couple of jumps, then wipeout like a splattered bug on the third ride, twisting in a backside 560 that means I come down hard on my left side, the left battered hip, and it feels like ass. My body twists and spins downward and I finally come to a stop, sprawled on my back at the bottom of the jump, staring up at the sky.
Start again.
You can’t catch air if you aren’t willing to wipe out. But it’s grueling work, going down over and over, falling, skidding, slamming.
And again.
After a lunch break, we review the good and the bad, and I spend another couple of hours hitting the jumps, over and over. I can feel it coming, the feet and the hands, the slant and the air, the style of it, myself, my way of doing things, coming back.
“One more,” says Alice. “Nail it, dude.”
I stand at the top of the slope, sky and snow and mountain all round. I’ve sweated hard all day but I can feel ice crystals in my beard. I’m listening to my cells, to my blood, mentally seeing the run, tick, tick, tick, and suddenly feel it, the click. I take a breath and launch. Rail, check. Rail, turn, check. Slope one, 520, sweet. Second jump. I launch and forget the tension of training, finally breaking through to the reason this is so fucking great in the first place.
It’s fun as hell. I’m spinning high like a creature of the sky, and tuck and grab the board, holding my body to get maximum spin—one, two, three, land backside, sweet as honey, building speed for the final jump. I feel it solid and clean as I catch air, high high high, and stabilize, riding currents like a hawk, spinning in extreme silence, far above the earth, a double cork. It was one of the first tricks I made my own, and now it comes back, roaring through me, and my body is strong, and it’s there, and I land as soft as a kitten, raise my arms, whooping out the pure, clean, perfect exhilaration bursts through me, bright as the dazzle on the snow spraying up from my board.
Alice meets me. “Holy fuck,” she says, and high fives me. “Dude.” She shakes her head. “I’mna find that judge and kiss him right on the mouth. With tongue.” She slaps the back of my head, hard. “Why the fuck have you been doing anything else? You’ve wasted so much goddamn time.”
I pick her up and spin her around. “No time like the present.”
“Yeah, let’s go soak it out. That’s a good place to stop.” She pulls off her helmet and her hair spills out on her shoulders. Again she smacks me, but this time, she’s smiling. “That was goddamn beautiful, son.”
And all I can do is laugh, because it was. It really was. I have a long, long, long way to go yet, but...yeah.
This is what I was born to do. How could I ever forget it?
By the time I’ve soaked and showered and eaten, it’s nearly six, and I’m hoping I can catch Jess again. Maybe it’s time to tell her what’s going on. It’s real now, that was real today. I’ve been around long enough to know it was good timing, a good moment, and I’ve got a long, long way to go before I can do anything like that consistently, but it’s buzzing through me when I get online.
There’s a second one line email from Jess, sent a couple of hours ago. Check ur Facebook
I’m scowling without any real sense of worry as I type in the address. Can’t be anything much, because I haven’t done anything. Some dumb misunderstanding.
But the minute it opens, I get why she’s freaked. Somebody has tagged a photo of me and Alice from Saturday night in the bar. We’re toasting the camera, grinning drunkenly. It’s from some sports gossip site and the headline is typically raggy speculation. Back in the spotlight? One of snowboarding’s glamour pairs spotted in Chile. Could somebody be making an Olympic run?
Hustler has tagged me and commented. “You’re outed, bro.”
And there are a lot of other comments, too. A lot. Friendly, mostly, encouraging. Every rider from here to the North Pole must have been
Start again.
You can’t catch air if you aren’t willing to wipe out. But it’s grueling work, going down over and over, falling, skidding, slamming.
And again.
After a lunch break, we review the good and the bad, and I spend another couple of hours hitting the jumps, over and over. I can feel it coming, the feet and the hands, the slant and the air, the style of it, myself, my way of doing things, coming back.
“One more,” says Alice. “Nail it, dude.”
I stand at the top of the slope, sky and snow and mountain all round. I’ve sweated hard all day but I can feel ice crystals in my beard. I’m listening to my cells, to my blood, mentally seeing the run, tick, tick, tick, and suddenly feel it, the click. I take a breath and launch. Rail, check. Rail, turn, check. Slope one, 520, sweet. Second jump. I launch and forget the tension of training, finally breaking through to the reason this is so fucking great in the first place.
It’s fun as hell. I’m spinning high like a creature of the sky, and tuck and grab the board, holding my body to get maximum spin—one, two, three, land backside, sweet as honey, building speed for the final jump. I feel it solid and clean as I catch air, high high high, and stabilize, riding currents like a hawk, spinning in extreme silence, far above the earth, a double cork. It was one of the first tricks I made my own, and now it comes back, roaring through me, and my body is strong, and it’s there, and I land as soft as a kitten, raise my arms, whooping out the pure, clean, perfect exhilaration bursts through me, bright as the dazzle on the snow spraying up from my board.
Alice meets me. “Holy fuck,” she says, and high fives me. “Dude.” She shakes her head. “I’mna find that judge and kiss him right on the mouth. With tongue.” She slaps the back of my head, hard. “Why the fuck have you been doing anything else? You’ve wasted so much goddamn time.”
I pick her up and spin her around. “No time like the present.”
“Yeah, let’s go soak it out. That’s a good place to stop.” She pulls off her helmet and her hair spills out on her shoulders. Again she smacks me, but this time, she’s smiling. “That was goddamn beautiful, son.”
And all I can do is laugh, because it was. It really was. I have a long, long, long way to go yet, but...yeah.
This is what I was born to do. How could I ever forget it?
By the time I’ve soaked and showered and eaten, it’s nearly six, and I’m hoping I can catch Jess again. Maybe it’s time to tell her what’s going on. It’s real now, that was real today. I’ve been around long enough to know it was good timing, a good moment, and I’ve got a long, long way to go before I can do anything like that consistently, but it’s buzzing through me when I get online.
There’s a second one line email from Jess, sent a couple of hours ago. Check ur Facebook
I’m scowling without any real sense of worry as I type in the address. Can’t be anything much, because I haven’t done anything. Some dumb misunderstanding.
But the minute it opens, I get why she’s freaked. Somebody has tagged a photo of me and Alice from Saturday night in the bar. We’re toasting the camera, grinning drunkenly. It’s from some sports gossip site and the headline is typically raggy speculation. Back in the spotlight? One of snowboarding’s glamour pairs spotted in Chile. Could somebody be making an Olympic run?
Hustler has tagged me and commented. “You’re outed, bro.”
And there are a lot of other comments, too. A lot. Friendly, mostly, encouraging. Every rider from here to the North Pole must have been
Similar Books
