"Even Olympians have to start somewhere," I said, helping the second-graders into their hats, mittens, coats and snowpants before we left the classroom to cross-country ski, something most of them had never done before. It was snowing hard and 30 degrees, so I worried that the gear more suited to sledding would overheat them.

Then again, most of the hour and forty-five minutes allotted for skiing would be spent fitting boots, finding matching skis and poles, clipping in, and then undoing it all and replacing the equipment on the racks in the storage room off the school's ceramic studio.

But my daughter, who is the second grade teacher, said we'd ski for an hour and have time for hot cocoa before the end of the day. Miss Eliza (as she is called) assigned each adult five children to dress, ski with, and then return safely to the classroom. (In addition to the two of us, she enlisted a friend visiting from Juneau and a student's father.)

She saved us time, and no doubt bloodshed, by not handing out the poles. She reckoned that learning to balance properly on skis was easier without the temptation of whacking each other with pointy sticks.

With our help, almost all of the children managed to locate fitting boots and skis and put them on in record time.

My five boys were out the door first, but Miss Eliza and the other two volunteers said they'd watch them if I would help a girl who was having difficulty following instructions. She sat on a table with her arms firmly folded, frowning. She was mad that she couldn't use poles or find boots that fit.

She wore a spiffy, fur-trimmed silver jacket and black snowpants with bare feet sticking out the bottom. I told her to put on her socks. She said she never wears socks and had already had one recess outside without them.

I know her well enough to know it is difficult to win an argument with her. "You may not need socks with your own boots, but ski boots are different. I have a feeling you might be the best skier in the class but we won't find out unless you put your socks on," I reasoned. She was unmoved.

So I said if she didn't wear socks, I would get in big trouble with the principal when she caught pneumonia or gangrene from an infected blister, and that the resulting medevac flight to Anchorage, along with a week in the hospital, would cost so much I'd have to sell my house to pay for it.

She looked at me hard, and then said she didn't have any socks. There was a wet one on the floor by the boots, but I couldn't find its mate, so I ran up to the office and fished a pair out of the lost and found.

We caught up with the rest of the class out on the field, and after falling about ten times, my now less grumpy friend agreed to follow me for a lap, and step from side to side on each ski rather than run on them, until she felt comfortable. Halfway around she passed me.

She crashed a few more times, mostly on the hill, and once, her skis became so cockeyed that I took one off to help her up. She did not say any bad words, and I told her I appreciated her self-control. She stepped into the rogue ski, patted the snow off, and zoomed away, with her unzipped jacket flapping in the waving curtain of snow.

The next time I caught up with her, she announced that we should ski more often.

I told her she could grow up to be in the Olympics like another Alaska girl, Kikkan Randall. She had never heard of her. "She's kind of like you, strong-willed and energetic. She ran cross-country in school. You should do that when you get older." The children in Haines do know about cross-country running, since we have a school team.

(There is no organized skiing for kids in Haines. Buying good skis and, more recently, snowshoes for the school is a big first step toward more outdoor winter fun, as are the skating rink at the fairgrounds and the ski loop on the golf course, both maintained by volunteers.)

I told her about the time the kids from Haines were in a running race with Kikkan and her East High Thunderbirds. Kikkan's team looked scary in their flashy uniforms. Kikkan wore sunglasses, and her blonde hair was dyed bright colors. Now, she favors a pink stripe. Her nickname is "Kikkanimal."