Growing up, my parents took my two siblings and me skiing most years. Being the youngest, I started early– at age three. It was no small feat since we lived in Illinois. We did it on the cheap—which involved my parents picking us up from school then driving 14 hours through the night. We would save money by not staying in a hotel and emerge from our powder blue mercury station wagon ready to ski when the slopes opened at 8 am. Oh, and we’d have meals of broccoli and summer sausage in the car to avoid stopping. The ride was fragrant.

I don’t know how my parents did it. After taking my 3-year-old skiing last January, I have a new reverence for them. Our experience went like this:

I spent the morning stressing out about everyone having warm enough clothes. Since it was -14 degrees the day before, I wore a wool base layer, a sweatshirt, a down vest, and then a full body snow suit over that. I wore two pairs of mittens. I would soon regret all of this.

We left two hours later than planned.

After buying lift tickets (I think I heard our bank account say ouch) and renting skis for the kids, I attempt to put the kid’s ski boots on, in the snow. I start with my 5-year-old. She’s shrieking that “it’s too hard to stand up!” while my three-year-old kicks snow into his, and her, unbuckled boots.

We fail rule number 1 about skiing… don’t get snow inside your boots because your feet will be cold and freeze off. Now my three-year-old is raging mad because his socks are wet. My husband calls to ask about where something is, and I drop my phone in the snow. We are off to a great start folks and we haven’t even put on our skis. Shall we just skip this and drink hot chocolate in the lodge?

We pressed on. My husband took our 5-year-old and I took our 3-year-old to the “magic carpet” which is like the conveyor belt at the grocery store that you stand on with your skis. It goes about 2 miles per hour carrying you up a slightly inclined hill for beginners to get comfortable skiing. My son is standing between my legs crying because his sister is ahead of him and he wants to be first. There are several 20-something guys behind us. We are half way up the hill when the conveyor belt halts.

We all stand there hoping it will start in a minute, but it doesn’t. The able-bodied people in front of me start inching their way up like penguins. They use their poles to keep them from sliding backwards.

They all gradually make it to the top.

So, in front of me is an empty conveyor belt. I’m at the mid-point with my sobbing child. Then about 35 people are crammed behind us. This is bad.

I attempt waddling my way up while carrying my poles and my 3-year-old by the armpits along with his dangling skis.  My double mittens slip off when I hold him. In other words, I’M WALKING IN SKIS UPHILL CARRYING A CHILD. His knees are somehow suddenly dysfunctional, crumpling when I don’t hold his body weight.

We make it about three inches. The guy behind me starts to bump his skis into mine. Are you seriously kidding me? You are an able-bodied 25-year-old man. I’ve got 40 lbs of dead weight I’m carrying up a hill and you’re running over the back of my skis? Dude.

Somehow—by having no options, intense embarrassment and a lot of anger at mechanical failure—I inch our way up. THAT DANG down vest. I hate my wool shirt! Why am I wearing so many mittens!? I hadn’t even skied one run and I was sweating like a boxer on their 9^th round. It is 20 degrees outside and 9,000 degrees inside my coat.

But there’s a bigger problem. I begin sliding backwards. I am in skis after all.

HOLY COW I’m going to be the domino to knock over 35 humans behind me with poles and skis that could impale us all.

WHY is everyone watching this and no one helping? What is wrong with humanity? Can’t anyone, especially the guy behind me (that I’m about to flatten) see this is impossible? My sobbing child doesn’t have functioning ankles. Plus, I have a foot of snot literally stringing out of my nose.

Finally, a man in tan Carhart’s and boots walks down and meets us a few feet from the top. He grabs my son’s wrists and pulls. My kid assumed superman pose with his upper body with a combo of a ski jumper and splits with his legs. It was so funny looking I laughed, and maybe I was laughing because finally, someone helped. There was a light at the end of this conveyor-belt hell. We get to the top and I find out that Carhart man is a dad and it’s his kid’s first day skiing too. Parenthood solidarity.

My kid is drenched in tears and I’m drenched in sweat. And after all that work of getting to the top of the hill, I realize don’t know how to teach my kid to ski. Teaching with words isn’t working, because he’s three and “45-degree angle” and “edge” mean nothing. “Make a triangle, pie, or pizza with your skis” was too abstract.

Is it even legal for me to ski carrying another human?

That was the only realistic option, so I ski down carrying him between my legs. My arms are under his pits. He lets out approximately four seconds of joyful laughter on the way down. YAY! WE ARE HAVING FUN!

We go up the FUNCTIONING magic carpet two more times. Then both kids are exhausted and turn into jerks. We retreat to the lodge, which resembles a high school cafeteria with the smell of a men’s locker room. Everyone is walking like they’re robots (because ski boots). After waiting in line for 45 minutes we enjoy mediocre hot chocolate and fries.

My sweet son cuddles in for a hug. I love you buddy! Then out of nowhere he bashes me in the jaw with his bowling ball head like he‘s The Rock. I held back tears and he let them rip with his three-year-old crying privileges. My jaw jammed into my neck in an unnatural way and 4 days later, it’s still sore.

But oh yeah, we are here to ski. We paid a lot of money to go down the bunny hill three times and eat fried food. They both wanted to go home. My daughter said she drank too much hot chocolate and was going to throw up and her body was telling her not to ski anymore. My son was clear about NO MORE SKIING by screaming those exact words. But give up now, after all this?

They were fascinated by the chair lift, so we lure them in by using wide eyes and the word “awesome” repeatedly. Their gear, boots, and skis are back on. We are in line at the chair lift. This time my husband took our 3-year-old (because of my sanity). My daughter and I are behind them.

It’s their turn. My husband does his best to hurriedly shimmy himself and our confused preschooler. When the chair is about to scoop them up, my son loses a ski, falls over, and bursts into tears. The operator sprints to pause the lift.

If you’re three and it’s you’re first time on a chair lift, you lose your ski, make the entire lift stop and have a public meltdown, you should be proud. Which is why I’m putting that in here for memories’ sake.

We make it through the “awesome” chair lift experience and are at the top. We tried to talk our 3-year-old into doing it again, but he could not be wooed. He might turn into The Hulk if we push further. Sacrificial daddy, who only skied down the hill backwards that day, retreats with him to the van to eat endless snacks.

I took my 5-year-old down the hill a few more times. She fell and laughed. I laughed too. She got up, eager to ski more and a bit faster. She had GENUINE fun and her smile might have made it all worth it. We’ll probably be back next year—with sausage, broccoli, and fewer sweaters.