This is #15 from my Live 100 list.
Ok, so when I was a kid I remember having roller blades in our garage but I was always too scared of falling. So I never really tried. And for years after that I always told people “I don’t do sports with things under my feet”. So I wouldn’t ice skate. I wouldn’t ski. I wouldn’t skate board. Now, in my defense, falling when you are 6’5″, is not the same as a regular person falling. So anytime friends would go to the skating rink, or there was some sort of activity ice skating, I always found a good excuse for not going.
Well, now I have kids, and I have seen some of those same fears in their eyes. So, this summer, I told myself and the kids it was time to learn how to roller blade. No matter what. At first they did complain and say they didn’t know how and didn’t want to, but I told them I was learning too and we would do it together.
My biggest fear was falling on my elbow, or on my knees hard or something. So I bought a full set of pads for me and the kids. The first thing we all did was go to a local gym and just practice falling on those. That made them a bit more open to the idea of putting roller blades on. So we bought some used and started going to the gym to practice. (Side note: trying to find size 13 roller blades is basically impossible. For some reason all roller blade manufacturers decided size 12 was good enough for the world. Feels like collusion to me…). Starting on a gym floor was actually really great because it’s super flat and there are no rocks.
We have been practicing off and on for a couple of months now. We are all pretty decent on flat ground, but still have yet to master how to stop. Not sure why that’s been so difficult, but it makes it hard to do anything but flat surfaces. The other week we challenged each other to jump off a curb. So we can try jumping off curbs but still can’t stop haha.
I’m proud of the kids, and really happy with myself for getting so much better at something I’ve been afraid of for years. So roller blading; one way we all got a little taller this summer.
