Jan. 19, 2002 - 19:01 MST

THE WONDERING JEW

Skater's Waltz

Another family birthday party today and another trip back to memory of days of joy.

Today it was a roller skating, birthday party at a roller rink. I remembered that I was a good roller skater on sidewalk skates and a fair one on the ice playing boys games. But years ago my wife to be, Heather, introduced me to the graceful and beautiful movements required to skate with a lady. To skate with an accomplished one to boot.

I guess after she decided I might be a keeper, she led me into the land of skate dancing and organ music. Gently though, to the point that I enjoyed every minute of it.

At Mammoth Gardens in Denver they used to have practise sessions during the day, free skating with out the roundabout flow of skaters, these sessions had some people who were figure skaters on ice in the winter keeping in practise when there was no ice out there. I was working a shift then that allowed me to go to those sessions with her. She encouraged me to attend a class in the finer points of roller skating, learning some of the moves and curlicues. I sit here, I try to remember the names of the actions and the only one besides a, "Three Turn," that I can even come close to naming is a Rondo Jamb (?sp) Teacher said literal translation is, "Round the leg." A simple move wherein a person can be skating one direction and by simply bringing the leg around and putting that skate on the floor suddenly be traveling in a direction at 90 degrees to the original heading. I was the dunce of the class, but by the end of it I could follow Heather's lead in a dance.

We spent quite a bit of spare time practising and then once a week going to the regular sessions and getting out on the floor at the skate dancing times.

The organ must have been a large one, the sound sure was big and melodious. The melodies Dixie the orgainst would pick out for the dance sessions were great. A huge floor with a mass of skaters all doing their best to dance or at least stay out of the way of those who could. The dancers had great patience and would sometimes help straighten the kinks in a persons efforts.

The rest of those evening sessions were the usual roundabout on the floor, reversing for the last half. The center of the floor was taken up by the twirlers, spinners and fancy skaters. During the regular session I would ofter find a vantage point and watch all that poetry of motion. Heather had been coming to Mammoth with her brothers and sisters for a long time and introduced me to her friends. I had the great pleasure a few times being an appreciative audience when she would be twirled about by a strong male skater. It was frightening in a way because the part of the whole thing is the hair of the lady sweeping the floor now and then. But it was exhilarating and thrilling to the max. I never was able to reach that level of proficiency but desired to be able to do it.

There was music at the rink today as we watched grandchildren and great grandchildren out on the floor. Some of them skating for the first time, hanging on to the railing as they went. One of our little great grandchildren, no bigger than a minute took to skating like a freight train whistling by a station. I said to Heather, "Is that Connor out there ?" and pointed to this little kid going a mile a minute. Heather said, "No, that's not him, oh gee, it is him."

There was cake and ice cream and loads of presents for the birthday girl. Heather and I sat drinking coffee and soaking up the atmosphere of the rink and remembering our days of fun.

There is to me a certain feeling about a skating rink, no matter where it is. Even the rink at Davenport, Iowa I went to once. I rented a pair of skates, oh, they were nice and new and well adjusted, put them on, laced them up just so and scooted to the floor. I don't think I did a full flip, but whatever it was seemed spectacularly laughable to those watching. The feel that I was in a skating rink was there, the organ music also, but I just couldn't stay on my feet. Disaster after catastrophe, no cuts but plenty of bruises. As I turned my skates in I asked the attendant what they did to their floors there. He said, "Nothing really except sweep the dance wax off the floor after Saturday nights." But the feeling was there, the feel of skates on my feet, the music just right. I might have mastered staying upright if my attendance was frequent there.

The beat of the music, the syncopated sound of wheels on the floor during skate dance times, the feel of making enough breeze to blow off my sweaty brow. Skating with a beloved partner. It is still there, down inside somewhere, and I am too. Skating to organist Dixie's well played Skater's Waltz . . . . . . . . .

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