After finishing high school, I realized I could not earn money in the immediate future as a skater or in the skating business; although, I had not entirely given up hope of someday owning a rink or becoming an instructor. The dream of competing and going to the Olympics as an artistic roller skater dissipated. Presumably, I came to accept my parents’ inflexible and mysterious decision that would effect the rest of my life. My father had explained the decision financially. He did not have enough money to send us to college and provide us with skating lessons. I graduated from high school a year early in the hope that my parents would keep their supposed word and literally “send me away to college” so I could flee from their constant bickering and my mother’s tyranny. However, when the time came to apply for admission, I did not have to option to go away to school, unless I could pay for it myself. I attended the local State College and commuted from home. Fortunately, my parents did not force me to pay rent. I knew other young people whose vindictive, unhappy folks eagerly collected a small sum from them every month for the honor of living in their childhood bedrooms while pursuing higher education.

The joy of college for me was getting out of the house. While I could not live in the dormitory, I did stay away all day and into the evening. I viewed college as an excuse to be independent rather than for the sake of study itself. Like many teenagers, I rebelled from my parents’ oppressive grip. I did not have a clear plan of how to prepare for the future, nor did I understand the value of making the most of my university education. I focused on escape, friends and searching for love. I wasted precious decisions that should have been made for my own benefit to aggravate my mother. To exert my personal power, I did the opposite of whatever she and my father said. Of course, some of their advice was good. However, given their track record, I turned a deaf ear to whatever they suggested. Anyone who could deny my opportunity to learn to spin and jump, did not have my best interests at heart.

I entered college a resentful, lonely young woman. When most adolescents embrace possibilities, I picked up the pieces of dreams that could never be fulfilled and struggled to deal with my own emotions and confusion. In high school, I excelled at foreign language. Before graduation, I received a district achievement award. My teacher had been a fortuitous positive influence on me. Without her, I might have turned my back on school entirely. I thought I could get a degree in language studies and teach high school. Therefore, I began my university years as a Foreign Language major assuming college French would be as easy as a high school course.

Although I was never the sharpest tack in the box, I was endowed with a decent amount of mental acuity. However, the menial amount of effort I invested to excel in high school was not sufficient to dazzle the foreign language department of a state university. The courses were considerably more difficult as I became involved in thorough study of French. Never a fan of English literature, I did not enjoy reading literature in French either. While I thought I was simply too young to understand symbolism in classic works, there was always one kid in the class who could pick it out. Whether this person had previous experience, a study guide or raw genius; I did not know. However, I felt incompetent by comparison. I spoke, read and wrote French beautifully for an intermediate student. I readily adopted the accents of native speaking professors. Lost in an enormous system that processed students rather than coddled them individually, no one encouraged my progress or cared about my capabilities. Undoubtedly, in a department that trained hundreds of students every year, I was not exceptional. By the time my curriculum diversified to include Russian, I became discouraged and restless. After flirting with the notion of spending a semester in what was still the Soviet Union, I dropped out of the foreign language program, bewildered and directionless.

Foreign language study did not fill the void left by adolescent skating ambitions. Nor did it provide me with the attention I needed to feel special and important. I still fantasized about skating and longed to find someone who would make me the center of his world. During my first semester, I met a young man ten years my senior. He was an attractive fellow from my ballet class. I took ballet to improve my posture for skating. As a full-time student, the luxury of a ballet class offered through the physical education department did not cost extra. The man took the class to meet young women, and I was undoubtedly the youngest of the group. My father actually allowed me to go on a date with this person.

Wanting to win my affections, he took me skating. At the roller rink, I changed into a leotard and skating skirt that I wore with my old pair of leather skates. As a college freshman, I was at the zenith of my ability as a roller skater, just before my life became too busy and complicated for continued growth as an athlete. Later my date made a comment about how sexy I looked gliding around with my butt hanging out of my leotard. This was my first experience with the behavior of single adult males. I was horrified that all he cared about was my body and not the fact that I could do back camels. At his age and stage of life, watching a supple teenage figure stretch and spin heightened his hormonal level. I was too inexperienced to understand the advances of a grown man and probably should not have dated him. I never went out with him again and refused to take his phone calls. While he desired physically intimate companionship, I wanted a fairytale with a prince closer to my own age with whom I could grow and share common experiences.

During the summer, I enjoyed a romance that consumed my adolescent emotions. I hoped Jonathan and I would get married and move to Sacramento to attend college together. Unfortunately, Jonathan was just as lost as I was during those years. He and I both worked in a restaurant and spent every possible free moment together outlining ridiculously unobtainable goals. He wanted to design automobiles but had fooled around in high school sacrificing his chances of being admitted to the State University. He would have to prove himself in a community college first. His parents supported him even less than mine supported me. They occupied the low end of the middle class income distribution and needed the small amount of rent they demanded of their son to live in the relative privacy of their basement.

Jonathan liked to dream but lacked the discipline necessary to work toward his ambitions. When he went to the community college to sign up for a night course, he returned saying he could not enroll because he forgot to bring a pen to fill out the forms. While I lacked focus and confidence, my boyfriend could not have found his ass if he had a tail to lift. We made a perfect pair. Neither had the strength to motivate or encourage the other. Getting married would have been the worst thing for both of us. We would have drowned in self-pity or dropped out of school due to economic necessity. Perhaps Jonathan deserves some credit. He left me to join the Army when the fall semester started and I returned to my classes. He did not promise to send for me or carry on a long-distance relationship. He just told me he was going, and he left within a couple of weeks. I heard from him once while he was stationed in North Carolina but never again.

I treated Jonathan’s abrupt departure as rejection; although, he had to do what was best for him to gain employment skills and financing for further education. All I comprehended was that he did not really love me either. Poor Jonathan could not provide me with love and support when he had so few resources to invest in himself. Some people are capable of genuine lasting love before the age of twenty, but most are still experimenting with their emotions and trying to prepare for life as independent adults. I probably did not truly love Jonathan either. I felt comforted by the prospect of facing challenges with a mate. Life seemed less intimidating with Jonathan by my side.

To his credit, Jonathan convinced me to sign up for a sewing class in the fall. We went roller skating together once and I wore the purple, skirted leotard that I made with Zoë. Impressed that I had sewn the little frock myself, he complimented my talent and suggested I pursue it. Since childhood, I liked pretty things. This could have been an offshoot of my interest in skating. I wanted a skating outfit and had to stitch my own. I admired fancy, frilly dresses and was fascinated by brides. My mother watched beauty pageants, and I adored the tiaras and evening gowns. That sewing class rekindled my interest in lovely clothing and accessories.

The sewing class opened a new world of possibilities to me. At the age of eighteen, I could not be considered an expert seamstress and my work reflected obvious lack of practice. I became bored with the repetitive exercises that taught us how to correctly install a zipper, a welt pocket, a waistband or some other construction detail. Instead, I became engrossed in the pattern books and fashion magazines. I started to sketch my own apparel designs. Surprisingly, I never sketched a skating costume while in college. I drew gowns and bridal ensembles. Apparent artifacts of my childhood fascination with glamour, my bridal designs were also a manifestation of the need for love. While the sewing class was a positive force directing me toward a new major and potential career, it also refocused my attention on searching for a mate. Since Jonathan was not the right man for me, I renewed my search for the man who would want to marry me.

I declared a Fashion and Textiles major and found part-time employment in a bridal salon. If I ever had an impractical thought it was not on skates but in college. I wanted to design wedding apparel. If I could not become a skater, I had to do something else beautiful with my life. I was too idealistic and naive to seek career counseling to establish a grasp on which degrees were marketable, allowed flexibility, could earn a decent salary and so on. It may sound like a contradiction that I wish I had sought advice about career paths in college but would not listen to my parents when they explained skating was a bad risk. What I needed was advice from an unbiased mentor. Computer science would have been the sensible choice for a university student in the early to mid-eighties as the personal computer revolution was just beginning. I would also have been able to earn ample money for ice time and private instruction.

When my parents did not encourage me to become a designer, I was not surprised. My father said very little about my academic choices. He was glad I was in college. At least I was getting some sort of education. My mother handled it differently. She mocked my designs and said I would never succeed as a designer. Granted, my first sketches were not excellent. While her comments stung, I learned to ignore her. Perhaps I stayed in the fashion program, rather than pursuing a more practical major, as an act of defiance. I gained a small measure of delight when I disobeyed my mother and did what pleased me.

Bridal salons are not good places to meet men, but science classes were. Afraid to be completely frivolous, I decided to concentrate on textile science with a minor in fashion design. Therefore, my major required that I take a few courses in chemistry and mathematics. At least I gained some fundamental background. After completing my initial sewing class, I dove into my new major the next semester enrolling in general chemistry, calculus, pattern drafting and textile science. In the chemistry lab, I met a young fellow who loved plants the way I loved fashion. Devin hoped to work for the forest service after completing his biology major. A few years older than me, he also wanted a storybook romance.

I remember our time together fondly. We often studied on the lawn outside the science building. He admired my sketches and encouraged my creative ideas. I helped him with chemistry homework. That semester I discovered my talent for textile science and chemistry. Not a mathematical genius, I managed to survive calculus. After working at the bridal shop, I often went to Devin’s house. His mother made dinner and we studied or went out to the mall or for a movie. Devin also took me skating. He lived near the roller rink where I occasionally skated as a high school student. He took pride in my skating and bragged about how good I was. Devin filled my neediness. He genuinely adored me. Devin’s emotional support of my skating motivated me to invest time at the roller rink. During our first semester together, I had a couple of free mornings per week, so I went to the rink to practice. This phase did not last long because my course load soon demanded that I study for midterm examinations and prepare term projects. Until the classes became overwhelming, I passed free mornings at the rink.

On one of those happy rink mornings, I met a young woman a couple of years older than me who skated competitively. She admitted that her career as a competitive skater was drawing to a close and she would have to turn professional soon or find another way to support her skating habit. I started talking to Lucinda by remarking on the beauty of one of her camel spins. She asked where I usually skated since she only saw me recently at the rink. She glanced at my inappropriate skates, but Lucinda was too polite to comment. I told her I practiced in my parents’ garage. When I admitted that I did not take lessons, she asked how I learned to do a camel. “By watching people like you,” I explained. The young woman forced a smile. She felt sorry for me but tried to conceal her pity. As a serious skater, she had seen many young people wearing recreational skates pass through the rink. Most circled the wooden surface methodically while talking to friends, trying not to fall or holding hands with their dates. Some gawky teens inevitably attempted sloppy two-foot spins from indelicate spread eagle entries. Few did camels, illusions and salchows.

I questioned Lucinda about jumps and spins, fascinated to meet a skater who was not a condescending brat. She complained about the difficulty of the jumps and admitted to never completely mastering the axel and landing her double salchow only sporadically. Artistic roller skating was never a televised sport, so I could not measure her skills against those of other roller skaters. However, I knew this level of ability compared unfavorably to what I saw in televised ice skating events. Even in the early eighties, women did triple jumps. The young woman looked embarrassed as she divulged her meager competencies. As though making an excuse, she truthfully explained that roller skates are much heavier and more awkward than ice skating blades.

My meeting with Lucinda did not blossom into friendship. I only saw her a couple of times before she took time off to evaluate her options. When she returned to the rink, if she ever did, I had changed my schedule to accommodate midterm study.

During the four or six weeks I spent roller-skating, I never took a lesson. Although I worked, I did not have much money. I saved to pay back my father for the used car he bought that allowed me commute to school and find a job. I never seriously considered committing to lessons or purchasing quality skates. From what Lucinda told me, I would have to work for two hours at the bridal salon to pay for a thirty-minute lesson. More than concern about the expense, I realized my window of competitive opportunity had closed years before. At that time, adult figure skating was not popular. Although adults disco skated on Saturday nights, I was too young to be admitted to a nightclub. Basically a beginner at eighteen, I assumed I was too old to be taken seriously by a coach, who probably would prefer to work with young talents. Certainly a coach would have accepted my money had I chosen to make the investment. The moment passed and I spent my time preparing for tests and working on projects for my pattern drafting class.

As the semester closed, I forfeited my “A” in chemistry by staying out late with Devin the night before the final. Both of us dreaded that standardized test. Although Devin took general chemistry before at a community college and did not pass, he felt just as ill prepared for his second venture. Avoiding the problem by going out for pizza and a movie did not help us to review for our exam. When I finally got home, I crammed all night and managed a few hours of sleep before driving to the campus. Tired and disoriented, my foolishness negated my hard work in that class. My “A” became a “B minus”, and Devin failed his second attempt at general chemistry.

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