We made it to the edge of the subdivision, and Paul and I jumped the curb and started off in to the Big Woods. The clean snow was about 8 inches deep and pretty fresh. No one had even walked through it.
"Mom told us ‘don’t ever go to the Big Woods,’” Roy hollered from behind.
"Come on you big baby. We’re not going to the woods, we'er just going through them to get to the hill.” "And don't you tell."
We slogged through the snow grabbing and eating handfuls. Roy followed twenty feet behind in our tracks trying to keep up, and Paul pelted him with snowballs and encouraging words to "hurry up." Roy was slow, partly because of his Michelin Man suit waddle, partly because of the heavy equipment he was dragging, but also because he was constantly looking left and right, listening for wild boar. They're out there. Spiky tusks. Hairy pig mammoths. Paul told him.
Our destination is probably half mile through winding trails in the woods, but in a few minutes we're there. Hock's Hill. So are all the other kids from the neighborhood. Kids from our Saturday morning football games. Kids from Boy Scout campouts. And kids from school. All silently studying the steep hill like its a Latin homework assigment. It's iced over and especially slick, and no one is sledding. Everyone is just looking. Scoping it out, waiting for someone else to go first.
Paul looked down the hill, and could see it was a fast dropoff, 100 feet straight down a goat path that let directly into a huge Eiffel Tower shaped boulder jutting out of the ground. The only way past was to build up speed, lean hard left to follow the goat trail twisting around the boulder, and then lean hard right to miss the tree. From that point, it was a free ride, lickety split, ninety to nothin' down a broad steep slope into the flat field. Farmer Hock’s field. A well earned thrill, once past the obstacles.
But, remember Farmer Hock. He was just a tad bit "impatient" with American kids because all the sledding and snowballing and monkey-weeding messed up his field in the winter time. As a result, he patrolled it from time to time when the snow conditions were most inviting. With a shotgun.
Farmer Hock notwithstanding, we needed a test pilot for a trial run to watch how best to accellerate, when to lean and how far to twist. It made good sense that the first run of the day would help flatten the snow. And it made good sense for that first run to be made by someone on a slow sled that would be easier to control. We discussed it, debated it, pointed down hill, measured distances and generally over-analyzed the situation hoping someone would grow impatient and sieze this opportunity. Someone with a big heavy sled. Someone who was small enough to roll off before hitting the boulder if it came to that. Someone who was well padded.
"Mom told us ‘don’t ever go to the Big Woods,’” Roy hollered from behind.
"Come on you big baby. We’re not going to the woods, we'er just going through them to get to the hill.” "And don't you tell."
We slogged through the snow grabbing and eating handfuls. Roy followed twenty feet behind in our tracks trying to keep up, and Paul pelted him with snowballs and encouraging words to "hurry up." Roy was slow, partly because of his Michelin Man suit waddle, partly because of the heavy equipment he was dragging, but also because he was constantly looking left and right, listening for wild boar. They're out there. Spiky tusks. Hairy pig mammoths. Paul told him.
Our destination is probably half mile through winding trails in the woods, but in a few minutes we're there. Hock's Hill. So are all the other kids from the neighborhood. Kids from our Saturday morning football games. Kids from Boy Scout campouts. And kids from school. All silently studying the steep hill like its a Latin homework assigment. It's iced over and especially slick, and no one is sledding. Everyone is just looking. Scoping it out, waiting for someone else to go first.
Paul looked down the hill, and could see it was a fast dropoff, 100 feet straight down a goat path that let directly into a huge Eiffel Tower shaped boulder jutting out of the ground. The only way past was to build up speed, lean hard left to follow the goat trail twisting around the boulder, and then lean hard right to miss the tree. From that point, it was a free ride, lickety split, ninety to nothin' down a broad steep slope into the flat field. Farmer Hock’s field. A well earned thrill, once past the obstacles.
But, remember Farmer Hock. He was just a tad bit "impatient" with American kids because all the sledding and snowballing and monkey-weeding messed up his field in the winter time. As a result, he patrolled it from time to time when the snow conditions were most inviting. With a shotgun.
Farmer Hock notwithstanding, we needed a test pilot for a trial run to watch how best to accellerate, when to lean and how far to twist. It made good sense that the first run of the day would help flatten the snow. And it made good sense for that first run to be made by someone on a slow sled that would be easier to control. We discussed it, debated it, pointed down hill, measured distances and generally over-analyzed the situation hoping someone would grow impatient and sieze this opportunity. Someone with a big heavy sled. Someone who was small enough to roll off before hitting the boulder if it came to that. Someone who was well padded.
Poor Roy.
When he volunteered he thought it was his idea. All the big kids cheered him, just like the cheering you hear from the kids who are shovel sledding across the river in It’s a Wonderful Life. He was the man of the moment. King for a day. Hooray for Roy!
Roy couldn't really pick up his togoggan and swing it like you 'd swing a sled to get started, so he sat on it upright, and asked us to push.
Well, he did volunteer.
Later Paul would even explain to Jewel, "He wanted to do it." And, "it WAS his idea."
So, Paul gave him a good hard brotherly push, and gravity took over.
Roy went flying down the hill, flattening and packing the snow just so, all while he was screaming his lungs out, "I can't turn this thing." "There's a rock!" And, "Heeeeeeeelp!"
Well, everyone knows you can't really turn a toboggan. Poor Roy tucked and rolled just as the toboggan slammed smack into the broadest part of the replica of the national monument. Straight on. He never had a chance of missing it. There were slivers of toboggan everywhere, and Roy landed in a pile of hay the farmer had set out for his cows. He tore his Michelin Man suit, and never had to wear it or use the toboggan again.
Paul hollered, "Roy, you okay?" Roy yelled back, "yeah but come get me." Just the excuse Paul needed to make a run, “Here I come.”
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