Waking up, I could tell it had snowed, the sunlight outside was flooding my room by sneaking around the edges of my window shades. The fresh snow acting like a mirror, reflecting the light into my room, as if to say, ‘you may not have school today, but get up and enjoy this day.’
This was a long time ago, in the Connecticut town that I grew up in. I was somewhere around the age of 12
I am relatively certain that this was a weekday. It wasn’t Christmas break, as I have no memory of our Christmas tree being in the dining room. I think it was a weekday because my Dad was not home, he was probably at work.
I went downstairs to the kitchen, where Mom was sitting, drinking her coffee. I had some sort of breakfast, probably a bowl of cereal. Looking out of the window at the fresh snow, thinking about what to do on this “snow day”.
I remembered that my Mom had asked my Dad for a toboggan for Christmas. It is the only Christmas present request that I remember my Mom making that I would say was a bigger ticket item.
My Mom had a friend from nursing school. A very close friend. This friend and her husband lived in the mountains on the Massachusetts / Vermont border. We would visit regularly throughout the year. Their property has a large hill in what would be their front yard that we would sled and tube on. I’m pretty sure this was the reason Mom had asked for the toboggan as she wanted nothing to do with inner tubes. Side note; do you have any idea how high in the air you go after going down a big hill on a tube and you hit a big bump at the bottom? We all did. As a kid it was fun, you tried to aim for it. Looking back now, my joints are saying, don’t you dare.
There I am, at the table with my Mom. In my mind trying to figure out and work up the courage to ask her if I could take her toboggan out sledding. I feel like I agonized over it but finally asked. To my 12-year-old surprise, she said yes! Just be careful, she said.
I called some friends, asked if they wanted to go sledding, I had four friends that said they would go. Perfect, the toboggan could hold that many snugly but well.
Getting dressed. Warm clothes, sweater, got my snow suit and boots out. And started the process of getting all of that on. Think of Ralphie’s brother in A Christmas Story. Pretty sure I had a big scarf wrapped around my neck and face as well.
I stepped out onto the back porch, the toboggan was there leaning up against the house. The air was bitingly cold. If I had nose hairs at 12, they would have frozen.
Wrestling the toboggan, I got it down the 3 or 4 steps to the ground, as I stepped down onto the ground my foot disappeared, the snow coming up to low to middle calf. Awesome! Additionally, if wasn’t a powdery snow, and it wasn’t a wet snow. It was the kind that compacted easily without being sloppy. It crunched and squeaked as you walked through it.
The quiet was soon erased by the arrival, one by one, of my compadres. Pretty soon we were headed out of the yard but hit our first obstacle. Where to go?
There was a nice park, somewhat nearby. Big hill, hocky rink, pond for skating. Probably a 15-to-20-minute walk. The problem was, it was all downhill going to it, and ALL uphill coming home. (and it was cold) So we decided that we wanted to sled, but not for too long and we wanted to stay closer.
…. Hmmm, where could we go……
There was a hill down by the nearby hospital, and that hill had a path or trail or utility right of way cut through the trees. It was a short walk compared to the park, and no big climb to get back home.
Off we go, fueled by excitement and hot chocolate. I’m sure we weren’t loud, not at all.
We get to our destination, and like the strategic planners that we were, we start analyzing the terrain, we build our strategy on how we will attack this formidable challenge. I.e. we were being 12-year-olds.
There were challenges trying to sled that hill. This was a trail that we all used as a shortcut on our bikes during the warmer months to get down to some of the shops and stores in our town. But now, in the snow, it seemed much narrower than I remembered. The trail was cut through trees. It was pretty straight, but the trees felt like they towered and crowded the path. The second obstacle was at the bottom of the trail. There was the mound of the plowed snow from the road that crossed no more than five feet from the bottom. So a big mound of snow that we will either crash into, or launch over into a street, albeit a normally quiet street with little or no traffic.
So the bravado, rambunctioness (if that’s even a word), adrenaline, everything, began to wane. Things got quieter, we began to doubt.
The very first thing I was thinking was, I CANNOT damage the toboggan, Mom would be really mad at me.
I was thinking, do we make the trek to the park? Do we just go home where it was warm?….
I’m pretty sure the other 4 Michelin men were thinking similar thoughts.
But…
We were 12, we were male, we were stubborn. Back to strategerizing (yes I like to use creative English) and we developed our attack plan.
Regarding the finish at the bottom, the plowed snow and the road. We hadn’t seen a car down there since we arrived, but we thought it would be smart (look at us) to not go into the road. My main concern, again, was to not damage the sled. I wasn’t sure if the combined weight of toboggan and boys hitting the mound would break something, or if going up, over and down that tall mound would bend the sled in a way that would crack something. My plan that I worked out with my co-conspirators was we would bail out near the bottom of the hill. I would hold the rope to stop the sled from hitting the mound and keep it from going out into the street.
So now the question circulating among the 5 boys that had never sledded on a toboggan, how do we sled on a toboggan?
I imparted my wealth of knowledge on tobogganing to my friends, I’m pretty sure that took around 20 seconds.
We would meticulously line the toboggan up to the trail so we would safely shoot the gap. I would be in front as it was my family’s toboggan, and I would be responsible for controlling it. (Like you have tons of control on a toboggan?) Sledders #2 and #3 would get on behind me and #4 and #5 were tasked with pushing then hopping on when we were moving.
This well engineered plan maximized the motion and speed of the sled, while maintaining the safe direction of travel. Undoubtedly, we were all destined for careers in public safety, engineering and science.
We went over the plan again, leaning to turn if needed, bailing out at the bottom to prevent going into the street, how we would get onto the sled.
To be able to fit all 5 of us we learned we had to sit cross-legged, kneeling would only allow for 4 riders.
We worked as a team to line up the toboggan at the top of the hill, looking at trees along the path, looking at bumps and slopes. We were like marksmen, taking every minute detail into consideration.
I got onto the toboggan, cross-legged up as tightly against the front curl as I could, riders 2 and 3 came on next.
4 and 5 had the job of pushing off, like Olympic bobsledders. They did an amazing job, we gathered speed quickly, they were screaming as they pushed. #4 jumped on, the added weight causing the toboggan to accelerate more. Then #5 jumped aboard after one last mighty push. Between the push, the jump and the landing, the sum of those forces caused the meticulously aligned toboggan to twist ever so slightly to the right.
I tried to correct the course of our vehicle. Between the relatively difficult steering of a toboggan, the fact that there is little leverage if you are seated and since I had zero hours flying something like this, we continued on our newly altered course.
We were gathering speed, we were all having fun and screaming, going faster, the cold air becoming even colder on our faces as we accelerated.
Then came my realization that there was a rather large tree in our direct (new) path. I tried pulling us left, I yelled LEAN LEFT! The guys were leaning, but we continued straight as regretted arrow.
The tree grew closer, I had no other options or ideas, I yelled BAIL OUT, TREE, TREE!
I felt 5 roll off, the tree was closing in.
4 then 3 the tree is looming.
And then 2 left. He left by strongly pushing off against my back, in so doing, my synthetic snow pants, slid ever so nicely on the now wet vinyl toboggan seat pad, firmly wedging my right knee under the curl of the toboggan. I was stuck; I tried to bail out but couldn’t.
Too late.
I have a few vivid memories of what happened, snippets, now flashbacks, questions at times.
The way the bark looked as I impacted, and my body and head pivoted into the tree.
The sound, or sounds, my friends screaming bail out from their scattered positions uphill. Then the sound as my forehead impacted the bark of the tree. Think of a squishy pumpkin or watermelon being dropped from the roof onto a concrete sidewalk.
Then nothing.
I came to, lying on my side, next to the tree, my knee still wedged into the curl of the toboggan which was also on its side. At this point my 4 friends were standing over me screaming, not in excitement like earlier, but in panic. I seem to recall one, crying, almost sobbing.
I’m not sure how long I may have been ‘out’, probably not terribly long, but I am very sure I was out.
They helped extricate me from the toboggan. My right knee hurt, a lot. We climbed back up the hill and walked back to my house. They asked repeatedly, “Are you ok?” I mumbled (that’s French for lied) yeah, I’m OK, but mostly I wondered how to tell Mom… That was a long painful walk. The long uphill walk home from the other park probably would have been better.
We arrived at my house, and my friends split up to go to their houses. I trudged to the back porch that I had left probably less than an hour ago, maybe more. Painfully wrestled the toboggan back to its spot, after checking for damage. As it turns out, it faired better than I did, there was a scuff on the front, but no cracks, splits or broken hardware. If you ever have the urge to buy a toboggan, Gladding is an old brand that is built like a tank. I actually had that with me until around 8 years ago, still in very good condition.
I went inside and Mom asked how it went.
Over the last decade or more, I’ve tried to dig into my memories, first to try to excavate memory that has seemed to be lost and second to try to understand how my injury history may have led to, at least in part, problems that I was having with my body and nervous system, and thirdly trying to understand what has happened in my life, my actions/reactions as well as those of the people closest to me.
It has been by no means been easy, both in the process of trying to remember sometimes blocks of memory that have seemed to disappear, but also difficult in reliving and coming to an understanding of things that have happened.
This memory was one of the first that I spent a good amount of time trying to understand. I first spent time on it as this is the first of three moderate to severe traumatic brain injuries I’ve sustained. I spent time trying to remember around this time to gain insight into how my functions may or may not have changed because of the injury.
What I didn’t realize in doing this was I would gain so much more insight into my direct family as well as my own development that had nothing to do with a toboggan and a tree.
My Mom was a Registered Nurse. As soon as I gave her the minimized detail of what happened, she was asking me nurse questions. The most obvious problem was my knee was giving me problems, I was limping pretty badly, and it was pretty obvious that it had been twisted pretty severely. Note that I really didn’t emphasize that I had hit my head.
I think I remember her calling my Dad, I think. But she and I bundled up and walked back down the street to the hospital. At the ER they eventually took us back, the doctor had questions, he poked, he prodded, he turned and twisted my knee, it hurt.
They took x-ray(s) of my knee/leg and everything look ok in those. The doctor surmised probably a bad sprain, told my mother what I should take, that I should rest, I should ice the knee, and if it didn’t start to feel better in a day or two which doctor to call.
We left and while I had mentioned hitting my head I now recognize that during that visit to the ER I had completely masked everything related to how I had hit my head, that I very well may have been unconscious, and any symptoms or signs that I had at that moment. I had a headache, I was nauseous, I was dizzy. The days after the headaches persisted, the other symptoms faded. I didn’t know then, but now I know all too well, I probably had a concussion. But I said nothing.
Why, someone might ask, would you not say anything, especially if your mother was a RN?
I didn’t realize it then, it wasn’t an intentional thought, it was more a learned or conditioned behavior. Coming to that understanding has taken decades and the help of someone trained to help with connecting the dots so to speak.
My Mom and Dad were children from large families, 5 or 6 or more siblings. Their parents were products of the Great Depression, and their parents’ values were shaped by that period.
I think that it would be safe to say that my parents’ upbringing was probably not optimally supportive. My Mom and I had spoken at length about what it was like for her to grow up, plus after she passed away, her diary came to me.
I know that when I became a parent, the new parent joke or meme was that there is not an instruction manual. At that time for me it seemed I was flying solo by the seat of my pants. Little did I know that some, if not a lot, of the parental (and relationship) flight instructions had been planted within me, simply by the way I was raised and what I was exposed to (or not exposed to). And as I look and explore this more, I find that it can even be traced generationally. (File that one under, I wish I knew that years ago.) The problem with these implanted or learned ‘flight instructions’ is, they sometimes do more harm than good. And generationally speaking, a small error repeated and altered to an even more negative direction, multiplies.
I once had an instructor explain it this way. If I teach you and you only retain 80% of what I taught, and then you go on to teach someone later what you had learned and they only retain 80% of what you taught, their understanding is only at 64% (80 * 80).
Showing emotion, being supportive, communication I don’t think were in the 80%+ category in my family lines. How does that present to a young child? When one parent is struggling if the other parent has learned that showing emotion should not be permitted they tend to communicate that in negative ways. Telling the emotional partner to stop, to not feel that way, (as if it were that easy), rather than being supportive, a skill that was probably never developed.
As a young child you see, feel and hear this and you know 1. This doesn’t feel good. 2. I don’t want to be in that situation and you start adapting.
If you know that showing emotion, pain, injury, struggles, making mistakes or wrong decisions will draw negative attention, you learn to stuff, hide, mask things along that line.
By the age of 12, I had learned to mask. In addition, I think there was a small amount of a fear factor, that I would be in trouble for hurting myself because it was probably very dumb to try to do what we did. So I said little about the knee, and just a sliver of info about my head injury, and I never said anything about being unconscious.
I’ve come to the understanding of the last few paragraphs over the last 5 or so years. Far too late. At least, I thought I was understanding, as if I could finish this chapter even if it was decades after the tree and toboggan met. But alas, it would appear that there is far more to this puzzle than I thought. Like the Bloomin Onion at Outback, you remove one layer only to find another beneath.
But that will have to wait for another day.
