I never learned to roller skate. My Brownie troop once took a field trip to a rink, and I wasn't allowed to sit out. You know: "Oh, Kim, look at everyone else having so much fun! You don't want to miss that, do you?" "It's so easy! I know you can do it. You just have to try a little harder." My etched-into-place memory of the whole thing features how dark it was inside the Roller Drome, and clutching the wall as I snailed my way through one lap. Then I re-sat and was teased therefor. (Although in the mid-to-late-60s, that was considered fun bantering and means of motivation and en-toughening.)
By the by, up the street from the Roller Drome was the park pool where I was once enrolled in swimming lessons. On the first night, all of us children (I still see maybe 6 or 7 to my left --- the only way I looked) were lined up on the pool's side and told to jump in. There may have been helpful pushing for some who didn't take kindly to that instruction. Literal "sink or swim." I can still hear the gruff meanness of the "teacher." I can also flash back to bobbing up and down out of the water a couple of times. I don't remember how I got out of the pool, or anything beyond the bobbing and the terrifying flailing. I never learned to swim. I'm sure I have underlying trauma from that "lesson."
I could never hula hoop. Never could turn a cartwheel. I could twirl a baton a little. (1960s, folks. Southern and female.) I could skateboard. I could throw a football and a kickball. I could kick a kickball really well (not just "for a girl" --- for anybody.)
1 comment:
I never roller skated as a kid but did as a college student onward. I cannot do a cartwheel and I can not hula hoop and I can barely ride a skateboard. I can swim but once had to be rescued at our local pool when I just literally freaked out in the deep end. And no no no on the baton but I did learn that if you could do the baton thing you could get a full ride scholarship to many universities.
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