In Love with my Eights

Hello out there in the blog world!  I am absolutely thrilled to be writing a regular old blog post.  No more off topic entries or horror stories about my injuries.  In short, I took two months off following my accident in September.  It sucked, I hated not skating.  But I was messed up and needed the break.  Now I am finally working again and yes, skating again.  People close to me are alarmed and concerned.  My doctor's advice was to "please, please never roller skate again".  Sigh.  Where's the sense of adventure?  I am so passionate about skating, there's no way I can stop.  Sorry, worrywarts.

It's hard to describe just how great it is to skate again.  I guess it's because of the forced break, it's made me appreciate it so much more.  Feels JUST AMAZING.  The first few weeks were understandably shaky.  I definitely have lost some of my confidence.  But it's not scary - what is scary is backwards skating since that's how I got hurt.  Session skating and roller dancing, I haven't hurt myself doing those things so I have no fear.  But after the initial few weeks, my confidence is back where it was and I feel like a million bucks when I'm on my wheels.

As for backwards, I am really afraid of it.  In some ways, I just want to forget how to do  it so I can relearn the skill.  Obviously I was doing something wrong.  My friends want to help me.  I have done some very, very slow and careful stuff.  What I have done is backwards couple skating, lots of that.  It may sound silly but I feel safer with a partner. If I were to fall back, I would land on them.  Of course I only skate with highly competent skaters that know how to make sure we don't fall.  We haven't.  Just doing the couples skating has made me feel better about backwards altogether.  I know I will do it by myself again one day. It's just too soon right now.

I've been going to Adult Night at Skate World, of course, but what's even better is I've been able to get up to Cerritos almost on a regular basis!  It's so completely awesome.  Fingers crossed that my ride stays solid.  I've started doing downtown with the skaters up there and they are welcoming me with open arms.  I love it.  They do the same roller dancing we do but with different names and slightly different moves.  It's a trip.  I go up there and pick up new steps and then I show my crew when I come back home.

That's about it, and of course skating at the Bay every weekend.  Been doing a lot more teaching there, I like it.  We are always trying to recruit new skaters to learn roller dancing. It's a dying art!  You know you want to learn.  Hit me up.

Me and my buddy, Paul, getting our Halloween roll on