Most of the adults who had lined up to lace their boots for the open session took ice dance lessons, something that did not interest me at the time. However, I observed a stocky gentleman, about my age, teaching adults freestyle skills. I liked his smile, his laugh, and sense of humor. He seemed to have a good rapport with his students. While none of his mature protégés were especially good, I appreciated the way he related to them, encouraging them within sensible boundaries. No one tried axels under his guidance, and no one appeared ready for the challenge. In the lobby, pupils spoke highly of Preston Reece and recommended I leave him my phone number. The next week I did.
Preston smiled broadly, his slightly crooked teeth sparkling with charm. He probably wondered when I would approach someone for instruction. Our appointment set, I decided how to deal with Orry. Taking the coward’s way out, I never confronted Orville, preferring to tell him that I had decided to skate at another rink during the week and take lessons from a pro there, simply because that worked out better for me. My years as a career woman had taught me not to burn bridges and to avoid offending people. Orville’s technique just was not right for me anymore. I did not need to provide him with a list of his flaws and shortcomings. Insulting Orville served no purpose. I could not tell how Orry interpreted our break-up, but only an idiot would not have seen it coming. I had cancelled lessons and questioned his judgment. We were no longer a happy couple.
Crazy Orry grinned at me and said: “Well, okay, Katie. But keep skating. And don’t give up on that axel.”
Maybe Orville thought I had some potential but the only thing on his mind was my stupid, under-rotated, severely retarded axel. Honestly, it was one of the only things on my mind too.
Preston sparked my enthusiasm and my skating began to improve. I may not have been landing harder jumps, but my basics had become more precise. I told Preston that I had been working on the axel and double salchow with my former coach, though I did not experiment with either of these skills in the still unfamiliar surroundings of my new rink. So Preston did not know the status of either jump, but could extrapolate from the available evidence. The conscientious coach busted me all the way back to rudimentary singles. Apparently, my salchows were too swingy, their entrances abrupt and curved. My waltzes suffered from similar ailments. My loop, the trick I learned through osmosis in a healthy environment, required no serious correction. Eventually, Preston helped me to develop it into a monstrous explosion of flight and power. My bowed flip entrance precluded a high or big jump and my lutz required an almost fresh start. I did not try an axel or double for about a year.
My new coach also taught me legitimate moves in the field, starting at the very bottom of the scale, and polishing the simplest spiral to meet test standards. I learned the fine art of edge control by skating inside and outside edge spirals on semi-circles down the length of the rink. I controlled my three turns by fastidiously placing them on a hockey line with the actual turn at the top of the lobe. A cocky adult skater, capable of a pretty good flying camel, might turn up her nose at these skills assuming she can do them automatically. Well, I could not do them on the first try or the second. They took months of work to perfect but built a firm foundation of technique that would eventually lead to more remarkable achievements.
Initially Preston’s return to fundamentals infuriated me, not at him and not necessarily at Orry. However, I was upset that I had wasted time and money developing substandard jumps that should have been scrapped long before. And, yes, I was a little miffed at Orville. He either let my imperfections slide or did not recognize them. Now I was working under someone else’s tutelage, a pro whose resume spoke for itself. Preston Reece had been a competitive Australian singles skater. He had competed in international meets and the Olympic Games. He finished dead last, but he had been there and no one could take that experience away from him. Preston was about my age, in his early thirties. He was still physically fit and enjoyed skating for himself, which usually encompassed demonstrations for his students. He particularly got a thrill out of working with me on spins. I responded well to his ideas for novel combinations and positions. Often both of us would spin side-by-side, trying our luck with one of his concoctions. The ones that worked were probably passed on to his young competitive students. If an adult could nail a spin variation, a kid with unlimited financial resources, practice time, and a more suitable body type could certain elevate a creative spin to new heights.
Preston possessed many admirable qualities, but he was not perfect. He occasionally failed to appear for our lesson appointments, which was especially distressing since I could only attend one open session each week. Preston tried to interest me in Saturdays and late afternoons. I tried one of these sessions once and found it identical to the insane higher freestyles that originally deterred me from this arena. My coach seemed scatterbrained, primarily because he had his fingers in too many pies. Married with a young tomboy daughter, he coached her hockey team in addition to his figure skating duties. He taught skating six days per week, in split shifts that included early mornings before school, adults and home-schooled children at midmorning, then he returned to the rink following a siesta to cash in on the after school crowd, which represented the bulk of young skaters in training. He coached hockey a couple of weeknights and, on Saturdays, worked from the wee hours of the morning through noontime. The rest of the weekend, he was involved in girls’ hockey. Comprehending this mind-boggling schedule exhausted me. I can only image how it disoriented the man who lived it week after week.
Since my coach only saw me once a week, he usually forgot the subject of our last lesson and did not recall whether he had introduced specific elements to me previously. Preston did not keep notes on my progress nor did he seem overly prepared for our meetings. He often greeted me with a toothy grin and “What would you like to work on today?” As I became familiar with Preston’s personality, I learned to take further ownership of my skating future by deciding where I required additional instruction and which elements needed another critique. When in doubt, Preston followed an agenda that worked for most of his adult freestyle students. He simply ran us through the jumps, basic spins, and lower level moves in the field. Preston rarely beat me over the head for an entire half-hour with the pronounced curvature of my salchow entrance. We would correct the entrance with a training drill, such as skating the initiating three-turn on a hockey circle and holding the backward inside edge for what seemed like forever before Preston announced, “Jump!” If an element stumped me, he would tell me to practice it later and moved on to something else.
Preston was a savvy teacher. He never allowed a client to become disgusted. He never belabored a skill that escaped a student. Like Orry, he recognized my spinning aptitude and could turn a bad lesson around by showing me a subtle spin variation that I almost always grasped. This concluded our meeting on a positive note. I may have struggled with one exercise, but succeeded with something else. I was mature enough to practice the problem elements independently, as my coach suggested, and did not merely forget about them the moment he proceeded to his next lesson. Preston kept me happy but not by buttering me up with exaggerated predictions about the axels I would land. I appreciated his honesty. Somewhere in my gut, I knew I was not ready for an axel. I went along with Orry, partially because he was my coach and was supposed to know his business, but also because I relished the image of myself soaring over the ice in a big delayed axel jump.
The atmosphere at the Chestnut Valley Skating Club had spoiled me. Only attending the open session once per week, I slowly began to make friends and find my niche in this skating world. My adult contemporaries took their sport seriously but did not make pompous fools of themselves. They did not sneer at other skaters or shout: “Excuse me!” Skating relieved their stress rather than adding to it. Most importantly, I respected my coach. I did not want to return to Hansie’s Ice Chalet even on Sunday or in the evening, though my skating aptitude could not survive on one morning of practice each week. I usually opted for evenings and maybe a Saturday; preferring, like a wimp, to avoid Orville.
I eventually did call Melissa Kowalckuk, wanting to meet the woman whose imaginary persona had inspired me to stand up like a mature adult and emancipate myself from my silly skating coach. After a few rounds of phone tag, I heard Melissa’s voice, and it did not sound much different than what I remembered from childhood telephone conversations. She seemed happy to hear from me and thanked me for looking her up. I can only describe her as serene, indicating that I still idolized her professorship image and did not personally know her. Had Melissa known me well enough to speak frankly, I might have found her life as muddled as anyone else’s, probably embroiled in university politics and interpersonal issues. Afterward, we continued to maintain loose contact by calling each other once per year, usually around Christmastime. We always had something to talk about, as friends do who only speak on an annual basis. Strangely, she seemed just as interested in my career as I was in hers. Our conversations often terminated with an exchange of warm wishes and the hope to see each other in the future.
“You will have to come for a visit.” Or “Let’s get together sometime”. These were polite words, and they were said with the best intentions, as people say kind things knowing they are unlikely to happen.
I did not attempt to telephone Melissa Kowalchuk again for a few weeks, preferring to preserve an unobstructed mental image of her as the sophisticated university professor I once hoped to be. My personal impression of who Melissa had become inspired me. A buffoon like Orry would not intimidate a self-assured professor of mathematics. A woman of Melissa’s stature would graciously fire him while leaving him feeling good about himself. Yet, I did not approach Orville immediately. One morning each week, I went to the Chestnut Valley Skating Club where I had learned a decent loop jump and watched several coaches instructing their pupils.
Chapter 75 posted 7/1/03
The content of this site is copyright by K. J. N., 1999 - 2003
www.skatejournal.com