehow fell four times on relatively level surface. They tried again. Mina clapped her hands and patted her legs, as if beckoning a clumsy pet. You can do it, you can do it, was the hopeful refrain. He couldn’t. He fell again and again, having to practically crawl over to her, using his poles as pitons on the horizontal cliff everyone else saw as “the ground.” The thought of trying to do this on a gradient sent shivers down his already cold spine. His incredulousness at his ineptitude preempted any embarrassment he would’ve otherwise felt. He just couldn’t believe that he was struggling so much. He started thinking of possible causes, and arrived back at the frigid conditions as the source of all his difficulty. If only it wasn’t so damn cold and he could actually do things like bend his joints without the temperature militating against it, well, it’d be a different story, of that he was sure.

He saw Mina’s eyes cloud over with disappointment and it made his insides sag knowing he was the reason. Before anyone else could interject their own suggestion of how to proceed, Mina’s dad stepped in—glided in, rather . . . slid over on his skis and stopped with a 90-degree turn so tight and efficient it could’ve been used to calibrate protractors—and he proposed in a simple and level voice that he take Mina’s physically capable but clearly struggling boyfriend under his wing for the day, show him the ropes, bring him up to speed, teach him how to stay on his skis while negotiating declivities, and they would join Mina and her brother later in the day on the blue-and-darker-shaded slopes. That way everyone could get the most out of the day they had all been eagerly anticipating. Mina put up the kind of obligatory protest required from a loyal girlfriend, but even he could see that forcing her to adjust her activities to his current capability would be pretty selfish of him and such a drag for her. So he immediately approved of her dad’s plan, telling her it was a great silver lining because he would be able to spend some “quality time” with her dad while also assuring her that they would definitely be joining her shortly, once he had ironed out the two-three kinks in a form and technique that would, by the end of the day, so closely resemble a professional’s that she wouldn’t believe her eyes.

With just the right amount of reluctance—not enough to actually derail the plan—Mina acquiesced, gave him a peck on his wool-swaddled cheek, and took off toward one of the lifts with her brother. He watched her go, she and her brother disporting, capering, the two of them looking for all the world like winter royalty, an ice princess and prince (princesses?), the gemel rulers of Inclemencia. He felt the sharp sting of abandonment and would’ve scampered after them if he could’ve, you know, actually scampered across this godforsaken terrain. . . .

Mina’s dad motioned toward another set of lifts with the tiniest of head tilts. He nodded and carefully pushed off with his poles, and would’ve fallen yet again if he had not been grabbed by the arm and set upright. His new teacher decided to take no chances and kept hold of his arm the entire way, using the pole in his other hand to propel them both forward. Just reaching the lift felt like a rousing success, as there had been so little to celebrate thus far.

As they were conveyed up the mountain, there was once again nothing to distract him from the unbearable cold. Needless to say the small amount of exposed skin on his body—mainly around the eyeholes of his balaclava—was freezing, being assaulted by what felt like a presence in the wind, an invisible yet palpable force of subzero malevolence, like an icy fist not so much hitting him in the face as simply placing itself against his eyes and maintaining a constant maddening pressure, and but also the cold was somehow penetrating the downy layers of clothes, coat, gloves, and hat, so that no part of him could escape this bitter chill. He was becoming uncomfortably aware of areas on his body he had never registered before. The water in his eyes. The mucus in his nose that was freezing into jagged occlusions, making it harder to breathe and begging to be picked. His teeth, even, which felt like exposed nerve endings. Blinking became a hardship. All these terrible new sensations from places he had never considered before, giving him a newfound awareness of his organic modularity. Parts of his body that seemed to have their own life while still being connected to him . . . more than connected, were him, indisputably. A together-but-separate quality . . . like sex without the pleasure. The very opposite of pleasure, in fact, since each discrete part was being subjected to gelid torture. At the same time, he was losing feeling in places he felt unwhole without, his hands and feet and ears. It was fortunate that Mina’s dad didn’t try to make conversation; he had no idea what kind of ragged sounds would issue from his beleaguered throat. He just sat there on the lift, shivering, while his insides shriveled up and cried out weakly for mercy. The whole way up, he tried to think of how to describe this new soul-crushing cold he was experiencing. He finally decided that the most apposite word for it was: unnecessary.

When they got off the lift he was ready to start moving again in an attempt to get warm, even if it meant falling on his face a few more times. They made their way over to the crest of the nearby slope. There was a wooden sign stamped with the words HOPPITY HILL in a non-threatening shade of green, along with a prominent picture of a cartoon rabbit. He peered down the hill and saw that the incline was minuscule, akin to the sidewalk ramps for the wheelchair-bound. Off to the side, a pulley device went down to the very bottom, a rope with handles attached to it strung through poles every fifteen feet or so, connected to a mechanism that kept it constantly moving like a conveyer belt, the top part moving down to the base of the hill and the bottom part moving perpetually up.

Mina’s dad cleared his throat to mark the beginning of the lesson and started issuing terse instructions in a soft voice. Eager to demonstrate what a dutiful and attentive student he was, he listened carefully, to the point of overzealousness (“Bend your knees . . . not that much. Angle your poles to the ground . . . not that far”). After a minute or so the lesson was done, leaving him thinking That’s it? But he felt ready and once again full of confidence. With Mina’s dad standing there, silently inviting him to show off what he had learned, he shuffled over to the precipice of the hill and, careful to follow the instructions he had been given to a T, pushed off down it. And promptly fell. He hastily picked himself up and pushed off once more, this time gliding a few feet before falling down again. Thus the pattern of his first downhill—if it could be called that, and even if so then just barely—run was set: slide, fall, pick self up, repeat ad infinitum, or at least until the hill took pity on him and leveled off. He could see at least partly what he was doing wrong but couldn’t get his limbs to make the necessary adjustments. He couldn’t stop the way his body would seize up upon that initial point of sliding down, when he ceded what felt like all control to the laws of physics. Let gravity be your friend, Mina’s dad had told him. Well, not only were they not friends, gravity was acting like he owed it large sums of money, and it was sending its heavy, Mr. Ground, after him to collect.

In those roughly three seconds of free-glide before every fall, he did everything he could to stay up. The poles did their part in keeping him from careening over; it was the forward and backward listing that was the problem. When he felt his balance start to tip in one direction, he would quickly lean the other way, too fast, which would upset the balance in the opposite direction, which he would then try to compensate for, invariably unintentionally overcompensating, which would throw him in the other . . . well, you can see where this is going. . . . It created a chain reaction of imbalances that would lead to the inevitable plummet, like a nudged bowling pin. He couldn’t maintain that nice orthogonal form of experienced skiers; instead he’d always be either bent forward like a hunchback or leaning way back as if trying to steal the limbo world record away from Shamika Charles, and he was quickly discovering that these lordo- and kyphotic undulations were not at all conducive to skiing or—most important to him now, because really just fuck skiing at this point—not falling down.

Mina’s dad stayed a respectful distance away, and, having exhausted all the helpful tips in his instructional toolbox with any further advice being a repetition or variation on what he had already said, allowed him to figure it out for himself. He was initially grateful for this heuristic teaching method; he felt he always performed worse in any activity when there was someone on the sidelines kibitzing away at him. But after the eighth fall or so, he wished his instructor would speak up already. There was obviously something he wasn’t getting, something easily correctible (he hoped), and to let him flounder like this was, well, a little sadistic.

Absent direction, he began to really focus on what was going on exactly. He became convinced that his pizza-ing, the method with which skiers slowed their momentum, was seriously flawed. He kept overlapping his skis, which invariably led to a wipeout. He would try to compensate by spreading his legs farther apart, which would make the triangle he was trying to form go obtuse (leaving him wondering if he was similarly afflicted), turning the slice of pizza too big for anybody, and the skis would hit his poles and he would lose his balance and fall. Plus when he committed to forming that V, he could forget about doing anything else because it was impossible for him to transition his skis back into straight lines before falling. He was simply not prepared for having his feet artificially stretched three feet in both directions, and then having to compensate for these new podiatric extensions on the fly.

Somehow, eventually, he got to the bottom of the hill, covered in snow but still in one piece. He looked back at Mina’s dad, who had followed him down, and raised his arms in mock triumph. Her dad regarded him for a moment, then tossed out that maybe the snowboard would come more naturally to him, considering. He couldn’t tell whether this was a joke—the delivery was bone-dry and matter-of-fact—so he hedged by snorting, which came out sounding dismissive and he immediately regretted it. He informed Mina’s dad that despite spending the first thirteen years of his life in San Diego, he had never learned to surf, if that was what he was implying. Mina’s dad just looked at him and blinked, and just before the moment turned awkward he motioned toward the pulley and suggested they try it again.

After being lugged back to the top of the hill by the conveyance, he set off on his second run, which went much like the first, with him rallentandoing down the hill and falling every ten feet or so. It started to seem like there had to be a better way for a neophyte to learn this activity. He knew that what he was being put through could hardly be called a trial by fire, it being the easiest slope and all, but man, this was one ignivomous bunny. And his reward for slaying it was being pulled back to the top and doing it all over again. By the end of his third time down he was dyspnoeic from the effort of constantly picking himself up, and yet he remained undaunted, sensing success was just around the corner. Dum spiro spero was his mantra, however ragged those breaths came.

Half a dozen runs later, he was doing a little better, cutting his falls by ten percent or so. Putting all his focus into what his skis were doing seemed to help. He began divagating down the hill, head down, making chevrons and parallel lines, staying upright. After a solid twenty-second stretch of sliding along without falling, during which time no one could deny that he was in fact “skiing”—if a bit aimlessly, but still undeniably skiing—he felt his heart soar and elation fill his body and he was so intent on keeping this train rolling all the way down the hill that he didn’t see the neon green parka—and oh yeah, the little 7-year-old boy wearing it—until it was too late. He frantically dug his poles into the ground and pizza-ed like crazy, but it was no good; his skis decussated and the momentum he had been feeling pretty good about building pitched him forward and he fell on top of the kid, both of them tumbling to the ground. The boy’s parents came skittering over, instantly concerned and protective. They glared at him with censorious accusation while comforting the keening boy, whose eyes were so piercingly blue that you just knew he was tow-headed underneath the ushanka. If anything had happened to the shining light in their lives, their beautiful boy . . . though currently the kid’s face—contorted in a misshapen rictus of exaggerated indignation—was one only a mother could love. As he watched them escort their son away, he twisted his torso and winced, testing how badly he had strained his abdominal muscles when he contorted himself in mid-air so he didn’t crush the kid.

Mina’s dad materialized and helped him up. He suggested that he keep off the center of the hill from then on. In fact, he had been watching his progress and was now realizing that they needed to start his training over and have him do substantially more basic stuff first. He stared ruefully at Mina’s dad, thinking No Duh . . . but also sorely disappointed in himself for not being able to meet his own expectations.

Mina’s dad instructed him to use the pulley exclusively, off to the side of the trail and away from the rest of the skiers, and just coast up and down the hill without worrying about propelling himself, free from navigational concerns . . . to just get a good feel for moving along the slick surface and practice the whole not-falling-down aspect of what he was trying to accomplish here. He obediently waddled over to the side and grabbed a handle on the conveyance and slid morosely down the hill. He didn’t release the handle when he reached the bottom and it took him right back up, something he’d already had a fair amount of practice with. And so he went, up and down, up and down, and all around. . . .

He managed to stay on his skis a little better this way, despite the pulley tugging him along at about thrice the speed he had been managing on his own. Ceding the locomotive duties to the machine afforded him the opportunity to look up and see the sights around him. Coniferous trees everywhere, coveys of some type of bird overhead, sastrugi rippling up various hilltops, the looming, claustrophobic massifs—nature in all its splendor, if you liked that sort of thing. Which, yeah, he had his doubts, personally.

The skiers kept passing him far to the left, flaunting their skills, a group he so bitterly wished to join. The most annoying ones were the damn toddlers, little homunculi who looked like they weren’t even ready to take their first steps, gliding effortlessly along, their kinesthetic grace a direct rebuke of his inability to reach some sort of accord with the physical laws of Earth. Everyone around him was traipsing along in playful, leisurely curves, following paths of sinuous parabolas without a care in the world, while he was stuck in boring linearity, struggling to go from the Apex (point A) to the Base (point B) without taking a digger.

As he was trundled up the hill for the umpteenth time, rolling his coat, so to speak, up a—was it really. . . ? yeah, sure, why not?—a knoll, the memory of a parodic ditty came to him, something that had once upon a time sprung from the homophone-addled, pun-addicted brain of a sixth-grader:

Roll roll roll your coat

Evidently up a knoll.

Verily verily verily verily

Life is such a troll.

And darned if it didn’t flawlessly fit the situation he found himself in six years later, almost suspiciously so. . . . What other near-forgotten moments of prescience had he had?

The day slowly darkled into evening. He released the tether at the top of the hill and took a break. It was the twilight hour when everything was imbued with the golden glow so revered by DPs the world over. The familiar crepuscular stillness, the day creatures undergoing the momentarily paralysis of knowing that everything would soon be turned over to the nocturnal. The sky bloomed with sunset, a particularly vivid one. Reddish hues meshed with yellows and purples. Clouds caught in the rutilant explosion were prettily shaded, accentuating the painterly effect. An aquarelle done on as large a canvas as one could imagine. The setting sun an inkwell containing all the colors that could be used, no more, though this hardly proved a limitation; there was more than enough to work with if beauty were the aim. One spotted new discoveries being made in the purple shades—mauve, fuchsia, magenta—supplementing what already seemed the most intricate of colors, full of the subtlest distinctions. Not to be outdone, the rubescent shades rose to the challenge, while the aureate ones glittered ever more brightly. No color out of place, no gradation too abrupt or too weak. Everything just right, for now. Easy to mistake it for something otherworldly, this incarnadined sky. The convergence of so many liminal states: night and day, the earth and the heavens, the immediate present and distant memory.

He found himself inspired to join the fray. As things around him were transitioning, he too would transition to a more exalted state and in so doing display a brilliance that would inspire awe. He felt ready to bomb down this damn hill, and this time it would be with a confidence born of real experience. He had put in the work, he had been at this all day . . . it was time to reap the hard-earned rewards. Planting his poles solidly in the ground, he gave the empyreal sunset one last will-strengthening glance, then pushed off down the hill with the blind assurance of a kid jumping off a diving board for the first time, scared out of his wits but knowing that in the end it would not only be all right but he would be better for it. He felt himself sliding along, gloriously unconstrained and free.

Then he fell.

He picked himself up, undaunted. . . . Well, a little daunted. But this slope, this mountain (or hill, Hoppity Hill, whatever) underestimated how pertinacious he could get, how there were times he clung as stubbornly to a plan of action as he did to an opinion about seminal ‘90s albums. He righted himself and pushed off again, sliding faster than he ever had before. Too fast. His legs flew up from under him and he found himself yet again on his back. Lying there supine, he thought to himself, “Oh.” But he was not afraid of revision, and by the time he was standing again he had already completed a second draft of his plan. He would take things really, really, really slow this time, and make it his one goal in life not to fall, he was not going to fall, no matter what, like seriously this time.

So now he didn’t push off but instead stood there waiting for gravity to do its thing, keeping his skis in a constant delta, sometimes lessening the angle but never relinquishing it. It wasn’t fast or pretty or awe-inspiring, but at least he wasn’t falling. He went the rest of the way down the hill in this fashion, pizza-ing all the way, not really gliding, more like being dragged against his will by a force that desperately wanted him to go 32 ft/s² already. It took him about fifteen minutes to get to the bottom. When he finally lifted his head, the sunset was gone. It was done, over, the day was ending like it always did, with the definition of success up for grabs.

He looked up and saw Mina’s dad, which disconcerted him for a second; he had forgotten anyone else was there. (He had heard the possibly snide laughter of little kids passing him on either side, but was concentrating so fixedly on his endeavor that he hadn’t looked up.) Mina’s dad looked at him and gave him a slight nod before motioning toward the lift. It was time to go.

On the way down to base camp, he reflected on the day, trying to ignore that it had gotten even colder, the wind picking up now and somehow finding seams in his apparel through which it could blow an arctic chill across his chest and back . . . so, so unnecessary. The day hadn’t been defined by his entelechy as a natural skier, but he decided to regard the last run as a glimmer of hope. He waited for Mina’s dad to say something encouraging—not a “thataboy” exactly but something similarly affirming—or to give some indication that the lesson hadn’t been concluded sine die, that they would pick it up again next vacation or whatever. But no such reassurance was forthcoming, and both of them remained silent all the way down.

They met up with Mina and her brother at the refectory, which was bustling with skiers exhibiting much cheer after a joyous day on the slopes. As they sat down at a long communal table with their bowls of soup—Mina’s dad got clam chowder (Mina insisted he get the Manhattan-style, which he did, much to her delight), Mina’s brother found some miso soup (natch), Mina got the split pea with added carrots and turnips (for color mostly), and he ordered the Tuscan bean chicken (though was sorely disappointed when, three-fourths of the way in, he had yet to bite into any chicken)—Mina immediately launched into the story of her day, which involved running into an old friend she hadn’t seen in ages, braving a particular black diamond trail that had always been on her bucket list, and giving chase to some barely-glimpsed woodland creature off-trail for a while until she considered the more ursine possibilities of what she might be chasing. Only after regaling them with this protracted tale of a full day well spent did she inquire as to how he had fared on his very first day. Good, he said, which was apparently too laconic an answer for her because she turned to her dad for a second opinion. Her dad paused, swallowing every last bit of the spoonful of soup he had just placed in his mouth before giving his assessment that promising steps were being made at the end. His spirits lifted as he took this as an acknowledgment of his having gone down a good sixty percent of the hill without falling in that last run. Mina beamed at him, saying she knew he could do it. As a warm happiness flooded over him, he took this as his cue to launch into his own tale of a day full of tribulation and adversity, hindrances and obstacles both physical and mental, tests of will and determination, all of them eventually conquered through sheer effort and perseverance . . . a rousing and inspiring account of obstacles overcome, tests passed, hurdles hurdled, etc., one that would perhaps be oft-repeated at family gatherings far into the future. . . .

But before he could say one word, Mina’s dad cleared his throat (of a bit of clam? or . . . not) and they all turned to him. “Well,” he said in an easy drawl, “it turns out he can be taught.”

And the thing that bugged him wasn’t what Mina’s dad said, or how he said it, with the “can” emphasized as if he couldn’t quite believe it himself (“He can be taught? Well good golly gee, will wonders never cease. . . .”), or even that he laughed after saying it. Nah, what really irritated him all out of proportion was that Mina laughed with him, as if the two of them were sharing a joke that he was the butt of, as if the two of them had discussed beforehand the dubiousness of his educability. “He can be taught.” Even Mina’s fey brother was smirking off to the side.

That was when he saw the three of them for what they were: an impenetrable fortress, an inseparable triune, a single entity that he had no hope of being subsumed into, a party he’d always be on the outside of. No matter how much he might’ve wanted to join them, no matter what he did to prove himself worthy, there would always be some unbridgeable distance between him and them. It was publicly sanctioned segregation and exclusion, all decorous and acceptable to the masses, filed as it was under the genteelism of “family.”

He never went skiing again.

"Downhill" is an excerpt from Don Hough's upcoming novel The Youthless Young.