December 2006
Week of December 10, 2006
Ready for Freestyle
I have had terrible luck with skating over the past few years, ever since I went back to work fulltime. Between limited ice availability, sessions disappearing for hockey, a rink closing, and finally a broken ankle, it’s a wonder I still persevere. Every time I try to make a commitment in my skating life, something happens. I started taking axel lessons again, and the rink closed. I found a coach and decided to test last summer, and I broke a bone. This fall, I was offered a position teaching group lessons and had to turn it down because I had not recovered from my injury. The job has been given to someone else; and, now that I am stronger, there are no new openings.
The skating director has been very accommodating, allowing me free ice at the back of the rink for physical therapy during group lessons. I gladly accepted his generosity. Of course, he planned hire me on in a few weeks, but enrollment fell short of his expectations and he cannot offer me a position. This week, I went to the rink to partake of a little free ice and was told rather abruptly by another instructor that the lessons were getting too crowded to have other people using the ice. I did not see a crowd, but there was no sense in arguing. I am not there to make trouble or get in the way, and I told the instructor this. I handled the disappointment graciously. She softened to my honesty. I only skated about a half hour.
During this time, I reflected on my return to the ice. I was frustrated by what this instructor told me. Sometimes, I feel that I am fighting a losing battle against ice rinks and schedules. For a moment, I wanted to just pack it in and give up. I am tired of not being able to skate. I am sick of limited ice availability. Even with the injury, I could come back faster if I could skate more, but I am exhausted after work. All of this sounds like a pile of excuses, and maybe that is all it is. But my aggravation is very real. I just cannot log enough hours to get my body and my skills back. My first instinct when this instructor told me my previous arrangement with Kurt could no longer be accommodated, I reacted by getting angry and panicking. When will I skate, some crowded public? On my way in, I saw a flier posted announcing new morning freestyle sessions, one of which is early Saturday. No, I prefer not to get up early on Saturday, but I also want to skate. The universe closed a door, but also opened a window.
I did not rip off my skates and go home, I stayed on the ice for as long as I was allowed. I practiced two-foot spins lifting to one-foot. They felt great. The time had come for me to give it a shot. I entered a one-foot spin cautiously and failed to hook the three-turn. My ankle did not flex as it should. So, I tried again. This time, I forced myself to bend more. If it hurt, I would stop. It did not hurt; my leg performed the way it should. I just had to push myself beyond my comfort zone. A few minutes later, I did an attitude spin and a layback. The layback was sad, and my lower back felt the strain, but I held the rotation on a leg that refused to function a few months ago.
In the glass barriers, I watched myself complete a backward attitude spin. I admired the elegance of my own position. My free leg curved gracefully behind me and my arms extended with the poise of a ballerina. Maybe I cannot skate during group lessons anymore, but I thanked Kurt for the opportunity and told him it really helped with my recovery. Now I am prepared for freestyle again. I reminded him I would still like to teach should circumstances change in the future. I’m back and I’m ready.
Saturday December 16, 2006
Early Morning
Last night, I went to the YMCA where I rode an exercise bicycle and participated in a water aerobics class. Water aerobics, low impact form of cardiovascular exercise, has become part of my life again. It is certainly not the most rigorous workout, but I tried a traditional floor aerobics class a few weeks ago, and my ankle swelled terribly afterward. Low impact floor aerobics would probably be an acceptable alternative, if I can work it into my schedule once in a while. For now, water aerobics on Friday evenings is perfect. I can relieve the week’s stress and go (guilt-free) out for dinner after a hot shower.
On Friday night, I want to stay up late. I have to get up at 5:30 every morning for work and relish being able to sleep in on the weekend. However, a nearby rink has an early morning freestyle on Saturdays. Since I have been expelled from the group session ice time for supposedly being in the way, I have to find another opportunity to skate. Fortunately, my last practice left me feeling confident about setting bladed-foot on a freestyle. I arrived at the rink in the pitch-dark before the slightest ray of dawn. That alone makes a person feel like a "real skater". Someone else was in the parking lot with a kid in the car. No one had come to open the rink yet. I almost drove past the place. Not even the sign was illuminated, much less the building. The place presents a perfect target for vandalism. I got out of my car and stretched right there in the parking lot. Shameless I am with my foot propped up on the car’s trunk loosening my hamstrings.
A guy came, opened the door, and I walked in before the lights had a chance to warm up. The computers weren’t even booted yet, so no one could take my money. I shoved my feet in my skates and went out on the ice. I could not ask for a better session. Only a few low freestyle kids shared the ice, and all but one of them for a fraction of the session. I skated the entire two hours.
My warm up now consists of swizzles, various swizzle pumps on the hockey circles, stroking, gliding, forward inside and outside swing rolls, change edge swing rolls, and chassé steps. Crossovers have become advanced material, though backward is the easier variant. Today I made a giant improvement by doing forward cross rolls. My spins have become more secure, and I feel comfortable experimenting. I did attitude spins, laybacks, and finally a camel; all on my injured leg. The camel presented an important challenge, one that will lead to the return of all of my spinning skills. It is virtually impossible to do a camel without hooking the entrance three-turn. My damaged ankle does not want to flex deeply, an absolute necessity for the fabled hook. My first camel looped around in a few big circles. Yuck. I forced the next one. If I don’t push myself beyond my comfort zone, I will stagnate forever. My toe pick bit into the ice, anchored the camel, and it turned on a perfect little circle for at least seven enjoyable rotations. I only managed to repeat this triumph a couple of times. I am determined to succeed and refuse to back off. After a failed camel, I glanced at the clock. Only ten minutes remained before Zamboni time. I told myself I have ten minutes to do another good camel. Fortunately, it did not take that long, and I could devote the rest of my precious time to squeezing a recognizable flip jump out of my body.
During this session, I also tried a toe loop and a waltz jump. For now, these elements require too much twisting of the foot, which might send a message that I am not jumping straight enough. However, I prefer to work on elements that are within my immediate grasp before pushing myself unnecessarily and worsening my condition. I have plenty to do in the meanwhile.
Hey, this is becoming fun again!
Week of December 17, 2006
Bad Karma
Here we go again. Yet another session has been cancelled out from under me. I have had nothing but bad luck with skating sessions for the last few years. Sessions cancelled, rinks closed, ankle broken, job offer to coach when I can barely walk, and now this. I thought I had hit the jackpot with an early morning freestyle. Yes, it was very early for a weekend when I prefer to sleep-in after working all week, but it was worth the sacrifice. I called the rink to find out if the session would be offered over the holiday weekends, fully expecting that it probably would not, but in the unlikely event that it were, I would rise before dawn to skate.
Kurt, the skating director, explained that attendance for the session was not profitable. Parents had even cussed at him for canceling the only convenient game in town. However, Kurt told me guest coaches who utilized that session had solicited students away from the rink and otherwise behaved unprofessionally. After the dust settled, only five or six regulars showed up to skate those wee hours. Those coaches have been banned from teaching at this facility, but the damage has been done. Kurt said the session may be reintroduced later if more people become involved in figure skating. Sadly, enrollment in lessons is still low and he cannot offer me a teaching job.
I must have really screwed up in a past life.
So now where am I? After the holidays, I will scope out a couple of rinks near my place of employment to see what they offer. I am in shape for freestyle again and want to build my skills back. However, the odds just seem stacked against me. I am also thinking of returning to roller skating in the park or at an indoor roller rink, as I did a several years ago. With my ankle still not one hundred percent, I do not feel comfortable running on the street and want to check with my doctor and his trusty x-ray machine before I start pounding away. In the meantime, I ride an exercise bike and do water aerobics. And I’m very frustrated and discouraged.
Week of December 24, 2006
You Never Forget How to…
“You never forget how to ride a bicycle” is a popular saying, probably the most well-know cliché related to sports, but I have not spent a lot of time listing sports clichés. My version of this theory relates to another athletic activity: “you never forget how to skate”. This is evidenced by adults returning to the sport who skated as children and went on hiatus for a decade or two or three. These people stroke and carry themselves the first time back on the ice better than many adult-trained skaters who have invested a fortune in ice time and private coaching. I was never trained as a child skater. I skated recreationally and was self-taught, mostly on traditional roller skates. But I grew up on roller skates in the same way that many young people grow up riding a bicycle around the neighborhood as a primary mode of under-age transportation. So, I was never much of a cyclist, even as a kid. Since then, my biking has been limited to stationary bikes as a form of routine exercise. I actually like the recumbent style bikes that allow me to sit in a chair and read a book while I pedal.
My husband grew up on a bicycle riding from one friend’s house to another and even to part-time jobs as a high school student. He even had a quaint little paper route as a young boy. He has continued to bicycle as a form of exercise on the street rather than in the gym. He tried many times to get me on a bike, so we could take rides together. Confession: I was afraid. Not being an expert cyclist even in the dark reaches of my youth, I do not feel confident on a bike. I gave him the excuse that I prefer to jog. That was before I injured my ankle. And I sincerely do love to jog. I miss jogging. I stare longingly at people who run down the street while I am driving to work. I watch them on the treadmills at the gym while I pedal an exercise bike. I even got on the treadmill once and jogged slowly for a quarter mile. I am one of those nuts who loves to run. However, my ankle does not need the pounding, and I have restricted my activities to lower impact forms of exercise.
This Christmas, we returned to Paradise Village in Nuevo Vallarta, Mexico, the heaven-on-earth resort that has a tiger breeding program. Last year, I made regular morning “tiger runs” to the entrance of the resort to view the mother tiger caring for her kittens. With the airline tickets purchased, I thought about establishing a goal. I should be able to jog out to the tigers. But my body is simply not ready for that challenge. Road running pounds my injured joint too much. So, I packed my quad roller skates as an alternative that went unused. We discovered that bicycles are available for members to borrow free of charge. My husband and I could bike out to the tiger habitat together and ride around the golf course looking at the exquisite views and fabulous new vacation housing construction.
I got my butt on a bicycle. I cannot say “I never forgot how to ride a bicycle”, because I apparently did, not that I was ever a candidate for Le Tour de France anyway. But I pushed off, pedaled and carefully propelled myself down the street. At first I was very slow and cautious, testing the breaks and practicing stopping and turning. We took several such rides. I love being outside in the warm sunshine, my back tanning and my hair rippling around my face. I enjoyed the freedom of stopping and taking in a beautiful view or wandering through a golf course home under construction. If I won the lottery, I know exactly which one I would buy.
The tigers were lovely, although there were no cubs this year. However, I met a charming young black leopard who rolled on her back and trilled at her visitors. And as for that golf course palace, we are looking into buying a condo in our price range. As a special bonus, I also know how to ride a bicycle and look forward to including biking in my exercise routine.
Tuesday December 26, 2006
Tennis Courts Anyone?
Alright, I am guilty of skating on a tennis court. However, these courts were not clay or some other sacred material, but painted concrete as evidenced by the obvious patch of cement over a crack on the far side. The wheels of my outdoor quad skates could do nothing to damage them. The resort in Nuevo Vallarta has a couple of lightly used courts right outside our building. No signs are posted forbidding skating or any other racquet-less activity. Early in the morning, before dawn, I went outside with my quad skates tucked under my arm. Three big cat habitats abut the courts. The cougars can watch tennis all day if they don’t fall asleep first, which they always do. However, ivy climbs the fences of the tiger enclosures blocking the big cats’ view of the action. The tigers can peak through openings in the vegetation at the bottom of the fencing but are used to tennis and rarely waste their time.
A person rolling around on the courts in the dark presented the felines with a new stimulus. Every cat watched me. The tigers crouched and peered curiously through the openings in the ivy to watch this bizarre human do something worth a damn on those expanses of green and red concrete. At this early hour the courts were not lit, but stray light from the resort buildings cast vague shadows over my skating surface. My husband had come to watch and help me get to my feet. I had not roller skated since my roller dance interlude almost three years ago. Even more time has past since my last outdoor skating experience. I stood up on the chunky plastic wheels and discovered that I did not know what to do and could not move. I stood there for a while completely befuddled. Finally, I marched a couple of steps like a tiny tot in a group class. That got me to the net. I pulled myself along the net, skimming it with my hand for security. After traversing the courts a few times, I swizzled and two-foot slalomed then finally stroked and scooter pumped in big circles and figure eights. I did not do a crossover, but I have not done a crossover on quad skates since I was a teenager.
Gliding felt good. The concrete was magically smooth. My husband kicked a coconut into the bushes so I would not trip over the offending botanical in the dark. The coconut won the prize for the strangest rink obstacle encountered during my long history of skating. I managed to amuse the tigers for about five or ten minutes and skated for a total of about thirty. That period of time was sufficient to raise my heart rate and work my leg muscles. I felt pleasantly sore afterward.
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