Jan 182012
 

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I’m not really sure what changed in Chooch, if maybe enough time had passed for him to genuinely want to give roller skating another try, or if he was adopting the old If You Can’t Beat ‘Em, Join ‘Em mentality, but he is a skating fool all of a sudden. After we returned to the rink two weekends ago after a long hiatus and saw that he was refusing to have his hand held, we decided that maybe a few lessons might benefit him.
“What are you going to do when he becomes better than you?” Wendy asked me in a taunting tone at work last week.

“Um, like that would ever happen,” I shot back, but I have to be honest here and say that I blanched a little. This is a possibility that hadn’t occurred to me!

Lessons are only $4.50 and then everyone gets to skate freely until the Saturday night session starts. I’m tempted to take lessons just so I can take advantage of that beautiful, open rink. And maybe learn how to do spins and twirls.

Before the lesson started, all the kids were permitted to stumble around on their own. I was actually surprised that Chooch took to the rink without even a hesitant glance over his shoulder. Kid completely didn’t give a shit that Henry and I weren’t skating with him. I think I was only surprised because I always project a little bit of myself onto him only to be reminded that my kid has way more confidence than I do.

I call this video Why Henry is Not a Skate Instructor:

This video was filmed pre-lesson. By the time the lesson was over, he had improved by leaps and bounds, was scissoring and doing cross-overs (albeit a little shakily, but the instructor said she was proud of him for trying, since it was his first lesson).

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There were some dicks in the group of kids, I’m not going to lie. Henry might yell at me for calling them dicks, but deep down, even he can’t deny that they were totally bastards. This clearly wasn’t their first lesson and their parents clearly knew someone affiliated with the rink, because they were acting like complete elitist motherfuckers and yes, my hate extends to children; I don’t age discriminate. Just being in the single digits doesn’t give you a free ride in my blog of wrath.

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Roller DJ was there! He got settled in his DJ booth and then came over and sat with me for the rest of the lesson and at first I was all, “Yes! Now I can sit here and take clandestine photos of him!” but after about 5 minutes of him lecturing me for not coming out enough and how irritating it is to him when kids request songs that JUST AREN’T SKATEABLE!, his follicular mushroom cloud novelty had dissipated and I had resorted to squirming on the bench in awkward imprisonment.

(I would like to take this moment to thank Henry for completely ditching me as soon as Roller DJ sat down. Fucking dick.)

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Goddamn, do I love that rink, and now Chooch does, too. Finally. I’m going to start schmoozing* the new owner so he’ll leave the rink to me in his Will.

*(I have ways.)

  2 Responses to “Chooch Learns to Skate (But Not Better Than Me)”

  1. Haha! loving your term: “follicular mushroom cloud”!

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