Getting Waxed

It snowed today. We received from the weather angels about 5 inches of that magic stuff that is, as one Pakistani student once exclaimed, "frictionless." Well, close enough anyway. So sensing an opportunity I asked a few of the youth in the congregation to come sledding with me on the hill behind the sanctuary in Nineveh. Of course, they were in.
The slope behind the sanctuary has two teirs of clear grass (er, snow), before it gives way to a sharper, forested slope. In order to get the maximum thrill out of the experience, we trudged up the slope, into the woods, found a path that did not intersect with any trees (of significant size) and started cruising down.
Oh, and there was a jump.
Well, it wasn't really supposed to be a jump at first. We intended it to be a curve--a luge sort of thing, you know--which diverted the sledder on a longer path to the bottom. However, it became rapidly clear that the velocity at which we descended out of the forest would carry us over the curving ramp, turning it into a jump.
There's nothing wrong with a good jump, so we changed our tactics.
Jordan was the first to discover the vaulting quality of our former embankment. He shot down the hillside, leaves torn up in a cloud behind him, and leapt from the edge of the snowbank into the air.
Awesome! I thought, and climbed the hill hoping to get the same effect.
No dice. I went down twice, then three times, but I couldn't get enough velocity to get any air. At most I crawled over the snow like a meatball rolling over a lump of spaghetti. Not very thrilling.
"I just can't do it. Is there anything special about your sled?"
"Yeah," said Jordan, "My dad waxed it."
He waxed his sled! "Can I borrow it?"
"Sure."
I climbed the hill, armed now with the triplet wonders of snow, gravity, and ski wax on my side. I got as high as I could and threw myself onto the track.
When I hit the slope and felt the slide of the sled under my belly, words leapt into my mind that pastors aren't supposed to think (let alone say). I had underestimated the effectiveness of the wax. I tore down the hill like a bat out of--well, a bat on a waxed sled--and hit the jump at a velocity I had never heretofore experienced in my memory. I also ascended higher than I like to be when my feet aren't under me.
Needless to say, I lost control of the sled and three of my limbs. With one hand still gripping the sled handle, I yardsaled into the snow on the other side of the jump.
"That was awesome!"
I got up, ignored the pain above my right kneecap, and did it again.
I gotta get me some wax.
~ emrys