Chapter 2

Monday

That first day was not a success. Helen went further than that and called it a complete disaster, but then she was always one for superlatives.

The issue centred around patience and tolerance. Peter’s father tried, perhaps not nearly hard enough, to be patient as the two women took an infinitely long time to come down a slope that he felt was well near horizontal – it actually was the way they took it since they went back and forth across it in tiny steps down.

For their part, Peter’s mother and sister were appalled at the awful steep slopes that they kept being taken too, despite their protestations. Each time they voiced an opposition to how steep it was and each time they were told this was the easiest of easy blue slopes (a fact that might have been backed up with evidence as a small group was walking up in snowshoes).

Peter, for his part, was caught in the middle. He encouraged his father to be patient, he encouraged his sister and mother to try to point down the hill a little and told them how well they were doing; which both knew was a lie.

By lunchtime, Peter’s dad was ready to break, he was told to go off and do his own thing in the afternoon. Now Peter was responsible for two nervous skiers, it seemed very unfair. He took them on a long green run through the trees, which alternated between being icy and being beautifully attractive. At the bottom, there were some gentle nursery slopes, and Peter set about getting his two students to try skiing straight down and stopping at the bottom. Increasing their speed and gaining the knowledge and confidence that they could stop. They weren’t entirely compliant to his instructions to ‘make some progress’. He would say ‘point down the hill for a while and then turn’ and they would immediately turn because pointing down the hill meant they might lose control. At one point he noticed a man walking straight down the slope. He was descending faster than the two women as they zig-zagged forever.

That evening a family conference was called. It was agreed that the two women would ski together on easy slopes and then take the lifts up to the easy slopes at the top (there was a wide bowl of snow that was very good fun to practise on). “And you and Peter can go off together.” said his mum.

“Oh, no. I’m not going with Dad, I’ve seen the runs he likes. Look, I’m not good enough for vertical blacks, so I’d hold you up, Dad; or I’d break something trying. Think of the insurance claim! No, you go off. You two go off, and I’ll ski alone on what I’m comfortable with. Okay?”

That was not received too enthusiastically; but by promising to say where he was going each day, it was agreed. Everyone knew that you might say you would take the Prorel chairlift and then find it closed so have to go somewhere completely different, but there was a sense that the parents were in charge. It satisfied everyone.

“Don’t do anything dangerous!” was the last comment from Mum.

“Extend yourself, son. Don’t just stick to reds.” was the last comment from Dad, in direct contradiction to what his wife had just said.

So ‘try new and challenging slopes, but don’t challenge yourself too much’. Since it was always impossible to know what a new slope was like until you had done it, the advice was as useful as a wet paper bag, as he commented to his sister – having tried and failed to not notice her shorty nighty that revealed her pants as she got into bed. Why would a girl wear such a thing and not expect to be noticed? Was she teasing him. Truth was, she didn’t think of him as a boy, he was her brother, not a boy of sixteen with a willing and ill-used penis that was standing on end at that very moment.

“That’s parents for you.” she replied “When I was your age, I got two talks ‘always make sure you aren’t alone with a boy, they only want one thing’ - which turns out to be true. And ‘make sure you take precautions’. So one said don’t do it, and the other said do it carefully.”

“Which advice did you take?”

“Well, I’m not pregnant yet am I?” which could have meant either advice was taken.

Tuesday

So Tuesday found him trying out a couple of blues that they had done the day before, but this time not at walking pace. Actually it had been good, he knew the blues well as they had studied each hummock, ridge and wrinkle. He felt good going down them. At the bottom, where the blue and green merged at a three person chair lift of some venerability, he opted to go up again. He stood back as a class of teeny tiny children who looked like they had only just learned to walk came down the ski school priority line. This row allowed ski schools to jump the queue. With small children, it was normal to put one on each chair and ask an adult to look after them. Not for the first time, Peter wondered how that would go down in England – asking a complete stranger to look after a three year old. Still, probably difficult to abduct a child from the top of the slopes.