A Weekend in Big Bear = Unpleasant Reminder of Time's Relentless March

For my birthday, I thought it would be fun to book a weekend in Big Bear with my sister's family and a few close friends. I haven't been snowboarding in three years, I thought, and it would be nifty to do it again!

It turns out, turning 34, having a baby, and never working out will culminate in feeling like death while on the slopes. During my very first run of the weekend, I had a lot of regrets about my decision to get a two-day pass. My legs ached from just putting on heavy boots. I snowboarded skurred for most of the first day and felt like I couldn't gain any speed no matter how hard I worked. Young, lean girls in glittery tank tops and GoPro'ed helmets whizzed by me, and I paused to think the worst of them.

My sister and me, and behind us, the Trail of Tears.

The second day, I realized that making my boot laces substantially tighter helps a lot. With age, comes wisdom.

Also? Having kids along for a Big Bear trip is a huge game changer. When I organized this trip years ago, M and I were just dating, and none of our 10+ friends who were there had kids. We happily slept on air mattresses or shared beds, four or five to a room, and stayed out on the slopes pretty much all day, coming and going as we pleased, since the cabin I rented was so close. It was fun, it was communal, it was easy.

Our carefree, silly-hat wearing days three years ago. We could stay up all night and be fine snowboarding all day the next.

This year: our group passes the time pleasantly playing a card game, while M tries to coax the baby to eat more strained bananas.

This year, our rental was a 10-minute walk away. Not a big deal, I thought. WRONG. The men and women had to switch off snowboarding, so that the other half could take care of the three kids (my two nephews and Baby C), and we had to stuff as many runs as we could into a couple of hours or so, because the cabin was just far away enough that going in and out was not an option. The walk was hard and exhausting and there were hungry babies to nurse. The second day, when I came in from snowboarding at 3 p.m., M handed over our intermittently wailing son so that he could finally get a bite of lunch to eat (was I secretly pleased that M now had a taste of my everyday life? A little.).

Our stupid house, that I wished was a half mile closer to the chair lifts.

Also? Everyone in our group this year was close to their thirties, or well into them. People our age have by now decided how we like to spend our time, and doing things just for novelty's sake is so five years ago. That means that some of us went snowboarding, and others went hiking, or fishing, or on walks by the lake. I was pleased that everyone could do their own thing and have a great time, but I'll admit that it was an adjustment to not move like a school of fish, as we did when we rolled out together in our twenties. It's a different, less raucous, more sincere kind of fun. Like we're all growing up or something.

Also? Babies do not care if you have to snowboard the next day, or if there are non-family members present. They will cry at night when everyone else is trying to sleep, loudly, multiple times. And I am thankful for the understanding, gracious friends who were with us, who willingly took the babies from us so that we could go to the bathroom or grab our third cup of coffee. Our friends Holly and Jared are expecting their son in March, and given their patient and gentle handling of the kids this past weekend, they are ready. More ready than I feel today.

Holly, lovingly holding my son. Not pictured: me, taking advantage of two free hands to double fist birthday brownies.

As for Sean and Abby, our other friends who so gladly took on baby-sitting duties as well, I have decided that I will pay them to come live with us.

I will say, it was great for the kids to socialize with our friends. Baby C loved being held by different people, my one-year-old nephew Jack stayed busy toddling around to every person and smiling, and when everyone left to do their respective activities, my three-year-old nephew Donovan asked plaintively, "Where did all the people go, Mama?" As much as my sister and I were scrambling to keep the littles from crying, it was good for them to see that there was more to life than what revolved around them.

And, as always, M is due a shout-out for somehow hiding a delicious birthday cheesecake in a cooler under all our bags and bringing it to the mountain, for taking pains to make sure I had as much snowboarding and hot tubbing time as I wanted, and for cheerfully being the driver both ways.

All in all, this past weekend was fun and enjoyable, but my aching body and the fact that M and I packed a diaper pail alongside our board bags were troubling signs that life will never be again as it once was. But also? It's impossible to imagine wanting to go back to life back then. Happy birthday to me!