Getting "Tubular"

As a child of the '60s I grew up with playgrounds that had metal slides and teeter totters....and lived. My parents wouldn't think twice if they didn't see me all day long. I rode my bike all over town. I played baseball without a helmet. I didn't have a cell phone so my Mom could find me. She told me to be home at dinner time and I did. It was a different world.
We would go sleigh riding on highway cloverleafs. If you got going really fast you'd have to fall off because the sleigh was going to be soon competing with the cars attempting to get on the Sunrise Highway. Nobody was ever killed. We froze our "keysters" (that's NY for bottom) off, played all day, went home and had hot chocolate.
I wanted my little girl to experience the fun I had as a child of playing in the snow. Since it's starting to look like winter is never going to come here, we piled in to the car and took a two hour ride to go tubing.
Thirty seven "are we there yet"s later....we arrived. I was a little concerned that Sarah would take one look at the slopes, decide they're scary and we'd be back in the car in 10 minutes. She's petrified of inflatable lawn balloons in Home Depot...you never know what's gonna press her "DEAR GOD...GET ME OUT OF HERE" button.










Nope...when it comes to snow...we're raising a daredevil. She couldn't wait! We had a blast, up and down the hill. I'm sure it's the most fresh air she's ever gotten in one day in her entire life. For Dad it was the most fresh air and FUN I've had in a long time! It was 60 degrees...the snow was melting. The slopes were fast, the lines were short. Sarah's smile probably contributed to the "global warming"....ear to ear all day.
When our session was over we had pizza on the deck over looking the slopes. Sarah was tired, Daddy was tired, but for me there was a sense of satisfaction that we made a big time memory today. She couldn't wait to tell Mommy, brother, her friends at school, the NY Times...it was big in her world.
Two minutes after getting in the car to go home she was asleep...that kind of "drool on your chin" power nap that you can only obtain after intense excitement.
When we got home there was a cold beer instead of a hot choclate. It's been a long time since I've fully appreciated dry underwear and socks!