faced with the prospect of falling down a mountainside, I got in my "half seat"

To celebrate both our birthdays, Kenny and I went skiing in Maine during the first half of this week. He had gone once before for one day, and this trip was two days of skiing. I went ten years ago in high school (and holy crap, can we take a minute to think about the fact that high school was TEN YEARS AGO?!) but it was not such a good experience. You see, it was a six week program where the school arranged a bus to drive us to a local ski mountain and drop us all off for a few hours of skiing once a week. There wasn't any instruction or guidance so I relied on friends to give me some pointers. Before I knew it, I was cruising around and doing fairly well, so my friends went their separate ways to the trails that were closer to their level (i.e. not boring beginner trails).

This was all fine and dandy until I accidentally went down the wrong trail after getting off the lift by myself. The lifts each served several different slopes, all of varying difficulty, and it was hard to tell which way led to the easy runs. I found myself on the sheer face of a mountain and ended up plowing over some poor innocent skier. Mittens, ski poles, skis, and my confidence went flying, landing in every direction. Ski patrol responded and told me to get off the mountain. I spent the remaining weeks of the program sitting in the ski lodge feeling sorry for myself.

It took me ten years to even consider skiing again! That's how traumatized I was!

Thank goodness that this trip was much less dramatic. In fact, I had fun. I took a lesson with a ski instructor, who showed me the proper form: weight in the front of the ski boots, bum out,  shoulders slightly ahead of the motion but not so much that they disrupt the balance, hands in front of you, look where you're going.

"Oh, so a half seat!", I said.

The ski instructor looked at me like I had three heads.

But every time I felt my centre of balance slipping backward, I reminded myself to get in my half seat, and surprise! I didn't take anyone out on the side of the mountain. I also was VERY diligent about looking at the signs to know which way to go off the lift!

but hey! don't I kind of look like I know what I'm doing?

the views were incredible.

Kenny being his usual insanely athletic self.