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Sunday, February 22, 2009

Snowshoeing


What do you get when you cross someone who grew up in NYC with someone who grew up in the suburbs of Chicago? Besides my two children what I'm trying to get at is since my husband is a city person and I am a quasi-city person, neither one of us wakes up on the weekend with the urge to go rock climbing or kayaking for example. I camped a little bit in high school and was in a camping club in college. The Big Giraffe used to always enjoy camping as a kid. His family would go every summer.

We too would like to be able to do that at some point with the boys, but we are planning a slow progression down the path from TV gazers to campers, from the family that plays games inside to the family that sings around the camp fire, from the family that plays at playgrounds to the family that makes our own playground out of sticks at campsites. In a nutshell, we've been here almost 8 years and dammit we want to become crazy New Englanders as well. It was with that mindset that I joined Sally HP's suggestion to join an outdoor family club in December. (She is also one of the assistant organizers.)

It was also with that mindset that I RSVPed for a snowshoeing event and informed suggested to the Big Giraffe that we attend. It helped that Sally HP explained to me that snowshoes no longer look like the giant tennis rackets that I had been picturing. Plus she and her family had a great time and highly recommended it. I admit that I was skeptical, particularly because our older son (OS) is just short of 5.5 years old and I have heard the whole range of ages a kid should be before doing this activity with an emphasis on 7 or 8. We showed up and had a wonderful pancake breakfast with real MA syrup that we all loved. Hmmm perhaps we became official New Englanders a while ago...

One of the owners fitted us with snow shoes and suggested we go practice in the field behind the lodge. Off we went. OS absolutely loved it. First of all, you get to wear your own boots so the hand-me-down army boots that OS hasn't taken off since he got them in August worked just fine. In fact, while the owners told the BG that he could wear the gym shoes (which as a New Yorker he calls sneakers) he brought with him, they offered him a pair of cross country boots to keep his feet dry at no extra cost. Regardless of footwear, all you have to do is tighten the straps on the snow shoes and then walk. For OS who loves to keep his feet on the ground, this really was the perfect sport. He was practically running in them with the BG and me following after him.

Unfortunately our younger son (YS) was too small for snowshoes. We were originally planning to drag him behind us in our baby sled, but Sally HP talked us into spending the money to rent a contraption with metal poles and a waist harness to pull the sled. This frees both your hands and more importantly keeps the sled from ramming into the back of your legs and knocking you over when you walk down a hill.

Knowing that such a contraption existed was only half the challenge. I also needed to know what it was called, and I still have a hard time understanding certain accents in MA. (It's probably hilarious to watch my neighbors who grew up in Worcester and me struggling to understand each other.) In this particular case, I knew that the the contraption started with a p sound and ended with a k sound. I asked the owner if it were a "poke" like hitting someone or a "polk" like the former president. He looked at me like I was nuts and told me that he always called it a sled. His wife overheard us and told us the correct word was "pulk," but of course she still had to spell it out for me.

Wow, I've learned about jelly rolls and pulks since coming out here! I feel as though that I have also given something back. Last night at a moms group function I explained to people what dugons are.

OS also learned a lot about his endurance. We had been expecting him to last about 10 minutes. He lasted an hour and half. We then took a lunch break and after lunch spent another hour on the trails. Everyone had a great time and now OS is asking for snowshoes for Christmas. After all it's only 10 months away!

Even the BG learned to feel at home in rural Massachusetts. When we pulled up at the town general store and gas station to fill up the tank, BG had to back the car up to get between two cars and the archaic pump that had a reset button and a metal on/off switch that needed to be flipped before pumping. As he got out of the car, a local said, "This is just like New York." The BG did a double take, and the local explained, "Well, it's just that it is so busy here." The BG did a triple take. I am not sure that even the explanation helped him to see the resemblance.

A. Elliot's Lesson Learned: A pulk is an enclosed, sled-like contraption with metal poles and a waist harness that can be pulled easily by a cross-country skier or snowshoer.

OS's Lesson Learned: Snowshoes are contraptions that allow you to move quickly through deep snow without giving up your boots.

Big Giraffe's Lesson Learned: There are some people who think any group too big to fit in a pulk resembles a New York City crowd.

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posted by Alex Elliot @ 6:15 PM   3 comments
3 Comments:

  • At 2/23/2009 2:29 PM, Blogger Goofball said…

    I've just seen your pictures too. Looks like a great day outdoors. Aren't you drop dead tired after such a day?

     

  • At 2/23/2009 9:37 PM, Blogger Kami said…

    I am tired just thinking about how much energy OS burnt! That is so great. I would envision my boys lasting all of 10 minutes too. Maybe they would surprise me?

    What a great family day and also a great workout...and there was maple syrup too. YUM.

    My mom calls runners sneakers too and it makes me laugh. And she has NEVER been to NY.

     

  • At 2/23/2009 10:33 PM, Blogger Count Mockula said…

    We called them tennies when I was younger, but lately I've heard sneakers more and more.

     
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Name:Alex Elliot
Home:MA, United States
About Me:Professional Mom of two cats, a dog, an ant farm, and oh yeah...two boys: a 6 year old and a 3 year old. Also found in my house is my husband who is known on this blog as The Big Giraffe.
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For those of us who didn't get an instruction manual with our babies and for whom parenting hasn't always gone as planned. On a more serious note this blog is about supporting a woman's ability to make her own choices about parenting including the choice, for whatever reason, to bottle feed her babies formula.

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