The City Ski Jumping Affair - "YCTTBOOTB"

Rated SA for stupid actionsCity Step Ski Jumping ...After the near death experience of the Inwood Roller Hockey Affair the boys moved onto a slightly less dangerous winter sport - City Step Ski Jumping. This was a sport my dad, CP, and Pat O’Meara invented one day after walking home from Charlie Hauben’s house. To understand City Step Ski Jumping you need to remember Kingsbridge is built on several hills and is surrounded on the East and West by towering hills leading up to Riverdale on the one side and Sedgwick Avenue on the other. Because of these hills, the city planners built “city steps” to make it easier to walk from the lower points to the higher points in the neighborhood. Some of the best known “City steps” were the ones which connected 231st street to Naples Terrace, there were steps which led from Broadway to Naples Terrace, another one joined Bailey Avenue to Fort Independence, and there was one which connected Kingsbridge Terrace to Sedgwick Avenue leading up to Our Lady of Angels (OLA). All the steps were designed the same way; they all had 10 steps then a landing (a flat area to allow the old ladies to catch their breath), then another 10 steps and a landing, another 10 steps and a landing – you get my point. On both sides of the steps were railings to hold onto and just past the railings were decorative bricks (usually covered with graffiti) which followed the same contour as the steps but instead of rough, choppy steps the bricks were laid out in a smooth, connected way – perfect for City Step Ski Jumping.
CP, Pat, and my dad invented the sport one afternoon after working out at Charlie’s apartment. As they trudged up the steep hills to Sedgwick Avenue it was cold and there were a few flurries coming down but no accumulation, however, over the next three hours, while the boys were pumping iron, the city was blanketed with snow. When they left the apartment at 3:00 p.m. wearing their Chuck Conner high tops there was about four or five inches of snow on the ground and so they did what boys do in the snow - they threw snowballs at stop signs, at street lights, and at cars driving by. When they walked down the street, which led to the city steps, it was beautiful – the white snow covered the poop, there wasn’t any yellow snow yet, and when you looked up - the snow flakes glistened in the city lights. The city steps were covered with untouched, virgin snow and as the boys stood there at the top of the steps looking down - an idea popped up in my dad’s mind. He said, “Let’s slide down the side of the steps. Look at it – it’s perfect!” Pat said, “Yea, that would be cool. Let’s do it, but not from the top. We need to find out how fast we’ll go.” This sounded reasonable and so they walked down a few flights of steps and started about a third of the way up the steps. All three of the boys slid down, and they went fast but not too fast – pretty good but not good enough. Pat said, “Let’s try it from one more flight up.” CP stood there for a moment without saying a word, my dad could see he was calculating something in his head. Then CP said, “Based on friction, aerodynamics, wind velocity, and the law of thermodynamics my calculations indicate we will slide fast but it will be safe if we start from the top of the steps." SIX FLIGHTS UP!Going down from the top sounded a little crazy to my dad and Pat but they said, “Yea, that would be great.” Because they didn’t want to sound like wimps but they had their doubts. My dad said, “I don’t want to walk all the way back up the steps and I need to get home for something to eat – let’s come back and do it tomorrow!” CP said, “If you don’t want to do it that’s fine but I’m going to do it. It will only take a minute, just wait.” So Pat and my dad waited for him. CP walked up the steps and when he got to the top he hopped over the railing, laid down on his bottom, he pushed himself over the first hump, and starting sliding. Immediately it was apparent CP’s calculation was off – he didn’t take into consideration the exponential increase in his velocity as he went from one slope to the next. By the time he slid down the third slope he was flying – both literally and figuratively. He was going so fast his body went airborne off every slope – each slope was like a ski jump but unfortunately he didn’t have any protective gear on. My dad told me, “When I watched him sliding down the hill, flying in the air, I thought for sure he was going to crack his head open, die, or both.” CP tried to slow down but he couldn’t – he turned over to try and grab onto something – anything - but there was nothing to hold onto – all his turning over did was to cause his face to smash against the snow covered bricks as he slid and flew down the hill. He flew off the last flight and was stopped abruptly by the railing at the bottom of the hill - he should have had broken bones, blood gushing all over the place but instead all he had were a lot of bumps, bruises, some scrapes, and maybe a few little squirts of urine in his tighty whity's. When he got up he was dazed and in pain but he was able to walk home. My dad told me, “CP was the only person I know who could walk away from something like that. He was the toughest guy I grew up with. He was a unique guy; he seemed to be invincible in everything he did – it was like he had a Guardian Angel looking over him.” In future City Step Ski Jumping events the boys kept it to two, three, or four slopes – never the six slopes CP skied down that day...