Things About Roller Skating

Natalee is turning 16 tomorrow. Sixteen. Sweet 16. A top-end teenager. Which means I only have one young kid left. The rest are all old.

For her 16th birthday party, we went roller skating. We took a good percentage of her class from school, along with some relatives and friends from other grades, for a sum total of 19 people, to the roller rink in Spokane, where we skated our collective buns off.

That's right, WE skated. WE including (but not limited to) me, myself and I. I skated THE WHOLE TIME. All three hours I skated. I swooped and circled, I chicken danced and limboed and even tried to do the cupid shuffle on roller skates, which is a terrible idea if I ever heard one. Especially when he says "freeze!" and all you can do is fall on your face on top of several small children who were in front of you and apparently know how to stop instantly on 8 rolling wheels of plastic. I was just happy during one sequence when I got a "hop" and a "right stomp" in appropriately. My left stomps always turned into a weird rolling recovery sequence of waving my arms foolishly in the air for several minutes. Turns out I am NOT an ambi-stomper on roller skates.

My ankles hurt within about 45 seconds of roller skating, which is important to note since my sister with the perpetually broken ankle and detached tendons, etc, etc, etc, skated THE WHOLE TIME too. She probably isn't speaking to me or anyone this morning, if she is still alive. I almost wasn't alive. If hips were capable of murder, mine would have killed me in my sleep. Instead, they collaborated with my lower back to exact harsh punishment on me today.

I am not sure which was more fun, watching the adults (i.e. me) flailing around like wanton scarecrows, or getting to witness my three nephews on roller skates for the first time ever in their whole lives. It was pretty much a perpetual dogpile with wheels on top. Roller skating is a sport where no one can actually take themselves seriously, which might make it my most favorite sport ever. Check your ego at the door, y'all. Even you - that middle aged couple doing constant couples skate routines - I see your potential for imminent disaster behind those clever hand movement that mask your instability, you don't fool me. Admittedly, I thought I was pretty cool at 11 years old when I won an Amy Grant record doing the Hokey Pokey at homeschool skate night. Far cooler than my sister who won Sandy Patti doing the limbo. Even homeschoolers don't like Sandi Pattie. For heavens sake. Did they think it was grandmother skate night?

The best part about it was that my Fitbit app says that three hours of roller skating burns approximately 1288 calories. One thousand two hundred and eighty eight calories. Twelve hundred and 88 calories. That's so many. I could have had two pieces of cake if I wanted. Why does running, which feels like torture, burn like 5 calories an hour, but roller skating burns over 400? Roller skating is FUN you guys! If it wasn't, I would have quit like 37 minutes in. But it's super fun! I would go every day if I could, and after awhile, I would beat Em at the limbo, win the races AND probably defeat my ex husband in a professional couples skate dancing competition (more on this, contact Josh Weston). Not to mention ROLLER DERBY!!!!

I drove home alternately whimpering in pain and plotting how to get a grant to build a roller rink in Northport. I am sure that somebody is dying to give away a couple hundred thousand to get kids and housewives off of the streets and onto 8 wheels.

Addendum: A friend of mine posted this on Facebook about the same time I posted this blog, it seems appropriate...

"That thing you want to do that makes no sense on paper that everyone says is ridiculous? Go ahead. Because I tap danced while wearing roller skates. So there." - Gene Kelly