It’s July. This post is obviously late. Please forgive the transgression!
A couple of years ago, we decided that it was time to learn to snowboard before it was too late. We didn’t want to look back a few years from now and regret not having tried it in our relative youth. And let’s be real— osteoporosis/bone density stuff is a real struggle for women in their late-30s and beyond— I’ve still got nearly a decade to go, but I wanted to get all the tumbles and falls out of my system before a serious fracture from a soft fall becomes a real possibility. It’s funny how motivation so often boils down to a tug of war to determine what you’re more afraid of: what will happen or what won’t happen.
We were super late to the snowboarding game— having been distracted in our even earlier youth by family matters— budget, pregnancy, parenthood, well, you know how that goes. Our circle of friends had years, some an entire decade, of experience ahead of us, and we wanted to catch up! We were further motivated by the budding (and quickly escalating) interest Kids 1 and 2 were showing in this winter sport.
After a few years of tepid runs down a some of the smaller mountains local to us, we stayed with our friends at their Vermont Airbnb, and the difference in the snowboarding experience was night and day! Having only been to smaller mountains, we were in awe of even the green trails at Stratton Mountain— they were so wide and open, and oh, those views! The roomy trails and forgiving terrain at Stratton’s greens made it easy for us to progress and gain confidence on our boards that day, and it was well worth the price of lift tickets for the whole family.
I wish I had more photos from that day, but we were all too busy enjoying the mountain to bother with pictures!
Before we started snowboarding, that activity was on my wishlist of things I wanted to do but felt that I just … couldn’t. It’s easy to make excuses for why you can’t do something, when really it’s just that you’re unwilling and won’t.
If there’s something on your bucket list that you want to check off, remind yourself:
- You deserve to make room for new experiences if you want them.
- You are strong enough to step outside your comfort zone.
- You can do it— it’s not too late.
