First on skates practice for the year and looking back

Wow! It's been so long since I've written on here! This fall was a blast! There have been a lot of changes in how Debs is run as the group has grown. Today was the first on skates practice for the session. The trainers decided to eliminate the wait list and invite everyone on it to sign up. There are so many new skaters! It's amazing how many people have decided to join us.

I was greatly reminded of my first practice. Or at least the feelings of the first practices. Except, I wasn't the one who didn't know anyone. I can imagine how overwhelming it must have felt for some of the really new skaters. I wanted to give them all hugs and tell them that they would survive the first day and start to thrive! There was also this desire to tell them to get lower and to not look at the floor. The floor lies and if you squat down as much as possible, you don't fall as far. In the end, I kept quiet as I'm not a trainer or a draft pool member. Instead, I've come home to blog about that desire. To be able to tell them that it's alright that it all seems scary because we've all been there! I never imagined when I was there that I'd one day be not there as I was such a bad skater. Never did I think I would improve to the point that I could see things and know better to hold my tongue at the time. I remember how intimidating it was to have other skaters who weren't trainers trying to offer me advice.

There was another way that I was reminded of my early days on skates. Today was a day of falling. The awesome part was that I wasn't falling because I was struggling to stand up. I was falling because I was doing really hard things. Hockey stops and I are yet to become friends. I decided that instead of taking it slow and easy, I would use some speed and see if I could get them to work. I almost succeed at them, kind of. We also learned a new stop to use while skating backwards. I believe it was called a power stop or something like that. That was also rather awkward. I'm pretty sure that there were a few times when my body decided that it wasn't happy with me for not getting around to skating or working out since the end of the fall session. As we were skating backwards, there were a few times that I went down. Every time, I managed to get back up! Recoveries have gotten so much easier! Trainers tell you that it's all about muscle memory but it's completely different when it actually happens!

One of the "new" skaters this session is actually an old skater. She was involved in the very first session of Debs and it's wonderful to be skating with her again. After practice, we chatted briefly. She commented that she went away for two years and suddenly snow plows are suppose to be narrow and there and single sided plows and power stops. My response back was that I remember when Wet Spot was also a trainer and not just a track maintenance guy and that there were two whistles to start every jam. This made me feel a bit old, almost like a grandmother of sorts. There are now skaters who have only just seen their first out last night. I've known about derby since 2006 (sort of; I knew people doing it and heard them speak strange things about practice) and I've been actively skating since 2010. In a week, it'll be my 6th anniversary of going to a roller rink for the first time. It's amazing how much has changed in 6 years. I'm really happy that I've kept up with Debs. There was the one year I took off because life got too crazy but it was never far from my dreams. I'm okay if I never make a team and only do derby as a recreational member. I've made so many new friends and finally found my sport. And maybe, one day, I'll be skating low enough that a trainer tells everyone to get as low as Ferret. And I'll be able to dance like Gene Kelly or Ginger Rogers or Fred Astaire in roller skates.