We all have stories to tell
Just driving on the winter roads turned out to be a sport!
How the heck did we make it this far?
I don’t feel like writing about 2020, it’s blunders, the political disasters, pandemic double-talk or how the planet is going to explode into a million pieces! I’m so done with all of it just like you. Most of us are doing our part to keep safe, stay well and be kind to our planet and the people residing on it. I want to end the year with a few funny stories that crack me up and take me way, way back.
Did you ever think back on some of your memories or stories about things you’ve done or said and then wonder why you’re still alive? Since I have some spare time right about now I’m going to share a story. Please remember to hold off on any judgement calls, you know we’ve all done some pretty funky things when we were growing up. The stories can be shared now because I’m too old to get the stink eye from my parents. But I’m not out of the woods yet, it’s all fun and games till my kids eventually take my keys away!
What we did growing up in the 50s and 60s would make most kids cringe today. It was normal behavior to be drinking out of a hose, everyone drinking out of everyone’s glass, making mud pies and taste testing them, plucking and chewing a long strand of grass, walking barefoot everywhere, eating snow, icicles and the list goes on as some of you well know. But I really believe we are more resilient and have stronger immune systems now at our age than most teenagers today. There is such a thing as being too sheltered, germ-free or ultra-careful with everything in life!
Winter Sports
There was endless wintertime entertainment with ice skating, ice fishing, snowmobiling and if you were a skier there were a few nice slopes around the area. And unless all your appendages were frozen numb there was no reason to shelter inside. When the enormous amount of snow covered the impassable roads the snow mobile was a normal and fun mode of transportation, one of many reasons life was better outside the city.
We lived on Conesus Lake in upstate New York back in the sixties and the lake would freeze over in the winter. The lake is about one mile wide and close to nine miles long. When spring arrived iceberg jumping became a major sport and I’m quite certain my Mom came close to having a heart attack that time of year.
As the weather warmed up you can hear the eerie sounds of the ice at night cracking and shifting almost cosmic like. That was a good indication it was time to head down to the lake the in the coming days and commence to the craziness of iceberg jumping. The ice would be broken up in different size chunks and when it got windy those chunks would slowly get carried by the wind to the end of the lake. So we would, of course start at the shore and jump on the first chunk of ice. The chunk would start to sink because of our weight so we’d have to quickly jump to the next piece and the next piece and repeat the insanity until too much laughter and exhaustion would set in.
When the wind kicked up the jumping would become a tad risky because of the ice chunks getting carried down the lake. It was so much fun to do but we had to be aware of how far out we traveled since we needed get back to shore and hope the ice chunks were available and in place to do that safely. Eventually all the ice would shift to the end of the lake, it would melt and that frightening sport was finished until next spring. My poor Mom…
However there was yet another “sport” that was just as fun if not just a bit suicidal….
Ravine Sledding
Most residences on the lake at that time had no insulation so a lot of the lake homes were summer cottages only. Our next-door neighbors were only there in the summertime. How convenient was that?
Water would run from the hills across the street into their ravine. The sides of the ravine were concrete walls a few feet tall and not very wide. There was a clay-like substance on the floor of it where the creek water would flow. In the winter it also would ice over but you could at times hear the water running underneath the ice.
Our residence next door was also our restaurant, another convenience. We’d grab the old-time round Budweiser beer trays made of metal and used them as our sleds. We would jump down into the ravine, get our balance not to fall on our butts from the ice, sit on the tray and fly down the ravine onto the iced lake. And we prayed the iced lake would hold us because the creek’s running water into the lake sometimes weakened it.
When the metal tray hit that ice it felt like we immediately were racing at warped speed. Now I realize this sounds like an all-around fun thing to do however I left out why this was suicidal. As we were gaining speed and flying down we’d HAVE to almost lay down flat halfway through the ride because it quickly turned into a narrow cement tunnel. And we did that run repeatedly. It would be the quickest way to get decapitated if we didn’t duck in time. I know!!! Not funny. My poor Mom...
A huge thanks to my parents for allowing us the freedom to explore and get a little banged up along the way. Fast forward to today, was it really that dangerous what we did as kids or is there more danger in what some kids do for fun today?? Without a doubt I’ll take my growing up years any day.
I’m glad I did all this when I was young, it sure doesn’t turn me on at this point in my life!
The South Florida weather has spoiled me rotten…
