Miles to Go Before I Sleep

Cross-country skiing has taught me to love winter again.

Every Saturday morning, between January and March, our family goes cross-country skiing. The tradition began several years ago when a friend mentioned that it's her favourite way to spend time outdoors in winter, and I thought, "I haven't done that in years!" So we went out and rented skis and spent a day in the forest that was so glorious, it felt downright revelatory. I felt like I'd found something that had been missing from our lives.

As soon as the next season rolled around, I signed my kids up for the local Jackrabbits program. It took a few years before they were all old enough to be left unchaperoned with their coaches; they first had to graduate from the rather painful yet amusing "Bunnies" stage, where they’re slipping and falling down all over the place and there's a great deal of wailing and complaining. But now each of the kids goes off with their group and I am free to ski on my own for two blissful hours.

Those first few kilometres are like a dream. I glide away from the noise of dozens of chattering, laughing children, the yells of coaches trying to organize everyone, motivational music blasting from the speakers near the gathering area on the coldest mornings. The groomed trail quickly goes quiet and I find myself in the middle of the forest, surrounded by snow-laden trees. The landscape is hilly, which makes for interesting routes and views.

Usually I make a beeline for my favourite trail at the back of the park, a 1.2-kilometre loop called Sidewinder. I hardly ever see anyone there, and it's a moderate-level trail, a good one to warm up with. I love the quality of the hardwood forest; it gives me a different kind of feeling than the cedar bush and pine trees at the front of the park. It reminds me of Muskoka, the region where I grew up, with the wide-open and sun-filled spaces between tall maples and beeches.

I climb to the top of the first hill, where I can see past the park boundary, out over neighbouring farmers' fields all covered in snow—and then I stop. I stand there to catch my breath, unzip my jacket, and revel in the silence. That silence is so pure, so intense, that it's almost jarring. It feels like the first real silence I've heard all week. But the longer I stand, the more I start to hear—the creaking and cracking of tree limbs in the cold, the wind through leafless branches, the chirp of a chickadee.

It takes effort to get moving again, to break the spell cast by that silence, but I have ground to cover. I can’t help but think of Robert Frost’s famous lines: “The woods are lovely, dark and deep / But I have promises to keep / And miles to go before I sleep / And miles to go before I sleep.”

Next I head for the Grunt, a black-diamond-equivalent that feels like it's uphill for two kilometres. I welcome the challenge, launching into a herringbone climb until the insides of my feet ache from working at such an angle. Here, I sometimes have to move to the side as skate skiers come flying up the hills behind me, moving with effortless speed. How they do it baffles me. I haven't tried it, but my much-more-skilled children tell me it's a lot of fun. (They consider my classic skis archaic.)

There's an even better view from the top of the Grunt, followed by a long, steep descent—"Freefall," my kids call it—that signifies the end of the loop. The speed reminds me of downhill skiing, though more precarious because I'm on much longer, skinnier skis. I can't help but feel a small sizzle of relief each time I make it down without a wipeout.

I have learned to underdress for skiing, wearing only a merino base layer, a light sweater, and a shell on mornings that are -15˚C or colder, because I know that within a half hour I'll be hot and sweaty. Some frigid mornings, it takes a lot of faith in my body's ability to warm up as I venture onto the trail, shivering with cold and wondering if today's the day I'll wish I'd put on another layer—but I've only ever had the opposite happen, wishing I'd worn less.

On this particular morning, it was -23˚C and my sweat froze to the inside of my shell.

When I collect my kids two hours later, they are exhilarated, pink-cheeked, and tired. We drive home, eat hot soup for lunch, and relax for the rest of the afternoon. There's a general sense of having earned that laziness, of already having made the best of the day. I feel no guilt about lounging for several hours with a good book and a pot of tea in front of the fireplace.

The secret to enjoying winter, I've realized, is to do fun things outside. I loved winter as a kid, and that's because my days were jam-packed with snow-based play. As I grew up, winter became boring, inconvenient, and even unpleasant—a season to be endured until summer came back—but that's because I wasn't out there enjoying it. My rediscovery of cross-country skiing has changed my perspective and now makes me look forward to snowstorms and plunging temperatures. It's teaching my kids the same—that winter creates natural playgrounds that relatively few people in the world are lucky enough to enjoy. Whether it's skiing, skating, or snowshoeing, there's so much to do out there.

This winter, though, has been weird. For the first three weeks of January, we didn't have enough snow to ski. Then a polar vortex tore through and created such bitterly cold temperatures that ski classes were shortened to prevent the kids from freezing. This past week, rain nearly ruined the trails, and it looks like that's in the forecast for this week. It's distressing not being able to rely on predictable cold and snow in mid-February, and seeing grass outside my office window.

In a way, that makes me even more determined to get my family out there whenever we can. The more hours we log on those trails, the more adventure we can squeeze out of this winter—and the more likely my kids are to learn not to take these beautiful winter days for granted.