Yesterday my son had a birthday party to go to. It was a skate party at the local elementary school gym/roller rink. It was his first time roller skating and (not that I’m biased or anything) he did really well. He did not fall nearly as much as he could have. The guy behind the counter tightened the chucks (that’s what they’re called, right?) so that the wheels weren’t speed racer fast. That helped a LOT. Before that he looked like a cartoon with sort of a blur of legs followed by a thump.
Once he’d been going for a while, I tried to give him a couple of pointers as to how to make it a glide more than a rolling run. But, he wasn’t having any of it. So, in the interest of happy birthday’s and happy future skating we shelved any skating lessony stuff for later. Cool.
I love roller skating. Once upon a time, my friends and I would skate all over the Canyon where we lived. I remember barreling down one street, ducking down to catch the lower bar of a metal fence thing and let our feet continue on and fly out from under us. We climbed up and down the epic staircases that line the sides of the Canyon to get to and from each other’s houses. But, that was long ago and far away. When we moved away from LA, I never lived in a place where skating was convenient. We moved to more rural places where dirt and gravel roads were more common. It became impossible to just skate out the front door. It became more of an ordeal to go to a place to skate. And so it fell by the wayside. I remember a few nights skating at the VFW hall in my teen years, but really when we left the concrete jungle for the woods of the northwest one casualty was roller skating.
So, in essence, I have not skated in 25 years. Until yesterday.
What I learned from my 15 minutes of skating yesterday was:
I am a big, old, chicken.
I am no longer fearless. I do not currently have, and would like to rekindle, abandon. I was scared of falling and ill equiped physically to keep myself from doing so. I will have to put skating on the list of things I will be doing when I’ve whipped myself into better shape.
I look forward to it.
***
Yesterday was also girls night out. We went to chinese food for dinner. Yum. Then we went to a bar for some drinks and conversation and dancing. Well, some of us danced. Unfortunately, my dance partner is an extremely early riser and so was forced to abandon me early in the night. We had a good time nonetheless. Met new people, renewed old acquaintances, and enjoyed each others company well into the night. Of course, I cannot stay out all night as I once did. I don’t really miss it. I got home around 12-12:30ish and went to bed after 1. Pretty late for me these days. Somebody (I won’t mention names-child) woke me up at 7 o’clock. Which I think was a little too early. But, I guess it’ll have to do. Now to take my test online for Health class and write up my report for that same class. Back to the ol’ grindstone for me. Hope your weekend has been as fun as mine.
Happy Sunday!
Today I am grateful for…..midori……sir mixalot…….new friends …….old(er) friends …. and ….. music.
Brook Art Human. A story, a yarn, a line, a shape 
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