Roller Skates

My first pair of roller skates were the old, metal kind.  You stuck them on your shod feet, and tightened them to fit by sliding the two pieces just the right distance apart and clamping them in place with a wing nut.  They weighed a ton and their noisy, metal wheels destroyed nice flooring.  I adored them.

I can recall one of the first times I wore my roller skates.  Mom helped me get them on my feet, then sent me directly to the garage, where my dad was doing some wood working on his table saw.  Your uncle Kevin was out there with us.  It was cool out, and it was evening.  I was only just beginning to figure out how to move myself along without falling.  I would push myself from one fixed point to the next, not really moving my feet but just gliding along until I stopped by colliding with another fixed object.  Back and forth in the garage I was doing that.  Back and forth, back and forth...I was going to be good at this activity.

I suppose Kevin was helping.  I guess he was encouraging me to move my feet along, to use one to push myself along while slightly bending my knees and swaying ever so gently to maintain balance and steer myself.  I suppose this is the case because I really don't remember but I do know I eventually was able to do those things.  I did them so well I used to wish roller skating was an Olympic sport because I would own that event!  Just wait till those judges saw me breeze through space backwards while Kool and the Gang Celebrated Good Times.  I could see them all holding up giant "10" placards.  That was to be at least a year from this moment.  At this moment I was pleased to be upright, and marveling at the sheer weight of the contraptions on my feet. 

I have no idea what Kevin was actually doing out there, but I do know dad was ignoring us both.  I think maybe when one has 5 children one learns to tune a lot of things out.  I don't remember what we were talking about but I do remember this:  I was perched upon the garage door when I suddenly needed to go to the bathroom right now.  I can recall seeing the distance between where I stood and the door into the house.  There was a bathroom just inside that door to the right.  But as I stood there the short scoot over there became an unbridgeable chasm.  I froze.  Then Kevin did something hilarious.  I don't know what it was, but I could not.  Stop.  Laughing.  And I could not move from that spot, but my bladder didn't care.  Full is full people, it's not subjective.  Kevin has never been that funny again, I promise you. 

At last I had no choice but to use every bit of arm strength I could muster to push myself from the garage door to the door to the house (and then somehow manage to lift one foot at a time up the single step that led inside).  When I finally managed this monumental task, it was too late.  I was laughing so hard, I peed my pants as I glided across the garage floor in my metal skates.  I left a trail of pee from point A to point B.  My oh-so-helpful brother left stinky me to my own devices, but he was good enough to help with the clean-up.  My memory of that evening ends with the sight of Kevin gingerly grabbing the broom then sweeping the freshly created sawdust from around the table saw into a tidy mountain range along the long line of urine I'd left in my wake.  And that, for me, was Roller Skating: Day One.  On Day Two and every other successive skating day, I'm certain, I visited the loo before donning my skates.