Imagine yourself climbing a waterfall that has completely frozen over. It's cold, wet and slippery, yet you have confidence that neither the toe-hold nor the ice axes holding you up will break away from the ice that stretches upward in front of you and cascades downward below you.
While many will be reaching for the remote this Sunday to take in the Super Bowl, the LeeShore Center and Tsalteshi Trails Association are hoping women will reach for their skis and poles before the game to raise money for a good cause.
Growing up in Florida, my idea of the perfect winter stroll included sugar sand between my toes, a light breeze in my hair and temperatures in the mid-50s. A weekend afternoon often included exploring some park boardwalk, where the fiddler crabs ran between muddy holes and egrets fished in the nearby wetlands. Mangroves were the familiar local tree and I never thought about needing more than flip flops to wear on my walk. A jacket, however, was essential, because those 50-degree winter temperatures were cold!
While parents are supposed to love and nurture their children, the role of the uncle is to toughen up the kids of their kin, and I take my role as uncle very seriously, particularly when teaching my niece and nephew about the outdoors.